Tank Warfare on the Eastern Front, 1941-1942: Schwerpunkt

Kempf’s XXXXVIIII Armeekorps (mot.) was advancing due east toward Kursk while Lemelsen’s XXXXVII Armeekorps (mot.) was immobilized around Bryansk and Orel for lack of fuel. Determined to push back the Bryansk Front’s 26th Army covering forces north of Mtensk, Guderian and von Schweppenburg prepared a deliberate attack to break out of the Mtensk bridgehead on 22 October. Guderian decided to mass his remaining armour in Kampfgruppe Eberbach, which was given the 6.Panzer-Regiment from 3.Panzer-Division and I./Pz.Regt 18 from the 18.Panzer-Division, giving him six Panzer-Abteilungen with about 150 tanks. After initial efforts to break out out of the Mtensk bridgehead directly failed, Guderian reverted to the standard formula of a flanking maneuver by sending Kampfgruppe Eberbach to cross the Zusha River west of Mtensk near Roshenez. On the night of 21–22 October, several companies of schUtzen crossed the 40-meter-wide Zusha river in rubber boats to secure a bridgehead, then German pioneers began building a 16-ton bridge. The bridge was not completed until 0930 hours and it took three hours for the first German armour to get across: the III./Pz.Regt 6 (three Pz.II, sixteen Pz.III and five Pz.IV) under Hauptmann Ferdinand Schneider-Kostalski and the 1./SR 3 with infantry mounted in SPW half tracks. The Soviets had shelled the bridgehead heavily but the 26th Army missed the opportunity to launch a counterattack with the 11th Tank Brigade before the Germans got panzers across. Now, Schneider-Kostalski’s small force advanced rapidly eastward to seize the village of Shelyamova. Around 1300 hours, seven T-34s from a company of the 11th Tank Brigade that had been in a nearby assembly area moved to engage the approaching German column. A brief tank battle ensued, with two T-34s and two Pz.IIIs knocked out. Inexplicably, the Soviet tanks broke off the action and retreated, enabling the German column to capture the village and establish a defensive hedgehog for the night.¹²⁸

During the night of 22–23 October, much of the rest of Kampfgruppe Eberbach crossed the small bridge over the Zusha, including two more Panzer-Abteilungen. When morning came, Eberbach’s forces fanned out to roll up the Soviet defenses still at Mtensk from behind. Despite the successful outflanking maneuver, it still took more than a day to overwhelm the 6th Guards Rifle Divisions but, by late on 24 October, Eberbach advanced with the III/Pz.Regt 6 to reach the Mtensk–Tula road, where they caught a retreating Soviet column and engaged them in a wild night-time tank battle. Two KV-1 tanks were disabled in close combat and three other Soviet tanks knocked out. Fuel was a problem for the panzers throughout the offensive and since the normal supply trucks could not cross the muddy terrain around the Zusha River, Eberbach had directed that each panzer regiment would use tank transporters towed by Sd.Kfz.9 semi-tracks from its Panzerwerkstattkompanie to carry about 9,000 liters of additional fuel – enough to refuel one Panzer-Abteilung.¹²⁹

On the morning of 25 October, Eberbach used his remaining fuel to form a Vorausabteilung from Schneider-Kostalski’s III/Pz.Regt 6, the 1./SR3 (SPW-mounted infantry), and detachments from Panzerjager-Abteilung 521 and divisional artillery, and sent them up the road to Tula in pursuit. The 26th Army had been caught off-guard and was falling back toward Tula, but it managed to emplace a huge minefield on the main road near the town of Chern’. However, the retreating Soviets had made the amateurish mistake of not leaving a rearguard to cover the obstacle by fire and the German vanguard simply bypassed the mines and reached Chern’ by dusk. It appeared that the village had been abandoned but, as Schneider-Kostalski’s panzers moved in, they spotted a number of T-34 tanks. Apparently, the Soviet tankers had gone to sleep, not expecting the Germans to show up until the next morning. Schneider-Kostalski fired a parachute flare to illuminate the area and another brief night mêlée ensued. The T-34 had less of an advantage at night since combat occurred so close that the 5cm gun on the Pz.III had some chance of successfully penetrating its side armour. After several of their vehicles were hit, the Soviet tankers withdrew.