With SS-division 'Wiking' through Russia

The following story is based upon the 1943 book 'Wiking door Rusland' ('Wiking trough Russia') published by Storm in Amsterdam. It tells the tale of the first months of the SS-volunteer division 'Wiking' made up of Nordic Germans, Danes, Norwegians, Dutch, Flemish and even a few Swedes (Sweden was neutral during WWII) and Fins. As the original book was pure German propaganda I will not follow it altogether and leave out some of the offensive comments and propaganda.

This will thus be the story of a division, one of the elite division of Germanies elite force, the Waffen-SS.

The iron cross

I had made the choice somewhere in February 1941. I walked along the Kalverstraat in Amsterdam and passed the German army recruiting station. Large posters of proud and heroic soldiers looked upon me from above and other posters telling me of the heroic battles to come shouted towards me. I was convinced, I wanted to be a hero as well, just like them. I craved the adventure which enlistment would bring me. Adventure beyond my wildest dreams. And tough I was only 17 back then I was old and wise enough to decide for myself, at least I thought so. Inside the recruitment centre I was greeted by a friendly but robust sergeant. His face was scared, from the battles in France last summer, he told me. He had saved seven men from a burning bridge after the French blew it, and this way he earned himself an iron cross. Off course he showed me his medal with a broad smile on his face before continuing his story in his broken Dutch. But he did not have to make an effort anymore I knew this was just what I wanted, the shining metal made my eyes blink.
That evening I told it to my parents whom where dumbstruck, scolded at me and did not talk anymore for the remainder of the evening. ‘How stupid of them’, I though back then, ‘what do they know, I will be a hero, their son will become a national hero, they should be proud’. Nevertheless mother cried three days later when I was leaving for Germany and our training camp. We would write each other I promised.

Two weeks later, after having spend a week in barracks in Apeldoorn and another week near Xanthen we arrived at the Truppen-Ubungsplatz Heuberg. This was the place where we where trained to become disciplined and crack soldiers. When, in April the training was finished we thought we could take on the entire world, we couldn’t have been more wrong.
On the composition of the division the following, back then we did not know where we would be going when the training was finished. The war in France was won for a long time. And so the wars in the Balkan and Greece. All of Europe was ruled from Berlin and we, the Dutch where to become a part of the great German nation. Regiment ‘Westland’ a unit composed of Dutch and Flemish was trained to become a part of the SS-division ‘Wiking’. Some 20,000 men commanded by SS-Gruppenführe Felix Steiner.

At Heuberg there where some 3,000 of us, commanded by German officers. A good part of us had signed up because of their ideologies, others, like me because of the drawing adventure. And then there where those whom signed because they would find a place to eat and cloth themselves, they did not thought much of this whole soldier thing and we detested them like those whom signed up for their ideologies detested the adventurers. There where even some whom where tricked into the division, or so they claimed as I did not believe them. They said they where promised to get a sport training or be able to study in Germany and return to the Netherlands as government officials. Some of them left us and returned to Holland. It was like that in the early days, I did not know what to think of it.

At the end of April we where trained to SS standards and by the first days of June 1941 we set out for the east. Large operations awaited us, we would move down upon the hated Bolsheviks.
And thus we left Heuberg, trained, equipped and with a sense of coming glory.

Mission Kiev

War had been declared on the 11th of June. At four in the morning the first bombs where thrown by Stuka’s. Minutes later the enemies artillery positions where bombed by shells from all across the line. Over a 1000 kilometre line, from the black sea to the Baltic German troops surged forwards. In the first hours of the eleventh the red armies broke on all fronts. In Moldavia, to the south of Odessa, our Rumanian allies and Mansteins panzers broke trough. In the centre two powerful armies crashed trough the Bolshevik lines. The southern force included Bulgarians, Slovaks and Sepp Dietrichs 1st and 2nd SS-Panzer divisions, our brothers in arms. All of Europe, all Germans where on the move ready to crush the Bolshevik threat. Yet in those first days the superiority of the SS troops over all others was obvious when Dietrichs troops halted almost 150 kilometres from their starting line after only 48 hours of war. More to the north Riga an attack on Riga struck home. The first days of the war where a startling success and the word Blitzkrieg regained a new meaning.

