At the beginning of the second hour of the night on June 22, 1941, a telegram from the People's Commissar of the Navy N. G. Kuznetsov was received at the headquarters of the Black sea fleet. It contained an order to all fleets, except the Pacific fleet, to immediately switch to operational readiness No. 1. The Black sea sailors were among the first to start fighting. My grandfather, Ilya Maksimovich Krivonos, also fought with the German-fascist invaders in the ranks of the hero defenders of the Motherland. As a twenty-year-old boy, he joined the Navy in 1939. He was trained at the joint school of training units of the Black sea fleet. The young man was assigned to serve on the cruiser Molotov. It was there that he learned about the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the most trying test for our country. Thanks to the courage and dedication of the sailors, attempts by the enemy army to disable the main forces of the Black sea fleet were thwarted. The cruiser "Molotov" was involved in the artillery support of the troops, firing at the enemy troops. During the defense of Sevastopol, it delivered 9440 soldiers and commanders, the “Katyush” unit, 560 guns, 45 mortars, 16,800 rifles, 3,680 machine guns and machine guns, 10 cars of aerial bombs, 145 cars of ammunition to the main base, more than 6,000 wounded soldiers, women and children were carried out of the besieged city. The landing forces of the South Ozereyka and Stanitski regions (near Myskhako) became the heroes of the history books of the Black sea fleet in February 1943, along with the defense of "The Malaya Zemlya", the Novorossiysk-Taman operation 1943, Kerch-Eltigen amphibious operation in 1942. The sea was the only way to transport troops and weapons to the area of defense, evacuate the wounded and civilians, as well as industrial equipment, raw materials, and valuable cargo. Throughout the entire defense period, the Black sea fleet reliably provided these sea communications. In 1943, near the village of Golubitskaya, during the landing, Grandfather Ilya was seriously wounded in the chest. After treatment in the hospital, he was assigned to the guard of the Azov flotilla, where he occupied the position of a signalman. The flotilla, which was part of the Black sea fleet, participated in the liberation of the ports of the sea of Azov by supporting the ground forces. The main tasks assigned to the flotilla was artillery support for troops in the defense of the coast, ensuring the passage of troops across the Don and the destruction of enemy crossings, preventing the landing of enemy troops, and ensuring the work of their own sea communications. As a result of active military operations of the Azov flotilla in cooperation with frontline aviation, the Nazis suffered heavy losses in ships and watercraft. From 1944 to 1947, Ilya Maksimovich Krivonos served on an armored boat in the Danube flotilla. Being part of the Black sea fleet, the flotilla fought from the lower reaches of the Danube to Vienna. The awards he received in battles speak for themselves: the order of the Red Star, the order of the Great Patriotic War of I and II degrees, medals: "For the Victory over Germany", "For the Defense of Sevastopol"," For the Defense of the Caucasus", "For the Capture of Budapest and Vienna". My grandfather had to go through a lot: a serious injury, which had lasting effects, the loss of comrades. Grandfather Ilya did not like to talk about the war. But in his eyes, you could always see the terrible memories of wartime. Wordlessly they spoke about the pain, losses, and deprivations of everyday combat. My grandfather, the defender of the Motherland, died, but every year with the arrival of spring, I feel proud of the Motherland, for the Victory, for May of 1945. Ilya Maksimovich Krivonos is one of the people who brought the victory to us without sparing himself.