His Deeds:

Drafts" From His Book

Western Front:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

His Deeds:

Drafts" From His Book

Western Front:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Excerpt from Chapter 16:

This trip differed from the previous one of almost a year before when, fresh from training and full of patriotism we were eager to defend our country as pledged in our military oath and learn what serving on the 'field of glory' meant. Well, I had learnt. But here I was, sitting in this train on this second journey into Russia with a slightly different attitude and apprehension of what the future has in store.

I guess I was luckier than most of those who went with me. At least I had come back, even if only for a short period, and it was nice to be still in one piece but it would have been even nicer if the war was over and I could stay at home. There had been no option to volunteer and I certainly wouldn't have done it now. But here I was, on the train again, going East, travelling to the front in the full knowledge of what one could expect, though not knowing the destination. Anyhow, that was the least worry. Marching orders and the various station commander's master plans would eventually get me there without fail.

We changed trains in Nurnberg for Leipzig, arriving in Dresden at night, Breslau the following morning and Warsaw late that night. There we boarded the troop train for Bialystock and travelled to Baranovichy and Minsk, crossing the Beresina river at Borisov. Was that the same route Napoleon took to Moscow? Late in the evening we reached Orsha, some 2500 km from Augsburg and 500 closer to Moscow. How we got that far in one piece, I'll never know since the last 300 km to Orsha we travelled with rifles at the ready, guarding both sides of the train. It was Partisan country at its worst and all along the line wrecked locomotives, blown up carriages and supply material littered the embankment.

At Orsha a transport of Tiger Panzers destined for Vitebsk was ready to pull out at dawn and the station commander ordered us to report to the train CO for instructions regarding Vitebsk, which was on the main line to Leningrad. However, we didn't get to see him as one of his staff referred us to the Hauptfeldwebel (master sergeant) who he thought had just the right job for us. And what a damn right job he had - watch duty for the rest of the night for the ride to Vitebsk on the wind-swept flat-top cars with rifles at the ready in case the train was ambushed.

Two open goods wagons filled with sand were hooked in front of the locomotive to act as mine catchers, just in case we ran over any freshly planted by gangs of partisans during the night. A trainload of brand new Tiger tanks was a very attractive target for partisans to highjack and blow off the track. I shared guard duty with three members from the tank unit. A bitterly cold wind blew from the north and we nestled under the tank chains for protection, both from the elements and from possible sniper fire from the woods on both sides of the track.

It was only about 60 km to Vitebsk but it took us almost four hours to get there, thank goodness with no interference from that army of partisans lurking in the forests along the track. Just as well daylight soon came as we could have had a rough time otherwise. That area of German occupied Russia, or Belorussia as it's known, was absolutely ideal for those heavily armed irregulars. They had their strongholds everywhere in the vast impenetrable forests, stretching from Vitebsk to Bryansk and in the huge Pripyet Marshes to the south around Minks and Rokitno, with the heaviest concentration in and around Orsha. They also had their airstrips deep in the forest, large enough to handle American C47 transport planes.

Partisan units were truly in command of the whole countryside. I was told that just the previous week a train carrying troops on their way to home leave was ambushed in the middle of the night, blown up and the ensuing massacre left no survivors. Some of the partisans were young boys aged not more than twelve or thirteen, to whom killing was more a pleasure than necessity.

We arrived in Vitebsk in the middle of a blizzard frozen stiff from such an unpleasant journey. The town was in ruins wherever one looked. We were directed to proceed to the flak field replacement battery whose barracks were located a few blocks away and easy to find as it was one of the few buildings still standing amid the rubble.

The outlook on the Moscow front was not very encouraging. Rzhev, an important rail junction half way from Velikiye Luki to Moscow had fallen to the Russians at the beginning of March, followed by Sychevka on the 8th and Vyazma on the 12th of that month. Vyazma was only about 70 miles from Smolensk and the Russian steamroller was gathering momentum before 'Rasputitsa' (spring thaw) stopped its advance. Further to the south in the Orel-Kursk area part of Army Group Centre and General Rudolf von Kluge's Headquarters had a narrow escape in being cut off temporarily from the rest of the Wehrmacht. Must have been a severe blow to his ego, He was nicknamed 'kluger Rudi' (clever Rudi).

I was in Vitebsk for only two days when a replacement request came from a flak Abteilung operating around Rudnya and Smolensk for four gunners. Names were posted on the board and mine was among them and next afternoon a truck from the unit arrived and took us to the Abteilung's headquarters, somewhere between Rudnya and Yartsevo, about 40 km north east of Smolensk. This outfit was just about to pack up and shift camp. In the morning we reported to the CO, a Major, and he and a few officers stood around, leafing through our papers and scrutinising us - a bit like a slave market.

