These letters and diaries are lively and direct Hitler, they were certain, would meet Napoleons end. Our men are being killed not only in the firing line, but in the rear, in buildings we have already occupied. Stretching more than 20 miles from north to south, but less than three miles wide at its broadest, Stalingrad clung to the Volga's western bank and was defended by the Red Army's 62nd Army. Source: Zelma/RIA Novosti. November 21. That has a tremendous impact.'. . We shall obviously be seeing them next in the other world. If they could only see what Stalingrad has done to our army. . what should be done? . They snapped at the gates of Moscow from October 1941 to January 1942, in vicious fighting that nevertheless set the stage for Soviet counter-offensives. already cut up four dogs, yet my comrades cant eat their fill. The story of the Eastern Front through the eyes of one young German. . . we actually cut up a dog, and the vodka really came in handy. The Russians are fighting desperately like wild beasts, dont give themselves up, but come up close and then throw grenades. In addition, these records may include the soldier's age, birthplace, residence, occupation, and physical description as well as the names of family members. We decided to give ourselves up to capture in order to save our soldiers lives. This was before the tide turned. Germans fire the 105 mm howitzer leFH 18 in the area of the grain elevator. . everything we did. 'For the first time in a documentary series we are letting the voice of a soldier be the narrator. Diary entries of a German solider during the Battle of Stalingrad Discussion/Question The entries are written by William Hoffman and records the fighting and general situation around him from the 29th of July to the 26th of December 1942. . Here it is: http://imgur.com/a/22mHD .. The testimonies were too truthful and multifaceted for their times, and Stalin forbade their publication, not least because he alone claimed full credit for the victory at Stalingrad. But now we have to roam around this horrible In September 1942, German lieutenant colonel Friedrich Roske declared himself "the master of the centre of Stalingrad" after his troops had smashed their way into the heart of the city. During the day the Germans managed to accupy only two blocks. This is nothing new. precisely this reason that we need to exert all our strength in order to win My question is, what happened to him? On June 4, at the Battle of Midway, Island, American planes destroyed all four of the attacking, Japanese aircraft carriers and established American naval. trenches and bunkers. I have been sent to work at battalion H.Q. One day I shot a magpie and cooked it. A Russian counteroffensive in November trapped the German Sixth Army. 'You see young girls, children hanging from trees in the park. This could not fail to influence our decision. . 'His voice unbiased by the horrors that were to come.'. When the Germans resumed their offensive, in spring 1942, their strategic target was the oil fields of the Caucasus. .. . . . . September 13. I send letters home, but there is no reply. Stalingrad: Directed by Fedor Bondarchuk. In the summer of 1942 Paulus advanced toward Stalingrad with 250,000 men, 500 tanks, 7,000 guns and mortars, and 25,000 horses. . I just want to scream it all away. Up to a thousand wounded soldiers a day are taken back to the rear from Stalingrad. Stalingrad, and the final desperate battles inside Germany at the end of the war. and rage. Among the documents collected by the Historical Commission in Stalingrad were two excerpts from the diary of a German private 1st class. But even such Nazi ideological work paled against the systematic, communist, political conditioning that took place in the Red Army from the hour the Germans attacked in 1941. . Why Do Some People Look Totally Different In Pictures Than In Real Life? With Mariya Smolnikova, Yanina Studilina, Pyotr Fyodorov, Thomas Kretschmann. Our regiment is attacking the Barrikady settlement. Stalingrad: The City that Defeated the Third Reich: Hellbeck, Jochen, Tauchen, Christopher: 9781610397186: Amazon.com: Books Books History Military Buy new: $12.19 List Price: $18.99 Details Save: $6.80 (36%) Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns FREE delivery Sunday, March 5 if you spend $25 on items shipped by Amazon beautiful Verdun, with new weapons. It was in fact the worst tragedy ever to befall a whole Army in the history of mankind. By 1945, Stalin made sure that official publications referred to him as the sole architect of Soviet victory over fascism. The main Soviet strategy was just to defend their territory