Our regiment, ‘Westland’ was finally to become a part of the division when we arrived at Kozienice. Here, more then 20,000 soldiers where encamped when we set out on the 15th of June, only four days after the war had started. Crossing the river Bug on the 17th we saw the first ‘victims’ of war. Burned out Boshevik trucks and armoured cars. Blown up guns and emplacements. Not much later our column passed a large group of Red prisoners, guarded by some grinning soldiers of the army. You could read ‘victory’ from their faces. When we had travelled two days trough the expanses of Ukrain, the new grain basket of Germany we knew for sure this war would be won. The roads on which we drove where only mud and it was told this where the main roads throughout Russia. The farms and houses where old and ramshackle, the fields badly tended. In all the Ukrain looked like Germany in the middle ages. Whenever we moved trough towns the soldiers looked at the concrete apartment buildings left and right. “They live in bunkers but aren’t even good soldiers.” Was one of the remark heard often.

On the 17th we heard our goal would be Kiev. The major city along the river Dnjepr. An assault would be made soon and we would be part of it. We would reach the front within two days.

Our baptism of fire

Next day we crossed the famous Stalin line just an hour east of the city of Korosten. It would only be a day before we would reach Kiev and in the far distance we could hear low monotonous rumbling. The impact of shells was reverberating across the plains of the Djnepr. The landscape around us was desolate. Here and there small fires still burned. Two days ago the fighting had started, retreating Bosheviks had held onto this line, although troughly prepared, for no more then a few hours. In the background, on a blackened field lumps could be seen. We knew it where dead soldiers although we did not think it where Germans. All fallen German soldiers should have been buried like the heroes they where.

And so we moved on, trough the rear of the Stalin line towards the rumbling of cannon. Four hours later we travelled trough a forest, ‘the forest of death’ we would call it for the coming weeks. Our long column of trucks and a few panzers drove over a small, almost ploughed dirt road. Trees and darkness between them on both sides.
A muffled crack and a scream was all I heard. I the truck right in front of us a soldier fell from his wooden bench clutching his chest. The raw soldiers besides him screamed, jumped up and made the truck swing from side to side as the scrambled for their rifles. Our co-driver jumped up from his seat in the front cabin and dragged the heavy spandau machine-gun to the left. Then he primed it with a quick move at the same moment hell broke loose. The forest on both sides of us exploded in an inferno of fire. Bullets struck the trucks in front of us and officers and sergeant yelled: “Ambush, we are ambushed. “Return fire now.” “Get out take cover!” Our baptism of fire was a fact and nothing resembled the clear and disciplined exercises during training anymore. Chaos was all around and I felt the fear gripping my throat. Then a explosion lifted the truck in front of us up and smashed it down on its side. Most of the men riding it got out and scrambled toward a ditch where they where greeted by a hail of bullets. The spandau threw its lead into the dark forest and more bullets where shot at running shadows. As most of the others in our truck I got out and fell with my face in the dust, rifle underneath my belly. Below our truck the supposed cover was crammed and a few partisan bullets found their mark. The soldier with whom I had been taking only a minute ago died in front of me.
I gathered all courage inside me and jumped up, running towards and alongside the cabin of our truck I threw myself with my back against the truck which had been smashed onto its side. A white hand was smashed between the heavy boarding at my feet. Slowly some of the men where getting grips on themselves, I was one of them and fired a few rounds into the woods as a bottle landed metres in front of me, exploding into a ball of fire. As soon as all had started it was over. A dozen of our men ran towards the trees, shouting encouragements and firing away. Two death partisans, one of them a young black haired woman where peppered with bullets by red faced soldiers standing besides them. “Hold your fire, they are death already.” An officer shouted at them.
We had had our first fight. For the first time we had been at the receiving side of fire and we had suffered our first casualties. The severity of the fight, in the eyes of us, raw soldiers was extreme. But the casualties where relatively light. Of our truck three men had been wounded, one died. Of the truck in front of that seven had been wounded and four died, including the driver. Then there where four other deaths from outside our company and half a dozen wounded. In the woods and on both side we found seven death partisans, two of them women.

