Hitler Moves East, 1941-1943 (82 page)

Not till half an hour later, when the artillery-fire abruptly stopped, did Teuber's men leap to their feet and shout all along the trench:
"Ruki verkh
—hands up!" And the Russians dropped their machine pistols and rifles and raised their hands.

Teuber's platoons continued their advance. A little over a mile behind a bee-keeping farm they came across ten steaming Russian field kitchens which had just made tea and a millet porridge. The Russians were somewhat taken

aback when German troopers suddenly lined up with their mess-tins. "Come on, Ivan, dish it out," they called. At first the Soviet cooks were aprehensive, but presently they grinned and piled the gruel into the Germans' mess-tins and filled their water-bottles with fragrant tea.

But breakfast ended on a different note. A Soviet biplane suddenly dipped low and machine-gunned the resting troops. The men of Teuber's Company opened up at the old-fashioned crate with their machine-guns and rifles. They scored several hits on the engine and ripped the wings to shreds. The machine reeled, went into a glide, and touched down barely 200 yards from where the troops had been taking things easy.

No. 1 Platoon charged the aircraft. But the pilot defended himself with his built-in machine-gun. When he had used up his ammunition he and his companion climbed out, both of them wearing leather flying-suits.

"Ruki verkh.'"'the
Germans shouted. But the two Russians did not raise their arms. Instead they drew their pistols.

"Take cover!" the platoon commander shouted. But there was no need for that. The two airmen had no intention of resisting: they merely intended to escape captivity. First the officer accompanying him and then the pilot himself put bullets through their heads. When Teuber's men, still shaking their heads uncomprehendingly, went over to recover their bodies they discovered that the second officer was a girl holding the rank of second lieutenant.

By nightfall on 17th May the regiments of Colonel Puch-ler's 257th Infantry Division had reached the Donets along the entire width of their front. On 18th May they took their most northerly objective—Bogorodichnoye. Just as First Lieutenant Gust, commanding 3rd Battalion, 477th Infantry Regiment, reached the edge of the village with his foremost platoon, a river ferry crowded with' thirty horses was making a last desperate effort to cast off from among the blazing barges. On catching sight of the Germans, however, the ferryman gave up the attempt. Burning boats were drifting down the river like meandering islands of fire.

Farther to the left the 101st Light Division also reached the Donets by the evening of 18th May. In a sweltering damp heat of 30 degrees Centigrade the battalions had to drive through a vast area of woodland, pick their way cautiously past well-camouflaged Soviet forest positions, moving in line abreast, and struggle laboriously through deep minefields. The sappers worked wonders. The Engineers Battalion 213, advancing with 101st Light Infantry Division, rendered harmless 1750 mines of all types on the first day.

For the first time since the previous summer's offensive mine dogs were encountered again—Alsatians and Doberman Pinschers with primed anti-tank mines on their backs. The dog-handlers, crouching in well-camouflaged positions, ordered the animals time and again to the advancing German formations. In a sickening kind of dog-hunt the animals were picked off and killed. But more and more of them came, entire packs of them, attempting, as they had been drilled, to get under the vehicles and gun-limbers. Wherever they succeeded and the projecting trigger-rod of the mine met with resistance the heavy charge exploded, together with the dog, and everything over an area of several yards was blown to pieces.

With the Donets line gained, 257th Infantry Division and 101st Light Division took over the eastern flank cover for the deep thrust by the armoured striking groups, a thrust aimed at the creation of a pocket. The 16th Panzer Division, acting as the spearhead of Lieutenant-General Hübe's striking force, drove through the Russian positions with three combat groups under von Witzleben, Krampen, and Sieck-enius. They dislodged the enemy and repulsed strong counterattacks. Then they drove on, straight through, into the suburbs of Izyum.

By 1230 hours on 18th May tanks and motor-cyclists of the Westphalian 16th Armoured Division were covering the only major east-west road crossing the Donets at Donetskiy. The combat group Sieckenius, the mainstay of which was 2nd Battalion, 2nd Panzer Regiment, left-turned and drove on westward, straight into the pocket.

