Ermakov, Peter Zakharovich

Born in the village of Verkh-Isetsky Zavod in the family of a working local plant.

He graduated from the five classes of parish school, from 1900 he worked at the village plant in the mechanical shop - first as a mechanic's apprentice, and then as a mechanic to repair cars (until December 1905).

From 1905, Peter Yermakov began to attend an illegal circle organized at VIZA, in which classes are held under the direct supervision of K. T. Novgorodtseva. In January 1906 he joined the RSDLP , at the same time becoming the head of the fighting squad of the Upper Iset Plant. In August 1907, he dealt with his party comrade Nikolai Yerin, nicknamed “Summer”, who was convicted of collaborating with the gendarmes. He is arrested on suspicion of murder, but in May 1908, due to lack of evidence, he is released.

Soon Yermakov became a member of the underground Yekaterinburg Committee of the RSDLP, which translates it into an illegal situation. Yermakov is assigned the role of one of the leaders of the militants, whose main task was expropriation. The most striking event for Yermakov was the expropriation of the plant fund in favor of the Ural Committee of the RSDLP, during which 6 people were killed and 12,400 rubles were seized.

During the failure of the Ural Party Conference as a result of the arrest of its delegates in late March 1909, Yermakov was again arrested and, after a year’s imprisonment, was transferred into exile, which is serving in the town of Velsk, Vologda Province .

At the end of 1912, at the end of the term, the exile returned to Ekaterinburg. However, he does not have the opportunity to re-enter VIZ - he is enrolled in the “black lists”. Soon he found himself a job as an agent for the sale by installments of sewing machines of the company " Singer ", which gives him the opportunity to visit many apartments, among which were safe houses. But in addition to this work, Yermakov carried financial assistance to the families of political prisoners ^[1] .

After some time, Ermakov leaves the work of the agent and opens his own photo shop in Opalikha (left-bank residential area of VIZ ). However, pretty soon the institution Yermakov attracted the attention of the local police, which forced him to close the salon and go to Kungur . In Kungur, he worked for some time in a private photo studio of D. Dolgushev, and then as a mechanic at a steam mill ^[1] .

Returning in the summer of 1917 to Yekaterinburg and posing as a political prisoner, Yermakov took an active part in the formation of the Red Guard units in the 4th district of Yekaterinburg and became the commander of the detachment in his home village. At the same time, in the spring of 1917, he became a member of the District and City Committees of the RSDLP (B), and also headed the VIZ Land Committee (until November 1917) in his district.

Member of the Civil War . On December 25, 1917, Yermakov at the head of the Combined Detachment of the Red Guard of the city of Yekaterinburg was sent to the Dutov Front, where he participated in combat operations from Buzuluk to Orenburg .

In February 1918, Yermakov together with the detachment, already referred to as the 1st Consolidated Revolutionary Detachment, was recalled to Ekaterinburg and thrown into a new section of work, the essence of which is to conduct punitive expeditions of local significance.

In the spring of the same year, Yermakov, at the head of his squad, is again sent to the “Dutov Front”, where he takes command of the 3rd Ural squad, made up of volunteer workers from the 4th District of the Red Army Reserve. During his entourage near the city of Troitsk near the Black River, on March 29, he was shot in the stomach by the end of April 1918 and was treated in the hospital of the city of Troitsk, after which he was transferred to one of Ekaterinburg hospitals.

In May 1918, he was appointed military commissar of the 4th district of the Red Army Reserve of Yekaterinburg. In this position, Yermakov had in his direct submission a special detachment of Red Guards numbering 19 people. After being discharged from the hospital in early June 1918, Yermakov assumed command of the detachment participating in the suppression of the Upper Iset Uprising, after which he was sent to Nevyansk with a similar task.

July 16, 1918 was elected by the members of the Presidium of the Executive Committee of the Ural Regional Council as a representative of the Red Army and a man who knows the surroundings of Yekaterinburg as responsible for the export and secret burial of representatives of the royal family. July 17, 1918 became a direct participant in the execution of Nicholas II and his family .