Right away the discussions started on partisans. We had not expected them in this part of Russia as we where greeted with smiles in every village. They had even given us pies and fruit although they had nothing themselves. But clearly not everyone in the Ukrain felt liberated. Our war had begun.

Kiev, a city on fire

When we first saw the suburbs of Kiev the next day our troops had already captured them. All around the streets where littered with the garbage of war. Burnt out trucks, discarded rifles, helmets and so on. Death soldiers lay here and there and some wounded where sitting with their backs against the walls of damaged houses. Most of the death where Russians, and none of the wounded German. This made us feel confident. We knew we where better soldiers and when we would be wounded our medics would aid us in the shortest possible time.
Our trucks drove us into the city across squares full of rubble, on one of them a big statue of Lenin was missing its head and an arm. On another Stalin had fallen from the base altogether. Then we drove into a small park and the trucks halted. Before us was a large encampment of our troops. Soldiers, dust covered, some bandaged sat all around, some of them looked proud others worried and some just had empty eyes, looking into nothingness. We dismounted our trucks and where led into the big tents by some of our officers. Before us where tables laden with food of every possible kind. I had not eaten so well since I left home five months ago. After all of us finished we where marched to the east, into further the city, marhing like on a parade.

Kiev had been won yesterday. The Bolsheviks had fallen to a massive bombardment, the one we had heard. Subsequently the First Hungarian army and four German divisions had attacked the defences from three sides and smashed right trough. Within a day the Bolsheviks where evacuating the city leaving behind thousands of wounded and dead. As we walked trough the streets firing went on but this where only small pockets. Our regiment, ‘Westland’ would be put inot action against one of those remaining pockets on this side of the river Dneiper.

When our company halted within a garden between two large concrete buildings the rattling of machine guns became very close. Later I saw two men of our company had been wounded by this burst of fire. Across the street in our front stood some older buildings from the Tsarist period of Kiev. As we where covered within the garden the low hum of tanks approached from the rear. Three Pzkw 2’s and two Pzkw 3’s where about to support our advance.
As I looked about I saw the faces of nervous men. We had seen some real battle yesterday but compared to what was before us that had been absolutely nothing. This time there would be machineguns, tens, maybe hundreds of enemies and whom knows what else. When a young lieutenant signalled with his hand most of us rose at once to our feet and advanced. The tanks raced forwards and peppered the buildings across the street with bullets and some shells. Covered by this fire we began to advance across the street as well. Of the few bullets which hissed past from the Bolshevik side of the street only a single one hit. With our backs against a white wall we waited for the tanks to make another move but at that moment all was silent and nothing moved. “All right, the tanks will advance slowly along the street and we will follow.” Spoke another office, this one a captain. “Our goal is the grey building with the columns and the red flag. As we approach the tanks will open up on everything that moves inside. We do not expect there to be more then a dozen of them but stay careful nonetheless.”
The last words of the captain where drowned in noise as the tanks advanced leaving a cloud of smoke from their exhausts. On of the smaller climbed a pile of rubble on the corner of the street created during our initial advance. As we slowly filled along the opposite of the street a large explosion shattered our eardrums followed by a second. The small tank on the corner of the street was thrown on his side with some extensive damage to the front. The crew climbed out. To our rear one of the Pzkw 3’s was a burning torch, apparently it had driven across a mine or explosives. At that moment the wall alongside which we walked was flogged by bullets from all windows on the street. Shards of plaster struck my face and arms but others where not so fortunate, they where hit by bullets and fell. As the remaining tanks reversed the company skedaddled to the rear, leaving a dozen dead and wounded.

"We will smoke them out with the artillery and Stuka’s.” A grim-faced sergeant commented. “What about our wounded?” was the question of a boy faced soldier. “The Medics will be here within minutes."
And so they where. Four of our guys where dragged from the street by those heroic men as the Reds ignored the red crosses on their helmets. Later, we where still covered in the gardens, four Stuka dive bombers blasted the Bolshevik stronghold to pieces. Another ten minute barrage reduced the building to rubble. This stronghold had fallen but our company did not see it as a victory at all.

