Description

City of Military Glory is an honorary title bestowed upon the citizenry of Russian cities, where defenders had displayed courage, steadfastness, and mass heroism in the fight for their Fatherland’s freedom and independence during the Second World War.

For a long time, the Russian government sought a foothold in the Far East; this role was performed by Okhotsk, Ayan, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Nikolaevsk-on-Amur. By the middle of the 19th century, outpost searching deadlocked. Neither of the ports met the necessary requirements - to have a protected harbor next to the trade routes.

In 1859, Nikolai Nikolayevich Muraviev-Amursky, the governor-general of Eastern Siberia, drew special attention to a well-hidden bay while sailing on a ship in the Peter the Great Gulf (the largest gulf of the Sea of Japan). It reminded him Zolotoy Rog (Golden Horn) Bay in Konstantinopol and the governor-general suggested to call it the same way and to found a military post on the shores of the bay.

The post, founded in 1860, was named Vladivostok (“holder of the East”).

During the WWII transport enterprises of Vladivostok provided pilotage and railroad trains with the vital freights for the front and the defensive entities of Siberia and the Urals.