The left flank of Rodimtsev's division rested on the Volga, where the high-rise buildings of the State Bank and the House of Specialists stood on a high cliff. Yakov Pavlov left the Army in 1946 as a lieutenant and joined the Communist Party. If Stalingrad is one of the most significant symbols of the Great Patriotic War, then Pavlov's House is the cornerstone of thatsymbol. A ceremonial Sword of Stalingrad was forged by King George VI. In this area, the position of the Wehrmacht's 295th Infantry Division came close to a steep cliff, under which only a narrow strip of the shore linked Rodimtsev's division to the rest of the 62nd Army. When a position was lost, an immediate attempt was usually made to re-take it with fresh forces. The starving encircled forces at Stalingrad made no attempt to break out or link up with Manstein's advance. Between 23 and 26 August, Soviet reports indicate 955 people were killed and another 1,181 wounded as a result of the bombing. The headquarters of the Rodimtsev division was very fortunate that one of the copies of the map from which the blueprint was made was available to them - staff officers of many of the units of the 62nd Army drew the schematics literally "on their knees". Fighting was so fierce and intense during one day that the railway station changed hands 14 times in six hours. A year of German gains during Case Blue had been wiped out. The military political instructor wanted to wring capital writers necks, but they not only reassured him, but also persuaded him to publish his article in the central newspaper. Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group. [116] From 21 August to 20 November, the German 6th Army lost 60,548 men, including 12,782 killed, 45,545 wounded and 2,221 missing. What happened next is known only from the words of Yakov Pavlov himself. With the Soviets forced into a 1-kilometre (1,000-yard) strip of land on the western bank of the Volga, over 1,208 Stuka missions were flown in an effort to eliminate them. The letter was signed by Colonel-General of Artillery Voronov and the commander-in-chief of the Don Front, Lieutenant-General Rokossovsky. In mid-October, after receiving reinforcements from the Caucasus theatre, the Luftwaffe intensified its efforts against the remaining Red Army positions holding the west bank. However, the combination of constant air support operations on the German side and the Soviet surrender of the daytime skies began to affect the strategic balance in the air. During the preparations for the attack, Marshal Zhukov personally visited the front and noticing the poor organisation, insisted on a one-week delay in the start date of the planned attack. The State Bank could not be captured, many old fighters, well-respected scouts, were killed. At this point, the Don and Volga Rivers are only 65km (40mi) apart, and the Germans left their main supply depots west of the Don, which had important implications later in the course of the battle. The Divisional Ensemble of the 13th Guards Rifle Division. For two months, subdivisions of the 34th and 42nd Guards Rifle Regiments tried to knock out the Germans from these fortified points. Lacking beds, the soldiers tried to sleep on insulation wool torn off pipes but were subjected to harassing fire every night in order to try to break their resistance. Yet despite the German onslaught, the soldiers of the Soviet 62nd Army doggedly maintained a 'toe hold' on the western bank of the Volga. [197] At the time, the global significance of the battle was not in doubt. On the eve of that day the 295th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht received replenishment and the task to finally get to the Volga on its site. [115], After three months of slow advance, the Germans finally reached the river banks, capturing 90% of the ruined city and splitting the remaining Soviet forces into two narrow pockets. [25]:498, Hitler decided that Germany's summer campaign in 1942 would be directed at the southern parts of the Soviet Union. The civilians were often sent into battle without rifles. With the restoration of the house, the Cherkassov movement began. One more push in the factory area would see the end of . The German soldiers who had hidden themselves in huts and trenches offered armed resistance after combat actions had already ended. For better internal communication, Pavlov's soldiers breached the walls in the basement and upper floors, and dug a communications trench to Soviet positions outside. Suffering losses, the group retreated again. Not all of the 6th Army was trapped: 50,000 soldiers were brushed aside outside the pocket. A handful of