The banner reads (translated from Dutch):

V for victory, Germany wins on all fronts!

This morning a Berlin news-paper reached us. Altough my German is not that well but I could make up more then enough to be startled by the news. Of course I knew the German armies in the Ukrain where making great headway but the news from all fronts is the same. Germany is winning everywhere and before Christmas the Bolshevik state will be no more and the German standards of culture, progress and humanity will be everywhere. The greater Germanic empire will rule the European continent. Those dogs in England and overseas will be on their knees before us, pledging to join Germany as the great nation of the future. The thousand years Reich of the Furher is being build at the moment I write this.

On the 20th of June we fought in the streets of Kiev, aiding the XI Armee eradicating the last pockets of resistance. On the 22nd we where in a reserve position when the northern Banhof was stormed. I still thank God we did not have to take part in the attack as the Reds blew the Banhof-hall with a company of our soldiers. In the end it was taken but the costs where severe. I have never seen anything like it and do not wish to see a battle as savage again. From the 22nd onwards we where moved to the southern parts of Kiev, a quiet place without any fighting and so we where able to rest and clean ourselves. The news I read of the other fronts was interesting; Riga had fallen only a day after Kiev, on the 21st of June. Our armies where fast moving towards Moscow and Leningrad.

On the southern front our Heersgruppe is preparing for the battle of the Crimea. Our own part of the front (northern- and central- Heersgruppe-Sud) will be moving across the Dnjepr within a few days. What our target will be from there is unknown to me the only thing I know at the moment is the rest we all are enjoying after this hard journey trough Poland and the Ukraine.

Crossing the Dnjepr and into Poltava.

A thick blanket of fog covered the river Dnjepr, one of the most magnificent rivers of Russia. We crossed it early on the 27th, leaving behind Kiev on the high western bank of the river. The day before our regimental commander; Fritz von Scholz addressed us. ‘Wiking’ would become a part of the XIX Armee Korps of Heinz Guderian. This korps already existed of two Panzer-divisons, the 3rd and 14th, none of them SS-divisions. We the motorized infantry, would be their support troops reinforced by three new battalions: SS-Panzer-Nachrichten-Abteilung 5, SS-Panzer-Aufklarungs-Abteilung 5 and SS-Panzer-Pionier-Batallion 5 (Engineer brigade attachment). Our goal would be the town of Myrhorod in the province of Poltova only recently captured by Sepp Dietrich and his legendary panzer divisions; 2. SS-division ‘Das Reich’ and 3. SS-division ‘Tothenkoph’. From Poltova we would prepare for our next great offensive, the last stretch towards the river Don.

The situation on the 29 of June 1941 on the southern part of the Russian front. In the south the battle of the Crimea is well underway while Sepp Dietrichs has reached the Sea of Azov near Rostov. A shattered but determined Soviet army occupies the last defensive line before the Don, only 200 kilometres to the North-east. The northern part of Heeresgruppe Sud undertook an offensive against Chernigov, the first move in the closing of the Dnjepr pocket. The blitzkrieg of the previous month had slowed down because of the immense disorganization of the ‘Kiev operations.’ From June 23 till July 14 the centre and bulk of Heeresgruppe Sud reorganized, reinforced and re-supplied itself for what they thought would be the final offensive.

The roads in Eastern Ukrain, where we had now arrived, where no better then those in the Western part. Mud and dust greeted us everywhere and the farms where even more shabby then those we had seen previously. Had we been greeted with joy by the population of the Western Ukrain, a similar air of liberation from the Boshevik joke was not encountered here. Partisan attacks where far more frequent and our supply lines had to be guarded more extensively. On the 30th we arrived at the town of Myrhorod, a collection of medieval hovels and haystacks. The ‘house’ in which we where quartered was no more then a ramshackle collection of walls and a thatched roof. There was no chimney nor a proper floor. The one room was only filled with three chairs a small table and a couple of straw mattresses. The local population where possibly even worse then their homes. Ugly and dirt-covered they looked like having travelled further then we had, not having had a proper bad for ages. Myrhorod would not be the place to prepare for the next offensive we had hoped for. The only thing we could do was drinking vodka and this we did with the greatest possible quantities. Consequential men did not behave themselves and the Polizie-company had to intervene frequently in order to punish for theft or far worse felonies against the local population or each other. We needed to get out of this place of nothing.

