Excerpt from Chapter 10:
Summer was rapidly approaching and Army Group
South was reorganized into two groups, Army
Group B under Field Marshal von Bock with
General (Papa) Hoth's 4th Panzer Army and
General von Paulus's 6th Army directed to swing
off east into Stalingrad, and Army Group A under
the Command of Field Marshal Siegmund List with
Ewald von Kleist's 1st Panzer, General Ruoff's
17th Infantry and von Manstein's 11th Army
entering the huge area of the Caucasus.
Kupyansk fell on 6 July, my 20th birthday,
though nobody, including me, gave a damn about
that. Birthdays came and went but death was
always too near. The offensive to take Rostov on
Don and the drive into the Caucasus was about to
begin and from morning to night the pilots from
the reconnaissance squadron were busy flying
their missions. We wouldn't have changed our job
for theirs, sitting in a glass bubble and such
an easy target. One of them, Hans (Johann),
who'd just had his 20th birthday used to come
over to our gun position in his off-time to play
cards and have a chat. He kept us informed on
what was going on in the front line and was well
aware that one day his luck might run out. More
than once he told us that should he be shot down
over enemy territory and reach the ground in one
piece he would shoot himself rather than
surrender to the Russians as it was well known
that being taken prisoner by them led to a
torturous death.
We remained on the airfield until the second
week in July. Enemy air activity grew weaker
mainly because the Russian air force was tied up
north, in the Voronesh sector, and at
Voroshilograd in the Donetz Basin, in support of
the battle for Rostov. We were able to deal with
fighter attacks in a more efficient way since
the Ils left us alone, temporarily, but the
nights were more annoying, mainly because of the
'Nachthexen' in their 'Nuhmaschinen'(Night
Witches in their sewing machines) who certainly
were a pest. They were women pilots in PO 2
aircraft, or U 2 as we called them, a small
two-seater bi-plane. They came with such
regularity that we also nicknamed them U V Ds
(night duty officers). The actual damage they
did was minimal, their purpose being to keep us
awake all night, while throwing down the
occasional bomb, or, what was more effective,
sawn-off lengths of railway track. The sound
effect of the falling object was the same as
that of a real bomb, only it didn't explode, but
we lost sleep waiting for an explosion, not
knowing until daylight what had fallen.
Those U2 planes were very hard to shoot down
because of their evasive flying tactics. The
moment we located the sound of the engine and
put a quick burst of tracers in its direction
the witch riding that contraption simply
switched off the engine and glided out of her
flight path, only to switch on again and return
from another direction. It didn't always work
though and early one morning we scored. She left
it a little too late for her home run and we
were just able to make out her silhouette for an
accurate burst, homing in on her plywood
structure and sending it down in flames, taking
the two females, pilot and navigator, with it.
There was no point in jumping out as they didn't
carry parachutes, and anyhow, they didn't fly
high enough for a parachute to be effective.
Maybe we should have admired them for their
dedication and courage and should have felt
sorry for them but we weren't concerned about
the people flying in that machine, we were
simply shooting down an enemy plane.
Orders to move out came towards the middle of
July and again we found ourselves on
anti-aircraft duty on the Rollbahn going
south-east. We hated this job hemmed in between
columns of vehicles, just sitting targets for
blazing machine guns and canons from attacking
aircraft, and not being allowed to jump for
cover offered little hope of seeing the end of
the day. It was always a relief to see the tail
of the last attacking plane head for the horizon
and be blissfully aware of still being alive.
It became very hot and dusty and with it came
another hazard. The Rollbahn was covered with a
heavy cloud of fine red dust making breathing
difficult and the only way to prevent inhaling
it was by wrapping pieces of cloth around the
nose and mouth. The dust rendered visibility
just about zero, making detection of approaching
aircraft almost impossible. The only way of
knowing their presence was when it was too late.
All they had to do was just fire into the dust
cloud and they always scored a hit. The dreaded
ILs showed up in numbers causing a fair bit of
destruction and casualties.
A heavy battle was in progress around
Kamensk-Shaktinskiy by Kleist's First Panzers
moving on the Donetz and paving the way into
Rostov. On the northern sector General Hoth's
4th Panzer Army had taken Millerovo in July and
was heading towards the Don, leaving von
Paulus's 6th Army to strike out for Kalach and
Stalingrad on the mighty Volga, ultimately
resulting in the destruction of the whole army.
We took up a position on the eastern side of the
Donetz crossing which by then had developed into
quite a bottleneck, thereby presenting an
attractive proposition for any approaching plane
formations, but this time Richthofen's
Luftflotte IV was dominating the sky. It's
Messerschmitt fighters and Stuka bombers were
harassing the Russian defence positions the
other side of the river at Kamentzk and that
town was taken on 15 July by Kleist's Panzers.
The battle for Rostov had gained momentum.