senior officers were taken to Moscow and used for propaganda purposes, and some of them joined the National Committee for a Free Germany. On the left is the 1st Battalion of the 42nd Guards Rifle Regiment of Lieutenant F.G. Fedoseyeva surrounded in the department exchange, The diagram of the frontline of the 13th Guards Rifle Division on September 25, 1942, transferred to the aerial photo. "[139] The Luftwaffe was able to deliver an average of 85 tonnes of supplies per day out of an air transport capacity of 106 tonnes per day. Germany's defeat shattered its reputation for invincibility and dealt a devastating blow to German morale. Anyway, it was Zhukov, having designated a new landmark for the artillerymen as "Pavlov's House", who laid the first stone in the foundation of the legend. Sgt. Newspapers visited positions, talked with commanders and political workers, among them Leonid Koren, agitator of 42nd Guards Rifle Regiment. The Germans lost 900 aircraft (including 274 transports and 165 bombers used as transports), 500 tanks and 6,000 artillery pieces. Nevertheless, the German forces were determined to continue their advance and heavy fighting continued for another two months. Paulus himself also doubted the feasibility of such a breakout. [5], Coordinates: .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}484256N 443158E / 48.7155N 44.5329E / 48.7155; 44.5329, introducing citations to additional sources, "The Gerhardt Mill: Ruins that Remember the Battle", ": 1911 .pdf", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gerhardt%27s_Mill&oldid=1125778857, This page was last edited on 5 December 2022, at 20:14. Opposite the complex, separated by the wide Republican Street and scorched wooden blocks, two German strongholds stood out: a four-story school No. Rodimtsev's last reserve was 30 fighters of the defensive battalion under the command of Lt. A.T. Stroganoff. The additional distance became another obstacle to the resupply efforts. The aim was to win as much time as possible to withdraw forces from the Caucasus (Army Group A) and to rush troops from other Fronts to form a new front that would be able in some measure to check our counter-offensive. Daily sorties decreased from 1,343 per day to 975 per day. [102] Exceptionally intense shelling and bombing paved the way for the first German assault groups. [200] Britain's conservative The Daily Telegraph proclaimed that the victory had saved European civilisation. And we all it's true felt better. at Stalingrad Catherine Merridale notes that, seemingly paradoxically, "their response was frequently relief. Hitler told Goebbels that the plight of the 6th Army was a "heroic drama of German history". The situation of the Romanian tanks is known, however. They could only be aimed at point-blank range through the bore of their gun barrels.[66]. [Note 3]. The battle started with the South Western Front. The Soviets were forced to withdraw at midday after only a few hours. This is how it looked after the war: The ruins of mill is now a part of Pavlov's house memorial, the modern look of ruins: The Soviet front's composition and names changed several times in the battle. By 27 Sept. the Germans occupied the southern portion of the city, but the Soviets held the centre and northern part. The book begins well, with Barbarossa, and follows German advances into Stalingrad, but then the details scatter. Later, the reports from the field found interesting insignia on the Germans killed on the shore, - in the night attack, paratroopers, veterans of the landing on Crete took part. The most famous Soviet sniper in Stalingrad was Vasily Zaytsev,[87] with 225 confirmed kills during the battle. Below to the right is the destroyed building of a butter-milling plant. The strike was planned at the most vulnerable point of Rodimtsevs divisions defense - the Dolgiy and Krutoy ravine area, where the joint was with the 284th Rifle Division. The 369th (Croatian) Reinforced Infantry Regiment was the only non-German unit[57] selected by the Wehrmacht to enter Stalingrad city during assault operations. Yes, we felt better. [108] Determined to crush Soviet resistance, Luftflotte 4's Stukawaffe flew 900 individual sorties against Soviet positions at the Stalingrad Tractor Factory on 5 October. The next day he made a six-page situation report to the general staff. The Germans approached the positions of the company closely - only the railroad tracks crowded by wagons divided them from their opponents. The loss of the two airfields, at Pitomnik on 16 January 1943 and Gumrak on the night of 21/22 January,[154] meant an end to air supplies and to the evacuation of