The Bolshevik bear

As the sun caressed Eastern-Ukraine with it first rays we left Myrhorod. It was July the 7th and the time for offensive had come at last. It was not that I was looking forwards to battle, it frightened me, but I wished to leave that despicable village more then anything. The soldiers of our company had dragged themselves into the trucks in which we had travelled for so many miles. Most of them where still drunk, some drunk enough they where not able to stand upon their own feet.
It looked as if the officers did not care. ‘They will need a bit of an encouragement for the coming battle.’ they must have thought. We set out north across the depressing plains and into Russia proper. Now our march towards the Don, our march to victory was on finally.

The Kursk-Kharkiv offensive (July 8- July 19) was one of the most severe battles of operation Barbarossa. Twenty-two Axis divisions, 11 German, 7 Rumanian and 4 Hungarian, fought eighteen stubborn Russian divisions. In the end the Russian resistance broke and the Eastern-Ukraine was secured. The march to the Don, now only a hundred kilometres, could continue.

The next day we drove trough Trostyanets, a tiny hamlet where the remainder of the XIX. Armee Korps where encamped. We joined the 3rd and 14th Panzer-division and together attacked the Bolsheviks. On the first day of the battle regiment ‘Westland’ did not see a lot of action. We where strafed two times by the Red air force, shooting down one of their planes but apart from that the advance behind the panzers was in the position of reserves.
After dusk we where gathered by our company commanders, to the north the thunder of heavy artillery rolled and numerous flashes illuminated the clouds. A few farms where on fire and we all knew this would be our moment to go in. It turned out to be a regimental attack with some 4,000 men in total. The Bolsheviks had been softened up all evening and now it was our turn to drive them out of two villages. Together with us where eighteen tanks and a two pieces of tracked artillery. Form the moment we set out from the grove in which our company was sheltered we received artillery fire. Running from tree to bush and from bush to little grove most of us got trough this frightening gauntlet unscathed. After crossing a broad field of wheat we received burst of machine gun fire but due to the size of the attack the enemy was unable to concentrate all fire on our company alone. Several of us went down but almost a full company arrived at a little dry ditch on the far end of a small pasture. One after the other soldiers and officers jumped into the ditch and hit from bullets and shrapnel, the chaos of battle was all around. “Remember, they are far more frightened then we are. They are outnumbered, outgunned and facing the best soldiers of the Reich. I want that line taken within ten minutes.” the voice of our Hauptsturmführer (captain) had reached our ears trough the violent explosions of artillery shells ruining the hamlet in front of us.