and wear out the German soldiers while using minor counterattacks only to diverge the enemy (Beevor 221). October 14. At that time we actually cut up a dog, and the vodka really came in handy. The economy, culture and society were fully mobilized by governments. December 3. After our attack the field was littered with dead. October 4. . I want to scream. Ultimately, the invasion forced Adolf Hitler's troops to fight a war on two fronts, leading to their defeat in the Second World War. 17189, to Battle of Stalingrad, (July 17, 1942-February 2, 1943), successful Soviet defense of the city of Stalingrad (now Volgograd), Russia, U.S.S.R., during World War II. . Every day I write two or three reports about them. He wrote: 'In total more than 20 corpses lay around the destroyed tank. Schwarz, 10th Company of the 131st Infantry Regiment of the 44th Infantry 87th Artillery Regiment of the 113th Infantry Division, no. by Weiss Wurst 21 Aug 2003, 18:01, Post You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked. The weather is getting worse and worse. In the summer of 1940, Italy had not entered the war until France had almost surrendered, and still the Italians were roughly handled by French troops (Italy's vulture-like behavior led Roosevelt. . Yes, leading generals of the Stalingrad battle, like Chuikov, were able to publish accounts of their role in the battle, but they carefully omitted any reference to executions within the Red Army. This consisted of around 3,400 tanks which were supported by 2,700 of the Luftwaffe. The Fuhrers orders were read inevitably soon be over. . . The victory at Stalingrad was not simply a matter of enormous human sacrifice. They say that the city is on fire; on theFhrer'sorders our Luftwaffe [air force) has sent it up in flames. 'They have managed to pull Gossler out alive, but both his legs are badly torn up,' he stated. All rights reserved by Rossiyskaya Gazeta. Up to a The Nazis' eastward expansion was halted and the Soviets went on the offensive until the end of the war. August 27.A continuous cannonade on all sides.We are slowly advancing.Less than twenty miles to go to Stalingrad.In the day-time we can see the smoke of fires, at nighttime the bright glow. There was an enormous membership drive over the course of the war, so much so that by the end of the war, the Red Army was predominantly communist, and the party had features of a military organization. Records from the diary of a German soldier who fought at Stalingrad in 1942-1943, after being captured, and in 1953 returned home:<br>". But, the Germansseverely underestimated their opponent and the weather they would face on their journey to Moscow. Frozen potatoes are the best meal, but toget them out of the ice-covered ground under fire from Russian bullets is not so easy. Stalingrad is hell on earthVerdun, beautiful Verdun, with new weapons. 4 pages, ebook First published January 1, 1942 Book details & editions The Russians lauded the everyday heroism of their troops, while the Germans cast the Soviet soldiers as subhuman beings who fought cruelly and without any respect for life even their own. The work of Hellbeck, who was awarded a 2017 John Simon Guggenheim fellowship in the humanities, continues to focus on wartime efforts to record German atrocities committed on Soviet soil. His journal provides a firsthand account of what the German 6th Army was experiencing and how they were coping . 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. But it is for Then the terrible struggles in . The fighting in Stalingrad, lasting from August 1942 to February 1943, and ending with the surrender of Hitlers army, changed the course of World War II and world history. Contemporary observers, German as well as Soviet, agreed that the Red Army troops at Stalingrad fought with enormous fervor. Stalingrad is hell on earthVerdun, September 28. The German veterans refer to Stalingrad as traumatic break in their biography, whereas the Russians tend to underscore the positive aspect of their self-realization in war, even as they confide memories of painful personal loss. After five months of unrelenting battle, the retreat of the Nazis became the turning point of World War II. After seeing many colleagues killed and horrifically maimed from driving through a minefield he wrote: 'I have had enough. The Russians are firing on allsides. The Fiihrer knows where the Russians weak point is. The soldiers on record dont know what will come next, and when and how the war will end. Six thousand survived, returning to Germany after the war. Everyone expects us home for Christmas. German attempts to break into the pocket failed. When during my research I discovered a trove of wartime interviews with Soviet defenders of the city, I decided that my book should centrally focus on the comparatively little-known, Soviet side of the story. 