the wounded. Za istinske ljubitelje ratnih tematika ovaj film je ZA OBAVEZNO POGLEDATI! The traffic jam is thought to have delayed the advance by at least one week. In spite of the failure of the German offensive to reach the 6th Army, the air supply operation continued under ever more difficult circumstances. (60 days)[8], "One of the most famous episodes of the Stalingrad battle was the defence of 'Pavlov's house', which lasted for fifty-eight days. [114], The Royal Romanian Air Force was also involved in the Axis air operations at Stalingrad. On the night of September 29 scouts of the 39th Guards Sapper Regiment managed to stealthily get close to the building and shoved through the windows incendiary bottles. The battle degenerated into house-to-house fighting as both sides poured reinforcements into the city. [citation needed], A significant historical debate concerns the degree of terror in the Red Army. The October Revolution holiday came on November 7th. The Gerhardt Mill ruins in Volgograd, Russia. From the OP actions of the small group were observed by battalion commander Zhukov, who earlier received orders from the regiment to seize the house in the square.Their group supported the whole regiment with machine-gun and mortar fire, then their neighbors on the right and left joined. Accordingly, Paulus did not respond. It consisted of two Romanian cavalry divisions and the 23rd Panzer Division, which mustered no more than thirty serviceable tanks. It was only of importance as a convenient place, in the bottleneck between Don and the Volga, where we could block an attack on our flank by Russian forces coming from the east. [82][83] Even the sewers were the sites of firefights. The Germans had no usable tanks in the city, and those that still functioned could, at best, be used as makeshift pillboxes. The third assault followed on 1 November. ", "Why was the Battle of Stalingrad So Significant? That would mean 350 Ju 52 flights a day into Pitomnik. School number 6 by September 17 was already burned out during the fighting. Soon, the long-awaited reinforcements arrived. Hiwi often proved to be reliable Axis personnel in rear areas and were used for supporting roles, but also served in some front-line units as their numbers had increased.[126]. Pictures are taken from the ruins of a four-story building, which stood to the east of the mill - there is now a panorama museum at this location. In autumn, the Soviet generals Georgy Zhukov and Aleksandr Vasilevsky, responsible for strategic planning in the Stalingrad area, concentrated forces in the steppes to the north and south of the city. A colossal monument called The Motherland Calls was erected in 1967 on Mamayev Kurgan, the hill overlooking the city where bones and rusty metal splinters can still be found. So the division began an epic with the two buildings, the names of which from that moment began to appear more often than others in its combat reports and summaries - the "Railwaymens House" and the "L-shaped house.". "[] the defenders of Pavlov's House who participated in it's [sic] defense from 26 September 1942 till 25 November 1942." [195] The Turkish Consul in Moscow predicted that "the lands which the Germans have destined for their living space will become their dying space". Beginning in late August, continuing in September and into October, the Soviets committed between two and four armies in hastily coordinated and poorly controlled attacks against the Germans' northern flank. [160], On 30 January 1943, the 10th anniversary of Hitler's coming to power, Goebbels read out a proclamation that included the sentence: "The heroic struggle of our soldiers on the Volga should be a warning for everybody to do the utmost for the struggle for Germany's freedom and the future of our people, and thus in a wider sense for the maintenance of our entire continent. Stalin rushed all available troops to the east bank of the Volga, some from as far away as Siberia. Intensifying the heat of madness, in the darkness suddenly there was heard a jazz melody, and then from the far bank of the Volga in broken German there were calls for surrender. [Note 4], As historian Chris Bellamy notes, the Germans paid a high strategic price for the aircraft sent into Stalingrad: the Luftwaffe was forced to divert much of its air strength away from the oil-rich Caucasus, which had been Hitler's original grand-strategic objective. The Unknown Stalingrad: Anatomy of the Legend of Pavlov's House, Scan this QR code to download the app now. The Soviet forces were allowed to retain bridgeheads on the right bank from which offensive operations could be quickly