In front of us was a hamlet of farms and a little Orthodox church with its golden pear shaped dome. More then half of the buildings, except for the church where on fire of destroyed to a pile of rubble. Between those houses and amongst the sheds ditches and fields surrounding it numerous Boshevik soldiers had dug in. Machineguns rattled anti-tank guns fired at our panzers and mortars threw grenades at us. This was our first battle in the open. The confines of the city where gone, no more threatening windows, dark shadows and looming corners. This time every bush, every pile of hay, every crater or ditch could contain a concealed enemy soldier. A scharführer (sergeant) led half a dozen men outsourcing of the ditch and into a large crater some fifteen meters in front. Form there they ran for a wooden fence and received fire but luckily no one of them was hit. The Scharführer signalled to his men and then they went on shooting at some Reds I could not see, one of them was falling and then I student-lid felt a thump in my side. I had stood in the ditch all this time, enthralled with the fight in front of me. I had not noticed the officer besides me until he pocked me in the ribs. “Move out! You are going with the next group. ”I did not know exactly what I was doing but I climbed outsourcing of the ditch after a few others and ran with them to the same crater clutching my rifle to my chest. Next we took the stretch to the fence. I was fourth out of five and saw the ground in front of me erupting when a mortar shell exploded, the fence was torn away, blood splattered my face and uniform and I felt the warm sticky gout between my fingers when I fell on my side. Dazed for a few moment I looked at the clouds in the sky, a bird was flying over, metal was flying between the white speck and me. The wising sound of shrapnel brought me back to reality and I stood up only to see a handful of young Bolshevik soldiers walking towards me with their hands on their helmets, I aimed and shot but my bullet went far wide. Through the buzzing sound in my ears I could hear someone shouting “They are surrendering, hold your fire!”. I could only murmur “sorry” but no one heard me.
The group of enemies soldiers, now not looking so much of an enemy with their hands held high and without their killing equipment walked towards us, smiling and saying in bad German ”comrades.” But just as one of our Scharführers set outsourcing to meet them a machine gun erupted again. The Scharführer and three of the Bolsheviks fell to the ground. ”What is happening!” I heard myself screaming. But I knew already. It had been a trick and so I kneeled and aimed at the enemy soldiers whom had crossed the corner of a burning building in front me. My bullet hit the door besides him, splinters flew everywhere. On my left the first group, or actually only half of them retreated to the ditch. In front a dozen Bolsheviks attacked us, screaming and firing their rifles. A grenade exploded not far away but I did not wince, I only shot a few more rounds. And then, there he came a large brute bear of a Bolshevik. He was holding a machine gun, spraying the ditch behind me, killing without any doubt. Bullets flew past me on every side but I raised my rifle to my shoulder, aimed and fired. The bear went down.......

The iron cross

I had come out unscathed. Better even, I was some sort of hero to my comrades. I had stood fire on my own in an open field while my comrades all around me covered in the ditch or a crater. It had only been a few moments during a ferocious battle. The Reds had counterattacked and I had been on my own, shot one of the Bolsheviks whom had killed two and wounded three so far. The next thing I know is scores of Waffen-SS soldiers streaming past on all sides and a Obersturmführer (lieutenant) kneeling besides me. “You will receive an Iron cross for that boy.”

I did not say anything for the remainder of the day, what happened next I do not know. Yes, we took the village but further on. The next thing I remember is the two days after the battle, the offensive was still continuing and the rumbling from artillery could be heard to the north. The company was arranged in two lines next on a roadside. We just had our lunch and a bit of rest before moving onwards. But then our regimental commander Hilmar Wäckerle arrived in his kubelwagen and addressed us on the battle for the villages. He spoke of our courage and the glory we had brought to Germany and then he took two iron crosses from his pocket. One of them was for a large, broad shouldered man whom had taken out two mortar squads. The other was for me.

That evening we camped in a little grove. Here one of my company spoke of the attack on the village, of the big man I shot and the men whom surrendered. A discussion was underway within seconds. Some of us thought it had all been a trick, I was one of them. But most of us thought a Bolshevik officer must have ordered his men to shoot the cowards whom where surrendering. “They where, surrendering they really where. Why would they come at us unarmed if it was a trap.” One of my comrades said. Another questioned: ”What happened to them?” They had died, all of them shot in the mayhem of the counter-attack, shot by their own men and some of our company said they would have done the same. This war was grim, it was ugly and there was no honour here. No honour, not even with an iron cross on your chest. And not a single one of them understood the long face I had for the next few days.

