Tank Rider: Into the Reich with the Red Army

The brigade had suffered significant losses in personnel and hardware in fighting for Skalat. The 3rd company commander, Senior Lieutenant Grigoriev, was wounded; platoon leaders Lieutenant Kravtsov (he was burnt by petrol from a petrol bomb that broke at his feet), Gavrilov and someone else, as well as Sergeant Major Vasya Blokhin, my friend from Siberia, were wounded. The commander of the second company, Senior Lieutenant Gulik, the commander of the submachine-gun company, Lieutenant Kolomiitsev, and some other officers were killed. In front of my eyes a sniper killed a leader of a machine-gun platoon from the machine-gun company, a tall, slim and cheerful Bashkirian Lieutenant. He was supporting our two platoons, mine and Shakulo’s, with his machine-gun platoon. We buried him in the garden of a house. I am sorry that I cannot remember his name, or the names of soldiers from my platoon who were killed in Skalat.

We were young, did not have any experience in life, and cared very little about our lives and the lives of others; sometimes we were even indifferent. In Skalat the soldiers arranged a game with death. Quite a brilliant idea they had: they ran from one side of the street to another under machine-gun fire from a German tank. They had a competition – who could run across the street fastest and not be hit. Normally Fritz would be late and open fire on an empty spot. Some soldiers ran across the street several times and even I dared to run across the street once, so that I would not look like a coward in the eyes of my subordinates. Luckily, no one was hit. I think that the Germans did not quite understand our game and thought that we were mounting an attack and were leaving several important buildings without a fight. Such things happened. Everything could happen in the war, and we considered such things normal.

After the end of battles for Skalat, when our company marched on the central street, I noticed the façade of a house, which looked more like a sieve – it was all battered by shells. I asked the soldiers whose house it was and how defenders could have stayed there. The men laughed and said that it was our house, the house where we had stayed for several days. I came up to company leader Titov; zampolit Gerstein was also there. I pointed at the building, told him about the conditions that we had had to fight in. Titov also remarked to the zampolit of the battalion that it was amazing how the company could hold such a battered building and repel German attacks, closing their access to the rear of the battalion. ‘Was it hard?’ Gerstein asked. What could I answer? I said: ‘It was OK.’

THE BATTLE FOR GUSYATIN

From 20 March, 1944, onwards the Brigade received a new order: to advance towards the south and south-east to the towns of Gusyatin and Kamenets-Podolsk. Tridtsatchetverkas arrived, and our company left as tank riders with the Brigade’s vanguard, as we had had fewer casualties in the previous battles (tridtsatchetverka is a nick-name for T-34 tanks – translator’s comment). It was also because the 2nd and 3rd companies, as well as the anti-tank rifle platoon, had lost their company commanders and platoon leader. These three companies only had one platoon leader each – Lieutenant Chernyshov in the 2nd company, Junior Lieutenant Belyakov in the 3rd company and Junior Lieutenant Drogovoz in the anti-tank rifle company. A five-day march to Kamenets-Podolsk started, with the objective to liberate it and encircle the enemy. At that time Kamenets-Podolsk was the centre of a province. We advanced on Studebaker trucks. Those trucks were real beasts! Sometimes they would rumble on the mud roads like tanks. We would travel on T-34 tanks even more often. The offensive was almost round the clock – during day and night, often we would make a long halt, hiding from the enemy’s air force, which inflicted high losses on us, both in personnel and even tanks.