launched. Paulus chose the grain elevator and silos as the symbol of Stalingrad for a patch he was having designed to commemorate the battle after a German victory. The fate of the division was hanging by a thread. [57] After 23 January, there were no more reported landings, just intermittent air drops of ammunition and food until the end. The 6th Army slowly starved. Batyuk, its neighbor on the right, and the rest of the 62nd Army. The siege lasted from 27 September to 25 November 1942 and eventually the Red Army managed to relieve it from the siege. The 16th Panzer was shocked to find that, due to Soviet manpower shortages, it had been fighting female soldiers. Sergeant Voronov I.V. "Stalingrad anniversary: 70 years on, Russian city still gives up its WWII dead", "Russia marks 70th anniversary of Stalingrad battle", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqFo-TswRss, Enemy at the Gates: The Battle for Stalingrad, "Stalinqrad dy: tarixin n qanl sava v II dnya mharibsind sasl dnn balanc", Stalingrad battle Newsreels // Net-Film Newsreels and Documentary Films Archive, Story of the Stalingrad battle with pictures, maps, video and other primary and secondary sources, Volgograd State Panoramic Museum official homepage, The Battle of Stalingrad in Film and History, Stalingrad-info.com, Russian archival docs translated into English, original battle maps, aerial photos, pictures taken at the battlefields, relics collection, H-Museum: Stalingrad/Volgograd 19432003. Judging by the direction of the trench, the mortar shelling hits the military exchange. During their second and third assaults on the city, the Germans captured the workers' settlements "Red October" and "Barricades", the settlement of Rynok, Sculpture Park, the Mountain Settlement and the Stalingrad Tractor Plant. Hitler reiterated that the Sixth Army would stay at Stalingrad and that the air bridge would supply it until the encirclement was broken by a new German offensive. The Battle of Stalingrad was a major battle on the Eastern Front of World War II in which Nazi Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad (present Volgograd) in Southern Russia, on the eastern boundary of Europe. He told Hitler that he was no longer able to command his men, who were without ammunition or food. [70] Deserters and perceived malingerers were captured or executed after fighting. [2], The importance of the building has been contested. [192][193][194] The Red Army had the initiative, and the Wehrmacht was in retreat. The location and circumstances of the photograph have not yet been determined. Among the snipers of the 13th Guards Rifle Division was the commander of the department of the 39th Mountain Rifle Troop, Sergeant A.L. [98] Three air regiments at Stalingrad were entirely female. The next two days in the division's sector were relatively calm - only to the south was frequent fire heard. "[91] Infantryman Lev Lvovich's explanation, for example, is typical for these interviews; as he recalls, "[i]t was a necessary and important step. The 62nd Army had been cut in two and, due to intensive air attack on its supply ferries, was receiving much less material support. Romanian military actions in World War II. The attached the 685th Rifle Regiment advanced towards the January 9 square and school No. According to the memoirs of Wilhelm Adam , Colonel Roske told him that German assault groups captured the lower floor of the building, but could not capture it entirely. Yeryomenko and Commissar Nikita Khrushchev were tasked with planning the defence of Stalingrad. Keystone/Getty Images. Dom Pavlova) was a fortified apartment building which Red Army defenders held for 60 days against the Wehrmacht offensive during the Battle of Stalingrad. Not far from the steep cliff there were two huge buildings, captured by the Germans - the so-called "Railwaymen's House" and "L-shaped house". He studied 11,237 letters sent by soldiers inside of Stalingrad between 20 December 1942 and 16 January 1943 to their families in Germany. There was an overwhelming surge in confidence and belief in victory. Guardsmen of the 3rd battalion of the 42nd Guards Rifle Regiment from under junior lieutenant N.E. By mid-November, the Germans, at great cost, had pushed the Soviet defenders back into narrow zones along the west bank of the river. The story told by the political instructor about the capture at the end of September of a four-story building on the January 9 Square was a real find for the GlavPU RKKA. David Glantz indicated[52] that four hard-fought battles collectively known as the Kotluban Operations north of Stalingrad, where the Soviets made their greatest