Voroshilov to the north-west of us fell on the
18th and was closely followed by the taking of
Likhovskoy and Krasnyy Sulin to the south of
Kamentsk.
The ever present dust was now mixed with smoke
from the blazing towns and the sweet smell of
burnt and decomposing bodies lying around
everywhere, most of them black and blown up to
almost double size by the summer heat, prior to
bursting into a liquid stinking mess. Drinking
water was becoming a problem as it wasn't too
healthy to drink from the river or any waterways
polluted and poisoned by dead, decaying cattle
or human remains. It was obtained mainly from
wells in the centre of villages and even some of
them were polluted. Food was a little safer; a
loaf of black kommiss and a length of salami,
the standard supply for the Army on the move,
went a long way, together with the odd potato or
occasional chicken if there was one around.
Tanks and motorized units were spearheading the
advance and leaving the slower moving infantry
behind. Poor chaps, it wasn't easy to march
20-25 km a day in full battle gear in the heat,
and dust, past stinking, decaying corpses. Often
we gave some of them a lift for a few kilometres
to give them a rest until their column caught up
again.
One evening we left the Rollbahn to fill our
water cans from a village well before settling
for the night. Bedding down was simple; we just
crawled under the vehicle between the chains,
using the steel helmet for a pillow and sleep
came almost instantly one was horizontal. It had
to be, since one could only sleep in
installments, always being interrupted for watch
duty and annoying visits from the 'night
witches' or random artillery attacks.
Langhans always shared watch duty with us, which
we thought was decent of him and the only member
of our crew exempt from any duty was Ferdl, our
driver, but then he had other things to think
about. He was the only one who knew the finer
details of a motor and how it worked so was
responsible for the vehicle being in top
condition at all times. Such drivers really knew
their engines and were able to take apart and
repair them in no time. On this occasion Ferdl
busied himself with his motor, tinkering until
he was satisfied it would run smoothly for
another day then filled the tank to the brim
before stepping back to listen admiringly to it
ticking over smoothly. Well, he was not amused a
few moments later when after a couple of
phut-phuts'it died. He uttered some unrepeatable
Austrian- style blessings the Pope would not
have approved as he realized what he had put
into the tank wasn't petrol but our precious
drinking water! Langhans, understandably, wasn't
amused either. Poor old Ferdl had to work all
night to rectify his mistake. "Serves him right,
stupid Arschloch" said Langhans and we all
agreed, mainly to prove the level of our
intellect was pretty well in line with our
Kapo's.
Sleep was out for the rest of the night as a
heavy German artillery battery positioned
somewhere behind us delivered salvo after salvo
over our heads into the Russian positions ahead.
Langhans decided to give Ferdl a hand and since
we had finished with cleaning and oiling the
machinery of our gun we also offered our
services as we felt partly responsible for the
mess up, only to be told by Ferdl in
unmistakable terms that if we came anywhere near
his motor he would shoot himself on the spot,
and then we would have to push 'den
Scheiss-karren' (shit wagon) ourselves. That was
indeed bad news, so we crawled under the chains
for some horizontal relaxation, leaving the two
experts - well, one anyway, fixing up the motor.
Ferdl still raved on to Langhans that the "verdammte
Scheisshauffen (shit heap) under there" - and we
were quite sure he meant us - "was to blame for
the whole thing." Had we not filled his petrol
can with water it would never have happened. He
had a valid point there, and Langhans agreed -
not so much about the can but with Ferdl's
scathing opinion of us.
Orders came to start moving well before dawn and
well before we were ready. Naturally we all
blamed Ferdl for not working hard enough and he
vowed not to speak with us ever again. That was
all right; he was a verdammter Auslunder anyhow,
(German booty from Austria.) The unit pulled out
without us in the direction of Shakhty, a
coalmining town in the Donetz Basin and we were
instructed to follow as soon as we were ready,
which was about two hours later. We were unable
to catch up with our group as was intended
because on the approaches to Shakhty we were
stopped by a Kettenhund detachment ('chain
dogs', military police) from the
Gross-Deutschland Division which was battling
its way through Novocherkassk on the way to
Rostov. We were directed to proceed west towards
Novashakhtinsk as a driving escort for a
motorized infantry unit who were on a mopping up
assignment of Russian units still holding out in
the surrounding areas.
There was nothing we could do. Our kapo's
insistence it was imperative for us to join our
unit came to naught and "Jawohl, Herr
Oberleutnant" was all that was left to Langhans
to counter the Kettenhund's barking. Progress
was slow as we were in territory held by Russian
troops, remnants of their Armies caught in the
pincer movement on Rostov from Kamentsk to the
east and Chistyakovo to the west. Village and
hamlets were hiding places for their infantry
units, some ready to put up resistance,
depending on the presence of the Kommissar. Most
units, however, were quite set to surrender. A
short burst from the 2 cm, or half a round from
a machine gun was usually enough for them to
make up their minds and out they came with their
hands above their heads, or maybe they would
slip out the other end of the village before it
was surrounded. But a unit guided by a Kommissar
invariably stood its ground. He was the
representative of the Party and, as such, a
powerful figure able to overrule any decision
made by an officer, regardless of rank. He also
could shoot anybody on the spot who in a moment
of weakness forgot that it was his duty to get
himself killed for Generalissimo Stalin.
