Title: Red Army soldier. The kind of troops: artillery. Born in a small Latvian town Krustpils, located on the bank of the Daugava River near Riga. In summer 1941, the Nazis invaded Latvia and began to surround Riga. The Soviet military unit, located near Krustpils, had to leave the encirclement through the huge Krustpils forests. The commander of this unit began looking for people who knew them well. Chaim Yakovlevich was a great nature lover, spent a lot of time in the forests and, knowing them up and down, volunteered to be a guide. For a whole week, they made their way through the woods and finally came out to the front line of the Red Army. After that, the commander invited Chaim to join his military unit. So Chaim became a Red Army soldier. Then, the military unit was sent to Gorokhovets camps in Gorokov region for reformation and training, where he learned to be a gunner of long-range artillery, combining this position with a riding post (at that time, the guns were transported from position to position on horses, and horses were in his care). After training, he was sent as part of the Artillery Regiment to the front line near the city of Naro-Fominsk, Moscow region, where there was a very active Nazi offensive in Moscow. Gradually, the Soviet troops began to pull the Nazis away from Moscow, and the batteries of heavy guns, including Chaim's gun, began to move forward along with the front line, providing artillery training and fire cover for the infantry. Chaim's six-man gun crew, led by the gun commander, arrived at the new firing position. At this time it was raining heavily, and the whole crew took refuge in a dugout found at the point, and Chaim, despite the rain, went to take care of the horses (straighten, fence, set the stern). And when he straightened the horses and led them into the forest to shelter them from the rain, a mine flew to their position and got directly into the dugout, and all who were there, died. Haim was the onlt survivor. He was saved by the care he took of the horses. For several days, he was alone with his gun, helping horses to get him out of the mud, he was trying to get to his people and succeeded, but his health was undermined - he went to the hospital and could not fight anymore. He was sent to Gorky to work in the rear of the defense plant. After the war, Chaim was awarded the medal "For Victory in the Great Patriotic War. His brother, Max Yakovlevich Karlin, died in the fall of 1941 in the battle of Naro-Fominsk, defending the approaches to Moscow. His father, mother, sister and three small nephews, as well as many other Jews in the Riga ghetto, were shot by the Nazis in 1941.