A First Lieutenant called my name as he flicked through my Soldbuch (identification book). I stood to attention and he asked me a few questions, including where I'd received my anti-malaria treatment and when I told him in the Caucasus he said "How the bloody hell did you get out of there?", without taking his eyes off my papers. I told him how. Then he enquired in what position had I got my training on the 2cm gun and when I said as a K.4,loading gunner, he handed me my papers and ordered me to hop into his Kbelwagen (Volkswagen). His name was Oberleutnant Hahn, and he was the commander of my new Battery.

As soon as we arrived at his headquarters he rang one of his gun positions to send somebody to pick up their 'replacement' but there must have been a problem so I was told to go to the kitchen and take a ride with the food delivery cart. Hmm. I remembered a harrowing experience of delivering food in the Caucasus, only this time there were two horses and a sturdy farm cart instead of a camel. I barely managed to hop on the contraption before the driver used his whip something terrible on the horses' backs, which made them bolt like a bullet, sending me flat on my back on top of the food containers. Not a great start, I thought. The driver apologised with "Tovarishch kharacho, da?" (comrade, are you OK, yes?) and to the horses he hurled some Russian obscenities, then I realised he was Russian - a 'Hiwi' (Hilfswilliger) - a former Russian prisoner, willing to serve in the German Army. By good luck we reached my assigned gun position safely after a few more 'kurvas' and 'yob tvoyu mat'. Probably not the right spelling - but who needs to spell Russian expletives. I was only too glad to get off the cart with just a few minor bruises and report to the Unteroffizier who, with a diabolical smile, enquired whether I'd had a comfortable trip with Gregory. I replied that I had, just so long as he didn't send me back with him.

There were two other guns close by, also belonging to Hahn's battery and Janko, our kapo, took me to the izba (Russian cottage) to meet the rest of the crew. Johann, the eldest and the only one who had the 'misfortune' to be married as they said, came from Sigmaringen, a town in the Black Forest. Two others were Heinrich and Manfred and the fourth was introduced as Wilfried, Gunner One. Since his efficiency, and perhaps life, depended largely on the chap feeding explosives into the barrel it was understandable he was most interested in the 'replacement, but once they discovered I wasn't fresh out of training and made it clear I'd seen quite a bit of action and knew which was the 'business' end of the barrel I felt accepted. With the exception of Janko and Johann we were all about the same age.

After a meal of Gregory's 'well stirred lentil soup Janko told us to get ready to shift camp. Wilfried said they had only arrived there two days previously, having got out of Vyazma just before the Russians moved in. When we'd removed the gun from the emplacement and I expected it to be collected by a half track but they weren't equipped with chain vehicles and instead it was put on its trailer and hooked to a six-wheel Krupp carrier. We moved out just before darkness and headed in the direction of Smolensk. I asked Wilfried what had happened to my predecessor and learned he had been hit by artillery outside Vyazma, shrapnel stuck in his back, so was probably in a hospital train going home to Germany. I said I hoped he would make it through the partisan controlled territory, stretching all the way to the Polish border, and told how we rode shotgun at the ready from Minsk to Vitebsk, and about the train that was ambushed outside Orsha with no survivors. An unarmed hospital train with its helpless occupants was a 'snip' for them to attack.

Actually it then occurred to me that should our convoy be ambushed we would be in a bit of a spot since the guns were hooked to the back of the carriers. A well-aimed round of machine gunfire would wipe us all out. I would have felt a bit safer with a half-track under my feet and the gun mounted on top, but looking at Wilfried's face he didn't seem to be unduly worried. I also noticed our vehicle was provided with mounting plates and asked him if they always pulled the gun on the back of the carrier and he said it was too much trouble to mount it for a short trip, that we would have to take it down again when we got there. "Get where?" I enquired. "Smolensk," he replied. "The Ivans would love to get their hands on that city before the spring thaw sets in."

We made it to Smolensk without being ambushed. Heavily armed road convoys were reasonably safe from partisans, who concentrated more on the rail system which was more lucrative and less risky for their own lives. Our objective was the defence of the massive bridge over the river (Dniepre) and railway gorge where the railway station lay below and we spent the next two days digging in on the western approaches to the bridge. The Russians were now bearing down on Smolensk. Durovo, 50 miles to the north-east fell on 21 March and by the 24th they had penetrated the eastern defences of Smolensk and orders were given to mount the guns on the vehicles and take up defence positions on the eastern approaches to the bridge.