The main blow of "Operation Fridericus," however, was to be dealt by General of Cavalry von Mackensen with his III Panzer Corps. He attacked with the 14th Panzer Division from Dresden in the centre, and with the Viennese 100th Light Division and the Bavarian 1st fountain Division on the right and left respectively. The Russians were taken by surprise and routed by the swampy Sukhoy-Torets river. Bar-venkovo was taken. A bridge was built. The 14th Panzer Division crossed over and pushed on towards the north. Eddying clouds of dust veiled the tanks. The fine black earth

made the men look like chimney-sweeps.

In co-operation with the Panzer companies of Combat Group Sieckenius the Bereka river was crossed. Soviet armoured thrusts were successfully repulsed. In the afternoon of 22nd May, 14th Panzer Division reached Bayrak on the northern Donets bend.

That was the turning-point. For across the river, on the far bank, were the spearheads of Sixth Army—companies of the Viennese 44th Infantry Division, the "Hoch-und-Deutsch-meister." With this link-up the Izyum bulge was pierced and Timoshenko's Armies, which had driven on far westward, were cut off. The pocket was closed.

Too late did Marshal Timoshenko realize his danger. He had not expected this kind of reply to his offensive. Now he had no other choice but to call off his promising advance to the west, turn his divisions about, and attempt to break out of the pocket in an easterly direction, with reversed fronts. Would the thin German sides of the pocket stand up to such an attempt? The decisive phase of the battle was beginning.

Colonel-General von Kleist was faced with the task of making his encircling front strong enough to resist both the Soviet break-out attempts from the west and their relief attempts mounted across the Donets from the east. Once more it was a race against time. With brilliant tactical skill General von Mackensen grouped all infantry and motorized divisions under his command like a fan around the axis of 14th Panzer Division. The 16th Panzer Division was first wheeled west and then moved north towards Andreyevka on the Donets. The 60th Motorized Infantry Division, the 389th Infantry Division, the 380th Infantry Division, and the 100th Light Division fanned out towards the west and formed the pocket front against Timoshenko's Armies as they flooded back east. At the centre, like a spider in its web, was General Lanz's 1st Mountain Division; it had been detached from the front by von Mackensen to be available as a fire brigade.

This precaution finally decided the battle. For Timo-shenko's Army commanders were driving their divisions against the German pocket front with ferocious determination. They concentrated their efforts in an attempt to punch a hole into the German front, regardless of the cost, in order to save themselves by reaching the Donets front only 25 miles away.

On Whit Monday the encircled Armies succeeded in steamrollering their way through the barrier set up by 6th Motorized Infantry Division and 389th Infantry Division and in driving on to Lozovenka. It was clear that the Russians were trying to reach the main road to Izyum. It was then that Mackensen's precaution proved decisive. The Soviets encountered the 1st Mountain Division, which had taken up a switchline east of Lozovenka. The cover groups of 384th Infantry Division, supported by IV Air Corps, also flung themselves into the path of the Soviets. The action which followed was among the bloodiest of the whole war in Russia.

The following account is based on the report made by Major-General Lanz, then G.O.C. 1st Mountain Division, in his divisional records. By the light of thousands of white flares the Russian columns struck at the German lines. Officers and commisars were spurring on their battalions with shrill shouts of command. Arms linked, the Red Army men charged. The hoarse
"Urra"
rang eerily through the night.

"Fire," commanded the German corporals at the machine-guns and infantry guns. The first waves of attackers collapsed. The earth-brown columns wheeled to the north.

But there, too, they encountered the blocking positions of the Mountain Jägers. They ebbed back, and now, regardless of casualties, came pounding against the German front. They beat down and stabbed whatever opposed them, gained a few more hundred yards, and then sagged and collapsed in the enfilading fire of the German machine-guns. Whoever was not killed staggered, crawled, or stumbled back into the ravines of the Bereka river.