'Both legs are only attached to the body by thin strips of sinew and flesh. At that time . by Whisper 21 Aug 2003, 19:07, Post The Battle of Stalingrad was amongst the bloodiest battles ever fought in the history of . . backward. What was the meaning of defeat for the Germans? Background to the Battle of Stalingrad: By mid-1942, the German invasion of the USSR had already cost Russia over six million soldiers, half killed a Furthermore, a large part of its territory and resources were under German control. Confessions of the Enemy. The print run was not specified, and the book was When I think about this, Im ready to howl from annoyance and rage. There are barely This is an apolitical forum for discussions on the Axis nations and related topics hosted by the Axis History Factbook in cooperation with Christian Ankerstjernes Panzerworld and Christoph Awender's WW2 day by day. the personnel army "lost weight", total mobilization was announced in all spheres of German life. When we got to Stalingrad, there were The battle for the elevator is still going on. I was extraordinarily lucky to have been the first historian to fully explore the 215 interviews conducted with Soviet defenders of Stalingrad, and publish them. September 1942. 1943. Answer (1 of 8): I only know this, when the army was strong enough to break out, Hitler ordered it to stay so the rest of the German army could break in to relieve it. He banked on the psychological blow that the fall of Stalins city, which is what Stalingrad literally means, would deliver to Stalin. 'He has started to sing with a slurring voice, so great is his pain. thousand wounded soldiers a day are taken back to the rear from Stalingrad. This diary covers the period from April 1942 to March 1943, the momentous year when the tide of battle turned in the East. November 19. His battlefield . Portion of a letter from Senior Lance Corporal Joseph Tzimach, no. He wrote them throughout the battle of Stalingrad. . Two men then carefully lift him out. . . The elevator is occupied not by men but by devils that no flames or bullets can destroy. The letters penned by the German soldiers as the Battle of Stalingrad raged on around them were infused with candor. Russians consider it to be one of the greatest battles of their Great Patriotic War, and most historians consider it to be the greatest battle of the entire conflict. The author, Gottlob Bidermann, an 18-year-old private in the 132d Infantry Division takes us through the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, across the Dnieper and battles in the Crimea, engagements around Leningrad and retreat through Riga to the Baltic (Kurland Pocket). A lot of Russian tommy gunners have appeared. The book became a bibliographic rarity. . They resonate with the din of the battlefield, and violence is everywhere in the picture. A big turning point for Leutnant Sander came on October 2 when many tanks were destroyed in a minefield near Wjasma, between Smolensk and Moscow. While the German army was penetrating deeply into Russia, he believed that victory was not far away and dreamed of returning home with medals. . 16:56 GMT 17 Jun 2021. When I think about this, Im ready to howl from annoyance Does that get to you? Shes expecting me home when victoryswon. But with thousands of Soviet guardsmen poised to launch a furious counter-attack, his triumph was to be short-lived. . German and other Axis losses in the battle of Stalingrad amounted to over 800,000 casualties. by PAK 21 Aug 2003, 22:11, Post We have never been through anything like this. Heziel Pitogo is one of the authors writing for WAR HISTORY ONLINE. by August 21 Aug 2003, 11:24, Post The number of soldiers cemeteries is growing .. I believe that the Fuhrer will carry the thing through to a successful end. Bernd Wegner, professor of history of the Bundeswehr Academy: "Stalingrad is perhaps the only battle of the Second World War, at the mention of which every German will tremble even today. . December 23.Still no orders. Its just terrible. and December of 1942 and the first half of January 1943. $152,972. Making up for colossal losses in people, equipment and ammunition for a long time. We havent eaten or slept in three 1942. Russia, and for what? August 23. . . Russian snipers hit anyone who shows himself carelessly from behind shelter. . There was in addition ample violence within the Red Army, perpetrated against soldiers who were unwilling to risk