The expected attack. however, never materialised. 'Rasputitsa' the spring thaw had arrived early, turning the countryside into endless mud and making it impossible for any vehicle to move. The whole area from Smolensk-Vitebsk - Rokitno- Brest and Kovel was just one large swamp forcing a halt to the Russian advance in our sector, though the battle in the north - Leningrad - was still as furious as ever.

We remained in Smolensk until the beginning of April then moved south to Roslavl, near Zhukovka on the railway line Bryansk-Orel. The front line veered sharply to the west from Ponyri to Sevsk in our sector and from Belgorod to Sumy in the south, a huge salient of some hundred miles deep held by the Russians. This salient was to be the scene of some of the heaviest fighting on the eastern front and turned out to be most disastrous for the German forces of Army Command Centre, not only because the Americans were supplying the Russians (Lend-Lease) with enough material to re-equip their forces twice over, but the German defeat at Orel-Kursk was mainly brought about by the betrayal to Stalin (Stavka, Russian High Command) of the entire German attack plan.

The thaw was upon us, with mud and slime everywhere, In a way I was glad we didn't have half-tracks or they probably would have found a job for us, sliding up and down the Rollbahn on air defence duty as we'd done the year before at Mereva and Kharkov. So we had a reasonably quiet period but miserable as it was, there was not much comfort. Our dugouts were like pig stys and with every footstep one sunk deeper and deeper into the slime. The Russian reconnaissance planes were too high for us to engage though we scored a few hits on some fighter bombers coming within our range unexpectedly. Heavy artillery from somewhere around Kirov gave us an uneasy moment now and then with random shots. They were heavy calibre shells, 172 mm and kicked up enormous dirt clods and mud mushrooms as they exploded with the all-too familiar 'whoompf' deep in the slime.

We constructed some bunks so we could sleep without drowning in the mud. Pure luxury! It rained quite a lot, which was good as it meant the other side couldn't do much either and it kept Russian aircraft from harassing us. A rifle unit of Finns had moved into the village to our left and we did some visiting and generally got on quite well, mainly because they always seemed to have a good supply of vodka. Also, of course, I considered myself an expert in German-Finn relations since my encounter in Gmunden hospital! "Who, Terboven?" They said they'd never heard of him, but then that was understandable, they were only interested in vodka.

One afternoon they came over with a bag full of bottles and I must say we had a good time getting sloshed, some more than others, though not the Finns who seemed pretty inured to the stuff. Wilfried got pretty happy and poor old Johann fell out of his bunk and nearly drowned but to make matters worse an attack alert was sounded right in the middle of our 'party' and quite a few of us couldn't make it to the gun. Luckily the Illyushins - I think that's what they were - and so many, (probably two?) veered off in the direction of Roslavl so we got off lightly. Our Kapo, Wilfried and Johann had to appear before Oberleutnant Hahn the next morning for a good dressing down and we were lucky he kept the incident within the battery and didn't report it to the Abt.Commander. That would have earned us, perhaps not a stretch in Torgau (military prison), but some other stiff punishment or perhaps worse.

As soon as the weather improved our battery pulled out and moved to an airfield somewhere between Slovgorod and Krichev, around Mogilev, to provide security. The field was quite large and had originally been a Russian base, judging by the hangars, and the concrete and brick buildings. It was partly destroyed but all essential installations had been restored so it must have been operated by the Luftwaffe for some time. Actually, it was two fields separated by a river valley, the Sozh river, I think it was. And the fields were called 'Schatalovka East' and 'Schatalovka West, if I remember correctly. The field on the eastern side of the valley was mainly taken up by Heinkel bombers and reconnaissance squadrons and the western side was operated by various fighter squadrons - Messershmitts and Focke Wulf FW 190s. The FWs were the latest in fighters and regarded by experts as the best fighter plane of WW2 and far superior to any of the Allied or Russian fighters planes at that time.

The FW 190s were flown by Nowotny's pilots, Walther Nowotny being one of our most successful fighter pilots ont the eastern front with 250 Russian aircraft to his credit. Other top scoring fighter pilots had downed slightly more planes than Nowotny, like Otto Kittel with 275 kills, Gerhard Barkhorn 301 and the most successful of the Luftwaffe was Erich Hartmann with 352 Russian planes to his credit. Eventually Nowotny, Kittel and Barkhorn were shot down, whereas Erich Hartmann survived the war and gave himself up to the Americans. He would have done better had he shot himself instead. He had a price put on his head from the Russian High Command and Stavka negotiated with the Americans to have him handed over for punishment! And the Americans obliged. General Eisenhower would agree to any request from his friend 'Uncle Joe' if it meant getting rid of a few more German 'Nazi' bastards. To Eisenhower every German soldier regardless what rank was a Nazi. Hartmann was sent to Siberia. He was a year younger than me. Winner take all...

 

 

 

 

 

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