stand, decided Germany's fate before the Nazis ever set foot in the city itself, and were a turning point in the war. Hundreds of cubic meters of very high-quality brickwork and reinforced concrete were blown out of the building. "As quick as lightning, the Panzergrenadiers jumped from their wagons. Initially, supply flights came in from the field at Tatsinskaya,[142] called 'Tazi' by the German pilots. The speech contained an oblique reference to the battle, which suggested that Germany was now in a defensive war. It was the inability to provide for oneself in the conditions of a bridgehead cut off from the city that destroyed the 92nd OSBR in September. The battle began with the heavy bombing of the city by Generaloberst Wolfram von Richthofen's Luftflotte 4. Hailed as the single largest confrontation of the war, the battle involved nearly 2.2 million military personnel, with around 1.8-2 million were killed, wounded, or captured. The sick and wounded reached 40,000 to 50,000. Several Soviet regiments were wiped out; the entire staff of the Soviet 339th Infantry Regiment was killed the following morning during an air raid.[109]. [101], After 27 September, much of the fighting in the city shifted north to the industrial district. Most of the armed groups were liquidated by March During this period of armed conflict with the Germans, the brigade's units killed 2,418 soldiers and officers and captured 8,646 soldiers and officers, escorting them to POW camps and handing them over. The last of the Red Army defenders of the Pavlov House during the Battle of Stalingrad died an ATR shooter Kamolzhon Turgunov from the village of Bardankul, Turakurgan district of the Namangan region of the Republic of Uzbekistan (he died on March 16, 2015 at the 93rd year of his life in his homeland) and a shooter Duisenov Kalambay from the village of Merke, Zhambul region of the Republic of Kazakhstan (died on May 4, 2006). The Germans made slow but steady progress through the city. [citation needed] Fighting on and around Mamayev Kurgan, a prominent hill above the city, was particularly merciless; indeed, the position changed hands many times.[85][86]. 2 Nomonhan: Japanese-Soviet Tactical Combat, 1939; MAPS, Meine Stalingradeinstze (My Stalingrad Sorties), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQ4Jz0H4fAA, "Heeresarzt 10-Day Casualty Reports per Army/Army Group, 1943", "80 years ago, the Soviets began defending Stalingrad against Germany". Most notably, he promoted Paulus to the rank of Generalfeldmarschall. During the defence of Stalingrad, the Red Army deployed five armies in and around the city (28th, 51st, 57th, 62nd and 64th Armies); and an additional nine armies in the encirclement counteroffensive[51] (24th, 65th, 66th Armies and 16th Air Army from the north as part of the Don Front offensive, and 1st Guards Army, 5th Tank, 21st Army, 2nd Air Army and 17th Air Army from the south as part of the Southwestern Front). [199] Soviet propaganda spared no effort and wasted no time in capitalising on the triumph, impressing a global audience. The mill operated until a devastating fire in August 1907 destroyed the complex. The authors are architect V. E. Maslyaev and sculptor V. G. Fetisov . On the left flank were the lines of the 39th Guards Rifle Regiment of Major S.S. Dolgov, in the center - the 42nd Guards Rifle Regiment of Col. IP. General Zeitzler, moved by their plight, began to limit himself to their slim rations at meal times. Manstein's plan to rescue the Sixth Army Operation Winter Storm was developed in full consultation with Fhrer headquarters. The 4th Panzer Army, ordered south on 13 July to block the Soviet retreat "weakened by the 17th Army and the 1st Panzer Army", had turned northwards to help take the city from the south.[47]. After being put on public display in Britain, this was presented to Stalin by Winston Churchill at the Tehran Conference later in 1943. Aleksandrov, V.S.Glushchenko, N.Ya. The man was probably already dying. Much of the city was smashed to rubble, although some factories continued production while workers joined in the fighting. For two days the 13th Guards Rifle Division was putting itself in order - the soldiers remembered and buried their dead comrades. Stalingrad battle On September 27, 1942, as a result of bombing by German aircraft, the architect of the house, Sergei Voloshinov, and his pregnant wife were killed . Soviet operations were constantly hampered by the Luftwaffe. On the right flank, where the positions of the 34th Guards Rifle Regiment were located, the situation was even worse. 