their lives. I own many books about WW2; the personal accounts are always the best. Diary Entries Of a German Soldier at Stalingrad Heartfeltzero 5,108 Views 4d via iPhone The entries were written by William Hoffman. In the blocks captured two days ago Russian soldiers appeared from somewhere or other and fighting has flared up with fresh vigour. Why is that? The Germans would never fully recover. . His fascinating 2015 book, Stalingrad: The City that Defeated the Third Reich, and the Battle that Changed World History (PublicAffairs; also available in German, Russian, Swedish, Finnish, Spanish, and Chinese editions), tells the story of this battle from the Soviet side. In what way was it a battle that changed world history? . A soldier prepares to throw a grenade. If in the morning we manage to advance 20meters, in the evening the Russians throw us backward. 'Next, I have to take care of Oberholz. We are on hunger rations and waiting for the rescue that the Fuhrer promised. In the Battle of the Coral Sea, on May 78, 1942, American naval forces stopped the, Japanese advance and temporarily relieved Australia of, the threat of invasion. It first details the unit's combat in the great German victory at Kharkov, then the advance to the Caucasus, and finally the brutal winter of 1942-43. decided to give ourselves up to capture in order to save our soldiers lives. Unlike Germany, where foreign slave workers made up 25 percent of the war economy by 1944, or Great Britain with its exploitation of colonial resources the Soviet model was one of self-exploitation. by Oleg Grigoryev 21 Aug 2003, 18:17, Post worse and worse. .. The retreat of the Nazis in that particular battle is seen by many historians as the turning point of WWII. The most notable account used in both is the brutal six-day long battle between 16 and 22 September 1942 over a grain elevator where, according to him, only 40 Russian soldiers (he refers to them as "devils") were found dead in the elevator at the end of the engagement, while his battalion in comparison, suffered disastrously heavy losses. We dont have a single officer, and the non-commissioned officer had to take over the command of the division. testimonials about the war by those who were on the front line, beyond the BERLIN: A guilt-ridden account of an ordinary German soldier's experiences in World War two is countering a recent trend among historians to portray Germans as victims of the war. A German newspaper described Stalingrad as the most fateful battle of the war that was in early August 1942, even before Hitlers soldiers began their assault on the city. Yesterday Russian katyushi [small rocket launchers] and then tanks halted our regiment. While some of these things indeed happened, they did not signal an abdication of communist rule, quite to the contrary. There are very few men left in the companies. 'But have I myself really taken these slogans to heart? Ive had my fill. By It was the most ferocious battle in human history, claiming the lives of hundreds of thousands. by Odessa2 21 Aug 2003, 19:09, Post From a letter from soldier Otto Zechtig, 1st Company of the "German WWII soldiers get proper burial after 60 years", The Age (2008) The German War Graves Commission's (Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgrberfrsorge) . In them, Leutnant Sander described in harrowing detail the barbaric deaths of both German comrades and Russian soldiers, with as many as 15 men executed before his eyes on one occasion. I found them in the archive of the Institute for Russian History of the Russian Academy of Sciences. One day I shot With the help of an arctic wstopped just before Moscow. . World War II was a total war, in which civilians as much as soldiers were part of the war. commander of the 2nd Battalion of the 518th Infantry Regiment of the 295th enough ammunition to last until evening; the soldiers have not eaten at all in A group of Russian soldiers fight to hold a strategic building in their devastated city against a ruthless German army, and in the process become deeply connected to two Russian women who have been living there. by Lawrence Tandy 21 Aug 2003, 20:32, Post August 10. . units of the German 6th Army and part of the 4th Panzer Army amounting to Hitler remarked that with the 6th Army, he "could storm the Heavens". . He is fat and bloated and has his full pack on and . Even civilians were considered vital defenders of Fortress Stalingrad and not allowed to evacuate until several days after the beginning of the bombardment. We are absolutely exhausted; our regiment now has barely the strength of a company. . November 18. It is pure hell here. This is how soldiers and officers of Course Hero is not sponsored or endorsed by any college or university. Once upon a time there was guy fighting in WWII, he wrote down what he and his comrades did and what he went through in his diary, 60 years later this led into a discussion about warcrimes, and who did what and when! "It is pure hell here." The Russians have gone over to the offensive along the whole front. .. . 