Lyudmila Mikhailovna Pavlichenko (12 July [O.S. 29 June] 1916 – 10 October 1974) was a Soviet sniper in the Red Army during World War II. She had 309 confirmed kills, including 36 axis snipers, on the Eastern Front. This is the most for any female sniper in history and places her 13th by kill rate of all snipers.
Pavlichenko fought in the Siege of Odessa and the Siege of Sevestapol. Her second husband, sniper Alexei Kitsenko, was killed by a mortar round when she was 25. She was promoted to lieutenant and also trained other snipers. In 1942 she was hit in the face with shrapnel from a mortar and evacuated.
She was then sent to the United States as a guest of Franklin D Roosevelt and invited to tour the nation with Eleanor Roosevelt to promote the war effort. Upon her return to the Soviet Union she worked as a sniper instructor for the duration of World War II.
After the war she finished her degree and became a historian and research assistant for the Soviet Navy. She was active in the Soviet Committee of the Veterans of War.
She was one of 500 female Soviet snipers, out of 2,000, who survived the war. Pavlichenko died from a stroke on 10 October 1974 at 58 and was buried in Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow. Her son by her first husband, Rostislav, is buried next to her
Christa Gail Pike (born March 10, 1976) is a convicted murderer who is incarcerated on death row in Tennessee. She is scheduled to be executed today, 30 September 2026.
The fascist man gods made sure Pike’s youth was filled with abuse. She was raped by a neighbor at the age of 11. Social Services removed her from her mother’s custody when she was 14 because she had been raped by her live in boyfriend.
Soon after she was arrested for a break in and was put into juvenile detention. While in detention she earned her GED and became a teacher’s assistant.
She enrolled in Job Corps in Tennessee where she and her boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, killed another member, Colleen Slemmer. Christa suspected her of trying to steal Shipp from her. They lured her into the woods and beat, cut and stabbed her. Shipp carved a pentagram into her chest and Pike killed her with a piece of concrete.
Shipp was given life with the possibility of parole. Pike was given the death sentence. She has been in prison since 1995; all of her adult life. Pike has requested to be executed by a firing squad of all female officers.
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