Where the Iron Crosses Grow

By early December the situation at Kerch had become deadlocked, and Allmendinger took steps to finally eliminate the troublesome Eltigen beachhead. The Germans provided Sturmgeschütz-Abteilung 191 with 12 artillery batteries and Stukas to support Brigadier-General Corneliu Teodorini’s 6th Cavalry Division’s attack against Eltigen at 0500hrs on December 4. Two mountain-infantry battalions from the Romanian 3rd Mountain Division spearheaded the attack on the southern end of the beachhead, which gained ground. Attacks on the northern end of the beachhead failed. Gladkov’s troops had limited ammunition due to the Kriegsmarine blockade, and the troops had been on limited rations for weeks. Continuing the attack on December 5, the Romanians slowly rolled up the beachhead from north to south. On December 6 Teodorini committed all his forces, and the Soviet perimeter began to crumble. After three days of heavy fighting, Gladkov decided that he would lead a breakout attempt to reach the Soviet positions near Kerch. This was a desperate decision, entailing a march of more than 12 miles through Axis lines. On the night of December 6/7, Gladkov led a group of more than 1,500 troops through the Romanian 14th Machine-gun Battalion’s lines and succeeded in breaking clean through the enemy perimeter. The next morning, the Romanians overran the Eltigen beachhead by 0715hrs and took 2,294 prisoners. Teodorini’s Romanian units suffered at least 865 casualties in reducing the Eltigen beachhead, but Soviet losses were much larger.

Gladkov managed to make it to the south side of Kerch before running into elements of Faulhaber’s Grenadier-Regiment 282, which blocked their path. Although only 4 miles from Soviet lines, Gladkov’s exhausted troops could not fight their way through the city of Kerch. Instead, he formed them into a perimeter along the water’s edge, just east of Mount Mithridates. Although some Soviet sources refer to this action as the battle of Mount Mithridates, the Soviet troops were not on the mountain itself and instead clustered near the water, hoping for rescue. It did not take long for the Axis to figure out what had happened, and Brigadier-General Leonard Mociulschi’s 3rd Mountain Division was assigned to eliminate the Soviet group. He quickly surrounded Gladkov’s group with three mountain battalions, while German artillery and Stukas pounded the trapped enemy into submission. After four days of this, Mociulschi’s 3rd Mountain Division overran the Soviet position on December 11 and took 820 prisoners. Gladkov was not among the dead or the prisoners, having been evacuated by sea just before the end.

Petrov had succeeded in creating a firm army-size lodgment at Yenikale that Allmendinger’s V Armeekorps could not defeat, which greatly added to the strain on AOK 17’s limited resources. However, the Eltigen beachhead was a clear defeat that cost Petrov a reinforced division, as well as a great deal of Gorshkov’s diminished naval transport. Yet the Axis ground forces had proved to have very little offensive capability left – just enough to defeat troops who lacked armor and artillery support. Given the Soviet lodgment across the Sivash and the lodgment across the Kerch Straits, it was obvious by mid-November 1943 that a force as weak as AOK 17 could not possibly survive an all-out Soviet offensive once Tolbukhin and Petrov had gathered sufficient forces and supplies. However, Hitler had no intention of giving up the Crimea without a fight.

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The Third Reich’s military situation on the Eastern Front deteriorated rapidly in late 1943, as the Red Army crossed the Dnepr River at several points before the Wehrmacht could establish a coherent defense. Kiev was liberated on November 6 and it was evident that Germany had lost the strategic initiative. Faced with one disaster after another, Hitler dug in and refused to consider withdrawals, even when military common sense dictated otherwise. He also failed to appreciate the reduced capabilities of his armies, and believed that they could still operate with the kind of superiority they enjoyed over the Red Army in 1941–42. In looking at the Crimea, Hitler saw terrain that was eminently defensible and a full army to defend it – why should AOK 17 evacuate the Crimea? Adding to his misperception, the Kriesgmarine assured him that they could supply the army in the Crimea indefinitely or evacuate it if necessary. Thus, in Hitler’s mind, AOK 17’s situation was not analogous to AOK 6’s situation at Stalingrad, one year earlier.