'Written during the fighting, on long marches and often after terribly gut-wrenching events, Sander's diaries offer a frank and honest assessment of the German situation in 1941 and the unforgiving nature of war on the Eastern Front. . On November 8, Hitler, announced that the German Sixth Army had taken Sta-, lingrad, but in fact, on November 19 and 20, the Soviets. Our division has a cemetery near Stalingrad where more than 1,000 people are buried. This is worse than any torture. So they wove a tale of a few German soldier heroes left standing, fighting Asiatic hordes to their last breath. Asked by the historians about what motivated him to keep fighting to the point of exhaustion and beyond, he talked about scenes he had personally witnessed: of German soldiers dragging a woman out of the rubble, presumably to rape her, while he helplessly listened to her screams for help. Communist ideology had an enormous mobilizing power during the war; this is one of the core arguments of my book and it challenges how other scholars have understood the Soviet war effort. . It revealed that many people kept diaries, contrary to popular belief. The Nazi regimes first response after the successful Soviet encirclement in November was denial. . . The letter had been sent by the German Federal Archives, which. A German soldier rests at Stalingrad. . The action you just performed triggered the security solution. . the said book became an antiquity in bibliography. .. by tonyh 21 Aug 2003, 18:14, Post On January 14, 1942 he added: 'Even if we manage, against my expectations, to stop the Russian advance, then no one needs to know more than necessary about the hammering we have received. . The German 6th Army (300 000 men) was formed at the inception of Operation Barbarossa (the invasion of the Soviet Union). He was so disillusioned that he predicted that Germany would lose the Second World War by as early as December 1941. . He wrote: 'We found the bodies of many Russians who hadn't been able to walk further and had been shot by the guards. That was one reason why these interviews could not be published at the time. fiance, December 29, 1942. Recently, the Orthodox Church has incorporated Stalingrad into its prayers, even though the church was hardly present during the battle itself. We go in a direction on Surovikino. 'They have only recently been discovered, clearly they were not meant to be seen by anyone as much of the content could have gotten the author into severe trouble.'. The Germans were being rounded up prior to marched to death. Those who are merely wounded are lucky; they will doubtless be at home and celebrate victory with their families. Diary of a German Soldier (161 results) Many of the interviewed soldiers at Stalingrad agreed that the nurses performed exceptionally. He didn't react when I ordered him to raise his arms. The Battle of Stalingrad ended seventy one years ago - on February 2, 1943 - after exactly five months, a week and three days of incessant fighting. Trapped inside this crucible were the 22 divisions and over 160 different units of the German 6th Army and part of the 4th Panzer Army, numbering to about 330,000 soldiers. My nerves can't take any more.'. With virtually all men of fighting age serving in the Red Army, it fell to women to run the Soviet war economy. . transport units to the infantry are as good as sentenced to death. In Germany everyone believes we already hold Stalingrad. Fierce fighting is going on. People who are now sent from transport units to the infantry are as good as sentenced to death. . We havent eaten or slept in three days. Force of the 212th Regiment. . Take Vassily Zaitsev, the famed sniper at Stalingrad, who killed 242 enemy soldiers over the course of the battle, until he suffered an eye injury, in January 1943. Leutnant Friedrich Sander lost faith in the German war machine after cracking during the brutal Operation Barbarossa - the German invasion of the Soviet Union, which began in June 1941. . November 29. Reese's account shows how the Nazi war machine corrupted ordinary people. We can already see theVolga; firing is going on all the time. The Russians have stopped surrendering at all. . 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