Security guard A. Strekotin recalled the execution of Nicholas II and his family ^[2] :

Tov. Yermakov, seeing that I was holding a rifle with a bayonet in my hands, suggested that I kill the survivors. I refused, then he took a rifle from my hands and began to pin them up. It was the worst moment of their death. They did not die for a long time, shouted, groaned, distorted. Especially hard to die that person - the lady. Yermakov has torn her entire bosom. He did so with blows with a bayonet, that every time he stuck the bayonet deep into the floor.

In his memoirs, Yermakov says that in 1906 there was an underground school of militants in Yekaterinburg ^[3] . Studied weapons, methods of street fighting, conducted practical exercises (shooting). Shooting took place in the forest, near the village Koptyaki . Perhaps that is why after 12 years this area was chosen for the burial of the family of the former emperor.

According to his own memoirs, he took an active part in the destruction of the bodies executed on the Old Koptyakovskaya road ^[4] .

At the end of July 1918, retreating from Yekaterinburg together with units of the Red Army in the direction of Perm, in August 1918, together with his detachment, defended the main line of the railway near Kungur. At the end of 1918, a detachment of Yermakov, which by that time received the name of the Malyshev Regiment, entered the 30th Brigade of the 3rd Army.

In 1919, after the discovery of injuries sent to the hospital. After treatment, he was enlisted as commissar of the guard battalion of the 3rd Army. In March 1920, sent by the Revolutionary Military Council to the Western Front.

In April 1920, he was enlisted by the military brigade of the 23rd brigade of the 8th division. He participated in the battles on the Berezina. After being wounded, he was enlisted as commissar of the reserve regiment of the 16th Army, where he stayed until July 1921, and then he was appointed military commander of the 48th brigade of the 16th Army. In connection with the discovery of the wound, he was sent for treatment in the city of Mogilev, and after discharge he was sent to the Urals, where in 1921-1922 he organized the work of cavalry courses as a commissioner. Demobilized from the ranks of the Red Army for the disease in 1923 ^[5] .

In April 1923, the goal was appointed head of the provincial government of Omsk , where he headed the elimination of criminal gangster groups. Since April 1924 he has been working in Yekaterinburg as Deputy Head of the Mining and Industrial Police of the provincial branch. From December 1924 to May 1925 - Head of the Administrative Department of the Chelyabinsk District Administration. Since May 1925, occupies a similar position in Zlatoust . From May 1926 to September 1927 - at a similar job in the city of Usolye, Verkhne-Kamsky District.

In the autumn of 1927 he was seconded to the NKVD of Sverdlovsk, was appointed inspector of places of detention of the Ural region (in Kazakhstan) and deputy head of corrective labor institutions, was also the head of the administrative-combat sector.

Since December 1934, retired. During the Great Patriotic War, he served as chairman of the military section of the Molotov District Council of Sverdlovsk OSOAVIAHIM , which allowed him to carry out an inspection of military training and instruction in all organizations of the Molotov district . At the same time he was the commander of the national militia of the Upper Iset plant.

He died on May 22, 1952 from cancer in Sverdlovsk ^[6] . He was buried at the Ivanovo cemetery . The tombstone at the burial site is often subjected to vandalism (it is poured with red paint as a symbol of the shed blood of the royal family).

In Soviet times, one of the streets of Sverdlovsk bore the name Ermakova. After 1991, the street returned the historical name - Klyuchevskaya .

• Memoirs: The shooting of Nikolai Romanov and his family // The Last Days of the Romanovs: Documents, investigation materials, diaries, versions. - Sverdlovsk, 1991.
• Borovikov D.V. Ermakov Petr Zakharovich // Bolsheviks-Leninists in the Urals. - Sverdlovsk, 1989.
• Platonov O. Murder of the royal family. - M., 1991.
• Plotnikov I.F. Who shot the Romanovs? // Latest News (Ekaterinburg). - 1997. - 11-21 Dec.

• http://www.book-chel.ru/ind.php?what=card&id=5691
• Zhuk Yu. A. Chapter 2. October Relic // Mauser Yermakova: Tsarevich Peter Yermakov: Between a Word and Oblivion . - M.-Berlin: Direct Media, 2014. - p. 22. - 525 p. - ISBN 978-5-4475-4043-2 .