The following evening the same scene was repeated. But that time several T-34s accompanied the charging infantry. The Russian troops, their arms still linked, were under the influence of vodka. How else could the poor fellows find the courage to charge with shouts of
"Urra/"
into certain death?

Wherever a German strongpoint had been overwhelmed by the Soviets the bodies of its defenders were found, after a

counter-attack had been launched, with their skulls cracked open, bayoneted, and trampled into unrecognizability. The fighting was marked by savage fury. It was an appalling highway of death.

On the third day, finally, the momentum of the Russians was broken. The two Commanders-in-Chief of the Soviet Sixth and Fifty-seventh Armies, Lieutenant-General Gorod-nyanskiy and Lieutenant-General Podlas, as well as their staff officers, were lying dead on the battlefield. The great battle was over; Timoshenko was defeated. He had lost the bulk of twenty-two rifle divisions and seven cavalry divisions. Fourteen armoured and motorized brigades were completely routed. Some 239,000 Red Army men were wearily shuffling into captivity; 1250 tanks and 2026 guns had been destroyed or captured. That was the end of the battle south of Kharkov, the battle in which the Soviets had intended to surround the Germans and had been surrounded instead themselves. It was an unusual German victory— conjured up out of a defeat within a matter of days.

However, the victorious German divisions did not suspect that the success won by military skill and valour had merely opened the door for them to a sombre destiny: the men were now marching towards Stalingrad.

As yet the shadow of this city had not fallen upon the troops. Their minds and the High Command communiqués were still full of Kerch and Kharkov. After all, they had scored an astonishing success—two great battles of annihilation within three weeks. Six Soviet Armies had been smashed, 409,000 Soviet troops had been taken prisoner, 3159 guns and 1508 tanks had been destroyed or captured. The German Armies in the East had once more displayed their superiority. The fortunes of war were again following Hitler's colours. The terrible winter and the spectre of defeat had been forgotten.

And while the last few shots were still being exchanged in the pocket south of Kharkov, while small groups and handfuls of half-starved Russians were crawling out of their hide-outs, the machinery of a new battle was already turning —the battle for Sevastopol, the last Soviet strongpoint in the south-western corner of the Crimea, the strongest fortress in the world.

2.
Sevastopol

A grave in the cemetery of Yalta—Between Belbek Valley and Rose Hill-324 shells per second—"Karl" and "Dora," the giant mortars-A fire-belching fortress—The "Maxim Gorky" battery is blown up—"There are twenty-two of us left.

. . . Farewell"—Fighting for Rose Hill-Komsomols and commissars.

"WE'RE ready to cast off, Herr Generaloberst." The Italian naval lieutenant saluted. Manstein touched his cap, nodded with a smile, and turned to his entourage: "All right, then, gentlemen, let's board our cruiser."

The cruiser was an Italian motor torpedo-boat, the only naval unit available to Manstein. Captain Joachim von Wedel, the Harbour Commandant of Yalta, had somehow got hold of it. Manstein wanted, on that 3rd June 1942, to sail along the southern coast of the Crimea to establish for himself whether the coastal road was under observation from the sea. It was along this road that all supplies for
XXX
Corps, which was holding the southern front of Sevastopol under General Fretter-Pico, had to be moved. Any threat to these supplies by Soviet naval units might have upset the programme for the battle of Sevastopol.

In brilliant sunshine the boat streaked along the Black Sea coast. The gardens of Yalta with their tall trees provided a beautiful setting for the white country houses and palaces. The boat held a westerly course until it was off Balaclava. The ancient fort on the bare, rocky hilltop towered into the blue sky with its two massive bastions.

The bay which cut into the shore at the foot of the rock was an iridescent blue. This was where in 1854—55, during the Crimean War, French, British, Turks, and Piedmontese, having landed at Yevpatoriya, fought their unending battle to bend the Tsar Nicholas to their will. The siege and battle of Sevastopol had gone on for nearly a year—347 days to be exact—before the Russians surrendered. The number of casualties, including civilians, had been very high for those days. Estimates vary between 100,000 and 500,000.