15. Januar 1944
The next morning, I stand in front of the bunker and look around. My shelter is between the HKL and the arty pimple. The front positions are a kilometre away, the arty pimple two hundred metres. A stone's throw away is a signal bunker occupied by six men from a signal unit. Apart from me, the only other person in my bunker is my messenger.
The land is undulating, with kilometre-wide, flat hollows and very gradually rising but endlessly wide ridges. The undulating surface is gentle and flat and stretches for many kilometres. Without standing on an elevated point, you can overlook the land over long distances. So by day, you won't get out of the bunker so much here. Only on the left does the terrain descend in steeper slopes to a deep valley. From time to time we can see the Russians walking around their positions from up here.[1]
Diagonally behind me, the steep hill of the "arty pimple" rises out of the plain. Two men are sitting up there, a lieutenant and a lance corporal. Many grey patches on the white blanket of snow bear witness to the shelling that the observer position has to endure. But thick steel plates protect the observers.
These distances! I have to walk a kilometre before I even reach the HKL. The company sections are another kilometre wide. Some machine gun and mortar positions lie a little behind the HKL and form, dot-like, an implied second line. And this is where I'm supposed to find the widely spaced positions at night on this monotonous, table-flat, snow-covered area! It's not without danger, because at such great distances you hardly notice that you've gone three hundred metres too far and are already between or even behind the Russian positions.
So I'm always zigzagging back and forth between the positions of the first and second lines. Today I started my patrol on the left wing of the battalion section. There's an heavy machine gun nest next to a hedge row and a mortar position a hundred metres behind it in a small hollow. In the same section of the platoon there is another heavy machine gun flanking the hedge row. The seam must be strong! The emplacements are well built and some are even wired. The bunkers are all properly equipped and can usually be heated.
The enemy HKL is several hundred metres away. It is almost impossible for the enemy to approach unnoticed over the flat, white area, unless fog rolls in. Our Landser are quite happy about this change of position, are talkative and cheerful. I walk from one bunker to the next. I hardly know any of the men in the rifle companies, but I recognise almost all the non-commissioned officers and sergeants, some of them by name. Finally, I visit the company command post of the 11th Company[2]. The company leader is new to the battalion. A greying lieutenant, no spring chicken, from whose person a pleasant calm emanates. He lives with two messangers, a combat clerk and a medic.
I finish my tour for today. From the command post of X Company, a path leads to the pimple, which I now follow. I march across the wide plain all alone. In the bright winter night, I can follow the path in front of me for some distance with my eyes. Vehicles and messengers have left their tracks in the snow. At one point, I come across a food vehicle rolling forwards through the snow with crunching wheels. Then the silence of the night surrounds me again. It's actually reckless to walk alone like this. I almost always do it, but I should get out of the habit because it's actually forbidden. It's all too easy to lose your bearings on this boundless expanse of snow. Finally, the huge white pointed hat of the pimple emerges from the twilight, and then I recognise the hump of my shelter, which lies in front of me like a large, snow-covered molehill. A few more paces and I descend the steps to my burrow.
There has been fog covering the country for days.[3] This forces us to set up listening posts in front of the positions again at night. During the day, however, we can at least move around the area a bit more freely without being seen by the Russian. I use the time to climb up to the observation post in the "arty pimple" and have some things explained to me and look through the scissor telescope. In general, the artillery observers don't like visitors because they rightly fear that their post would be detected.
I went to the battalion to provide information on the condition of the positions and the fire plan. There's a large map on the commander's table and Gust is making entries on it. He asks me about an old Russian machine gun that he has seen lying next to my bunker, rusting away quietly. And while I explain to him that the thing is unusable, he draws it into his firing plan and casually orders me to make it ready for use again. Looks good on paper. One more firing position! That's the way to do it!
All around the commander's bunker they are busy entrenching. The infantry gun platoon is digging out positions for their guns. They form a semi-circular safety ring around the commander's bunker. The heavy IG (15 cm) is located directly next to the commander's bunker.[4]
Tonight I was on the right wing of our battalion section, where there are still three positions of my company, one heavy machine gun and two mortar positions.
Ever since the OKW (High Command of the Wehrmacht) offered bonuses for the delivery of loot material and weapons, the Landsers have been collecting with a real passion. They go out at night in front of the positions, crawl around between mines and unexploded ordnance and don't even let the danger of being captured stop them from earning money.
Tonight our sentries observed a Soviet scouting party trying to stalk through our lines. They first let the Russians through until they were behind our HKL. Then they suddenly opened fire with machine guns and rifle grenades. The effect was murderous. The scouting party was horribly shot up. Only one escaped, the others collapsed. The leader of the patrol, a captain, was badly wounded. Despite our comradely behaviour, he was very dismissive. We only learnt that it was an officer patrol of six officers. The one who escaped was a lieutenant. Otherwise he was defiantly and doggedly silent. He was wearing a spotless white shirt.
We get close combat packs. These are small cardboard boxes containing highly concentrated foodstuffs: A 50 gr bar of chocolate, a fruit bar made from pressed fruit, a few biscuits and a small packet of cigarettes. Very nutritious and tasty things. There is a packet like this for every day of close combat or major combat. We receive them a few days after the fighting. However, as the wounded and dead have gone in the meantime, there are sometimes a few parcels left over, which I then distribute to particularly deserving soldiers, volunteer scouts and others. This time, too, the sergeant major wanted to do a deal with me for the surplus parcels in favour of his drivers, but I remain firm. Knowing him as I do, he's still somehow managed to "spare" some.
Today I was at the regiment's and took the opportunity to visit the leaders of the 13th and 14th companies in their quarters. The commander of the 14th (anti-tank gun) Company is just finishing a parcel for his wife. I must be seeing things: it's four close combat packs he's packing! And there are more on the windowsill! Since when do people at the back of the regiment get close combat packs? It's so revealing if you come round to the rear just once. There are more packs lying around here than I've received so far. But I'm the one in the mess at the front, I'm up all night and in constant danger, while Mr Comrade back here is watching the fighting from the warmth of his bed on the phone. In war, it's like in the cinema: in front it's flickering, and in the back are the best seats.[5]
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- ↑ The description points to a kurgan east of Lebedinskij with a relative height indication (+10,0), but no absolute elevation is given, so it seems not to be a trigonometric point. A kurgan 2.5 km to the north-east, in the map, has a relative height (+10,0) and an absolute elevation number (167,8) and even a name, but it lies on the front line (cf. situation map) and is therefore out of the question.
- ↑ in the original “x. Kompanie”, the 11th for sure, which the author had previously led in personal union, as the 9th was certainly still led by Lt. von Arnim (see above), the 10th probably already by Lt. Baumann (see below)
- ↑ from 19th (KTB 6. A., NARA T-312 Roll 1485 Frame 000590, Roll 1482 Frame 000462) until 22nd (on 23rd, sunny again acc. to Roll 1482 Frame 000480)
- ↑ for the preparation of the place defence see reports of corps on 24th, e.g. XVII. A.K. (KTB 6. A., NARA T-312 Roll 1484 Frames 000820-23)
- ↑ Apparently a not uncommon misbehaviour, so that GenOb Hollidt felt compelled to personally inculcate his GOCs with the rules of distribution, in: Der Oberbefehlshaber der 6. Armee, A.H.Qu., 29.1.1944, Betr.: Zusatzverpflegung für Frontkämpfer im Infanterieverband (The General Commanding 6th Army, AHQ, 29 Jan 1944, subject: Additional Nutrition For Front Line Warriors In The Infantry Unit, KTB 6. A., NARA T-312 Roll 1492 Frame 000457)