Rudnya, Rudnyansky District, Smolensk Oblast

Rudnya (as the settlement of Rodnya) is first mentioned in 1363 since the lands were occupied by Andrei of Polotsk and included in the Principality of Smolensk. During Polish rule it was part of the Vitebsk Voivodeship. It was located on the route connecting Vitebsk and Smolensk. As part of Tsarist anti-Polish repressions, the local Catholic church was closed in 1866. In 1919, Mogilev Governorate was abolished, and Orshansky Uyezd was included into Gomel Governorate. In 1920, the uyezd was included into Vitebsk Governorate, and shortly the area was transferred to Smolensky Uyezd of Smolensk Governorate. In 1926, Rudnya was granted the town status. Rudnya is known as the maiden battle target of the famous Soviet multiple rocket launchers Katyusha. On July 14, 1941, an experimental artillery battery of seven launchers was first used in battle at Rudnya, under the command of Captain Ivan Flyorov, destroying a concentration of German troops with tanks, armored vehicles, and trucks at the marketplace, causing massive German Army casualties and its retreat from the town in panic. ==Administrative and municipal status==

Within the framework of administrative divisions, Rudnya serves as the administrative center of Rudnyansky District. As an administrative division, it is incorporated within Rudnyansky District as Rudnyanskoye Urban Settlement. ==Economy==

Industry 80% of the industrial production in Rudnyansky District is produced by food industry. There is also production of shoes and of doors and windows. Transportation The railway connecting Smolensk with Vitebsk and further with Daugavpils passes Rudnya. The R120 highway connecting Smolensk with the state border between Russia and Belarus, and continuing across the border to Vitebsk, passes Rudnya as well. The R130 highway connects Rudnya to Demidov. ==Culture and recreation==

Rudnya contains a number of protected cultural heritage monuments, including the monument to the first Katyusha rocket launcher military usage during World War II in Rudnya. July 14, 1941 was the site of the first combat use of Katyushas, when a battery of I. A. Flerov's rocket launchers directly attacked a concentration of Germans on the city's Market Square. After the capture of Vitebsk and the threat of a cauldron being formed, when Soviet troops were surrounded, and Army Commander Konev and the commander of the western direction Eremenko miraculously escaped death or capture along with the headquarters stationed in Rudnya, a critical situation developed. Therefore, the command decided to launch the first rocket salvos on this section of the front. On July 14, 1941, the command instructed Captain G. A. Adilbekov, commander of the combined tank battalion that united all the combat vehicles of the 102nd Tank Regiment of the 51st Tank Division, to provide reliable cover for the organized retreat of the troops and headquarters of three corps and the 19th Army near Rudnya. In a similar situation, on July 11 near Vitebsk, he also covered the retreat of infantry units. Katyusha salvos supported the tank crews in holding back the advancing 39th motorized corps of Goth. In honor of this event, there is a monument in the city - Katyusha on a pedestal. In Rudnya, there is a history museum and a museum-house of Mikhail Yegorov. The latter is a subdivision of Smolensk State Museum Reserve. Yegorov, who was born close to Rudnya, was one of the two Soviet soldiers who raised a flag over the Reichstag on 2 May 1945, after the Battle of Berlin. Rudnya at one point had a Shtetl status, meaning that the village had a large concentration of Jews living in it. Jewish families first arrived after the Pale of Settlement was established in the western Russian Empire in 1791, granting Jews the legality to live in this settlement area. In 1926, there were 2235 Jews in Rudnya, nearly half of the village's population at the time. Many Jews in Rudnya moved to larger cities such as Leningrad and Smolensk in the early 1900s due to the newly established Communist driven industrial boom in larger cities. Of the nearly 2000 Jews who remained in the village during WWII, most were killed by the Nazis during the Holocaust after a ghetto was established in Rudnya. Local Jews were shot to death in several murder operations between 1941 and 1943. ==Geography==

Climate Rudnya has a warm-summer humid continental climate (Dfb in the Köppen climate classification). {{Weather box ==References==