8,314 German aircraft were produced from JulyDecember 1942, but this could not keep pace with a three-front aerial war of attrition. The operative report of the Don Front's staff issued on 5 February 1943, 22:00 said, The 64th Army was putting itself in order, being in previously occupied regions. On 19 November, the Red Army launched Operation Uranus, a two-pronged attack targeting the Romanian armies protecting the 6th Army's flanks. [33] Hitler proclaimed that after Stalingrad's capture, its male citizens were to be killed and all women and children were to be deported because its population was "thoroughly communistic" and "especially dangerous". If I do not get the oil of Maikop and Grozny then I must finish [liquidieren; "kill off", "liquidate"] this war. Soviet offensives in the central and northern portions of the Eastern Front tied down Luftwaffe reserves and newly built aircraft, reducing Luftflotte 4's percentage of Eastern Front aircraft from 60 percent on 28 June to 38 percent by 20 September. [34] Hitler planned for the fall of the city firmly securing the northern and western flanks of the German armies as they advanced on Baku, with the aim of gaining its strategic petroleum resources for Germany. Fierce fighting for the mill lasted for several months: it was bombed, and blown up numerous times, but the German Army failed to take it, or pass around it. The picture was taken in a trench coming out of the unfinished southern wing of the Railwaymen's House - behind the fighter there is Pavlovs House. [202] The statue forms part of a war memorial complex which includes the ruins of the Grain Silo and Pavlov's House. On 18 September, the Soviet 1st Guards and 24th Army launched an offensive against VIII Army Corps at Kotluban. " . The northern cauldron consisted of the XIth Corps, the central with the VIIIth and LIst Corps, and the southern with the XIVth Panzer Corps and IVth Corps "without units". The front line of the defense is under constant artillery fire. A new building was built on the same site by May 1908. On August 23, Paulus's mobile formations were spread out on their approach to Stalingrad. Chekhov. [37], Hitler intervened, however, ordering the Army Group to split in two. The film is the second German movie to portray the Battle of Stalingrad. Of its three regiments, one was completely smashed and the other only had three battalions remaining. In this first photo from the "killed" series, the fighter in the lower right corner is still "alive". [97] At least three women won the title Hero of the Soviet Union while driving tanks at Stalingrad.[99]. 6 and a five-story building of a military exchange. Description. The house, held by the garrison of Senior Lieutenant IF Afanasyev, is considered the first restored building in Stalingrad. The risk of being killed at any time was still great - judging by the testimony of physicians of the 13th Guards Rifle Division, most of the soldiers were killed by shrapnel wounds. Winter weather conditions, technical failures, heavy Soviet anti-aircraft fire and fighter interceptions eventually led to the loss of 488 German aircraft. Winter Storm, as Zhukov had predicted, was originally planned as a two-pronged attack. The initial objectives in the region around Stalingrad were to destroy the industrial capacity of the city and to block the Volga River traffic connecting the Caucasus and Caspian Sea to central Russia, as the city is strategically located near a big bend of the Volga. In the very first nights, an impromptu garrison turned the house into a stronghold of defense (which in many ways contributed to its further successful defense): the approaches to the building from the side of German positions were mined, the house was surrounded by a wire fence, sheltered firing points were created outside the house, a deep passage was dug from the house to the positions of the regiment for the delivery of ammunition and A telephone line completely hidden under the ground, narrow embrasures were made for firing in the windows and in the walls, and the soldiers prepared several reserve positions for each firearm. Stalingrad, the 2013 film by Fyodor Bondarchuk, presents a Russian perspective on the fierce battle for the titular city with gratuitous special effects. The Luftwaffe also lost close to 1,000 highly experienced bomber crew personnel. [36]:98 The third and last serviceable runway was at the Stalingradskaya flight school, which reportedly had the last landings and takeoffs on 23 January. - Real History Online, The Sword of Stalingrad- An Award From King George VI, The reconnaissance group of Sergeant Pavlov Ya.F., which seized the building.
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