The military rank is Major General. Alexander Kirsanov was born on December 23, 1898 in Kazan. He graduated the Real school and the Teacher's Seminary. He finished also the Training team and joint to the Kolchak artillery as a Firecracker. During one of the battles, he was captured by the Red Army. After an appropriate checking, he was enlisted in the 29th Omsk Red Army Rifle Division of Blucher and sent to the Belopolsky front. He fought again in the artillery, earned trust, and joined the the Bolsheviks’ Party. At the end of the civil war, he remained in the same division for some time, and then entered the school of the Command Staff of the red army named after S. S. Kamenev. In 1926, he graduated with honors from the Kiev Artillery Military school. In the 1930s, he served in the Transcaucasian military district. In 1939, he graduated from the Command Staff improvement courses. He went to the front in September 1941 as the Regimental Commander of the 157th Rifle Division (renamed the 76th Guards by order of the NKO of the USSR on March 1, 1943). He had fought on the Southern, Stalingrad, Central and Belorussian fronts. He had participated in the battles near Odessa, in the Crimea, at Stalingrad, on the Kursk bulge. In 1943, Colonel A.V. Kirsanov was awarded the military rank of Major General by the decree of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR. Alexander Kirsanov especially distinguished himself when crossing the Dnieper river in the Braginsky district of the Polessky (now Gomel) region of the Byelorussian SSR. On the night of September 28, 1943, soldiers of the Guards division under the command of General Kirsanov crossed the Dniepe River, captured a bridgehead and successfully repelled numerous counterattacks by superior enemy forces. Subsequently, by decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on January 15, 1944, Major General Alexander Kirsanov was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union with the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star Medal for his skilful and successful command of the Rifle division, exemplary performance of combat tasks of the command on the front of the fight against the German-fascist invaders and on June 24, 1945, Major General Kirsanov participated in the historic Victory Parade on Red Square in Moscow. After the end of the war, he continued to serve in the army in command positions. In 1949, he graduated from the Military Academy of the General staff. After his retirement, he worked as a Vice-rector of the Belarusian state University from the early 1960s until 1974. He died on November 16, 1994. He was buried in Minsk at the Eastern ("Moscow") cemetery.