By mid-morning, with the temperature hovering
about the 30s we came to a Kholkhoz, a
government-owned farm with grain silos and the
familiar watchtower in the centre. We were
ordered to stop there while our infantry fanned
out and surrounded the farm complex. Langhans
surveyed the buildings through his glasses and
Ludwig unhooked the trailer. Jakob sat with both
feet on the pedals and I slipped a magazine of
incendiary grenades into the loading block. We
knew the Russians were there; it was too quiet.
Langhans directed Ferdl to move slowly forward
and turn the vehicle around, mainly for a quick
getaway and to protect the motor from a frontal
hit though Ferdl always maintained it was for
his protection. Anyhow, we weren't too concerned
about Ferdl that particular morning since he
hadn't spoken to us on the journey. "Verdammter
Auslunder" Hans said to Anton. "He should be
grateful the 'Anschluss' came when it did, or he
wouldn't have the pleasure of being with us" he
said, referring to Ferdl's Austrian origin.
Ferdl did a good job turning the vehicle round,
locking one chain and putting speed on the
other, nearly knocking us off the carrier in
doing so. No doubt that would have given him
great satisfaction but his quick movement was
our good fortune and salvation, and not a moment
too soon, as a Maxim machine gun opened up from
the nearest farm building with some of its
bullets hitting us square on, rebounding off the
armour plates with the impact sound of a sledge
hammer.
That was one instance when we were quite willing
to accept that Ferdl was entitled to some sort
of protection and I was more than thankful to
have those steel sheets in front of me. Jakob
didn't wait for Langhans's order but hit the
rapid fire pedal almost as soon as the first
bullet hit us, emptying the whole magazine into
the building complex and silencing the machine
gun and I quickly replaced the empty magazine
with hardly an interruption to the firing
sequence.
Almost the instant Jakob removed his feet from
the pedal three barns were well alight and when
the infantry moved in they discovered the
mangled bodies of three of the machine gunners
with a fourth body and that of the Kommissar
some short distance back, both with a neat
bullet hole in the head. Those Kommissars really
were the true believers and Stalin's great
asset. When our infantry finished their rounding
up operations there weren't too many prisoners
taken, the main body of the Russians having
managed to slip out of the farm complex,
probably well before we arrived, leaving behind
a fair bit of their equipment.
It was now getting towards evening and it was
decided to stay there for the night. Some 20 km
to the south the battle for Rostov was coming to
a climax. Langhans and Anton went to explore the
farm on a 'salvage mission' as there was always
the possibility that some stray chicken had
escaped the hastily retreating Ivans. Indeed,
they returned shortly not with a chicken but
with a nice young piggy and a few old potatoes.
Ferdl, with his farmer's background from
somewhere around Linz, was the best authority
for dealing with the roasting and it tasted
delicious, served with my bratkartoffeln fried
in the gun's recoil brake oil.
Then we settled back, watching the night sky lit
up by the artillery bombardment and exploding
shells in the direction of Rostov, like
never-ending lightning and a colossal
thunderstorm. We organized our watches and tried
to get some sleep but just after midnight a
messenger from the company came with the order
for our gun to pull out and turn back towards
Shakhty. On the approaches to the town Langhans
made some inquiries from the military police and
eventually were given directions to find our
battery and we caught up with our unit just
outside the town at the pit face of a colliery.
Novocherkassk fell to Kleist's Panzers and heavy
street fighting was in progress in Rostov when
we entered in the last week of July. The place
was burning from end to end and the fierce
summer heat, smoke and the ever-present
sickening stink of dead and decaying bodies made
breathing awful. The main street leading down to
the waterfront was ablaze but firmly in German
hands, while fierce house-to-house fighting was
still going on in the outlying districts. We
slowly moved down the street to the waterfront
where stood the only building, apparently still
undamaged. Ironically this was the NKVD
building, (OGPU, or today's KGB) with the Soviet
red star and hammer and sickle displayed from
the top. Very impressive we thought but on
getting closer we discovered the reason the
edifice was still standing. Built in 'Potemkin'
fashion it was a huge facade propped up from
behind with steel braces and the only part of
the structure destroyed was the small building
behind the front entrance, presumably used by
the NKVD as their office. At the bottom of the
street was the harbor where the mighty Don river
forms into a delta to flow into the Sea of Azov
but the waterfront and harbor installations were
all destroyed and in utter ruins, with half-
sunk ships, cranes toppled, burning oil tanks
and floating, decaying bodies everywhere.