Out of action

Only a few days after receiving my Iron cross, instantly becoming the hero of the company, I fell serious ill. On a dark night I had ‘invaded’ a farmstead with two friends, we had asked the Russian occupants, sorry looking peasants for vodka which they gave us. As I was hungry I ripped a piece of pork hanging from a beam of their ceiling. With hindsight I can say this was no wise action at all. As the ruse of drunkenness ebbed away I feel seek quickly and was taken backwards to the regimental bandage station while our company moved forwards towards the Don in another attack. My journey to the regimental headquarters was one of bumpy roads and waling and screaming, in short a journey of agony. Three more where taken back by the same truck but they had all been wounded on the front, one of them died during the 40 minute drive. At the bandage station I was guided into a great tent where a bunk had been prepared for me. Exhausted and far away I threw up once more and fell into a great and long sleep. After waking up a nurse approached me telling me I did not have to be afraid, my disease was not dangerous, just highly annoying. It was just a bad case of food poisoning but would take my out of action for weeks. The effect lasted almost two weeks, after this period I could finally keep my food inside but was suffering from severe dehydration and had lost some twelve kilo’s of weight. The immediate effects of the food poisoning had gone but I was week and even had a hard time walking around the place. Somewhere during the first week of my stay at the regimental sick bay most of the doctors had gone forwards after the troops leaving behind some supplies, a doctor and two nurses to mend two score of sick and wounded. During my third week away from the company I got an order to report at the hospital in Kiev, some 300 kilometres to the west. I would go there in order to recuperate from my sickness and get strong again. It is was common practice in the early days to let those whom where able sort out for themselves how to move around behind the front and so truck and trains where crowded with “passengers” going one way or the other. It took me only two days to reach Kiev as I could travel most of the trip by train and I was happy about it because the truck which had taken me to the station had had no cover which was a serious annoyance in the Russian summer heath.

Kiev, the city in which I had fought a more then a month had changed. The empty city under siege I had left had been transformed into a busy military hub. On every street you could see German soldiers, trucks and Kubelwagens raced past while the population looked about, hollow eyed. “What had gone on here.” I wondered but all too soon I found out. Men where forced to labour on German projects all around the city while much of them had been brought to Germany and Poland to work the factories. Their wives and children in the city where left on short supply of food while before their very noses tons of every imaginable type of food where brought to the front. I did not understand what had happened here, why this had happened to the people of Ukraine whom had hailed us as their liberators in the first day of the war against the Bolsheviks. “Why where our possible allies mistreated like this?” Unfortunately I left Kiev two weeks later, a healthy man again, without any answers to my questions.

Reinforcements

My return journey took me as long as a trip around the world would have taken me. The first part from Kiev across the Dnjepr had been difficult enough because of the immense railroad gun that had preceded us on our track trough the suburbs of Kiev. Due to it’s slow progress we lost more then a day until we where finally about to overtake it. The gun was very large and must be extremely powerful and impressive. Two waffen-SS comrades on leave from the 2nd SS-Division ‘Das Reich’ told me it was going to the front in order to support an attack and subsequent bombardment of Moscow. They told me more amongst which much recent news of the front. To the north the Dnjepr pocket had been closed after weeks of bitter fighting and as a result some 10 Bolshevik divisions for a total of 250,000 men had been taken prisoner, together with countless tanks, trucks and artillery pieces. On the front of Heeresgruppe Sud some great victories had been fought during the remainder of the Don offensive. All of the Belgorod region had been captured and, had it not been for the severe storms which had tortured the region for weeks turning every road and field into a puddle of mud and flooding the river, the Don had been crossed and the Bolshevik front destroyed. Furthermore they told me of the battle for lake Pipus and the drive for Moscow which was now only 200 km from the front.
They had been friendly for along time but their camaraderie cooled a great deal when they found out I was Dutch instead of a German and my explanations of Holland being a part of Greater-Germany did not matter much to them. It was a feeling I only encountered amongst waffen-SS soldiers, they just thought someone not from Germany was not worthy of wearing the SS-runes.

During the second leg of our train journey the track was attacked and broken up by a partisan attack. They had to be flushed out by a squadron of Stuka-Stuerzkampfflugzeug planes. A most spectacular sight no more then three kilometres from our position. In all it would take me eight days to find and get back to my company which had changed markedly.
Throughout the campaigns of the last moths we had lost some 1400 in the division for a total strength of almost 20,000. Before I returned the ’Wiking’ had been reinforced by fresh recruits from all over western Europe. Most of them where small, meagre looking men and we all got the impression Germany was already short of manpower. The requirements which had been made by the Waffen-SS half a year ago where no more. When I had signed up men had to be at least 1 meters 80 in length. Now you could sign up if you where over 1,70. Because of this the men where not a strong and as healthy looking as the remainder of my company and we had some serious reservations about their training and use in battle.
Other units had suffered as well, Dietrichs divisions had taken a aggregate total of 28% casualties from the outset of the Bolshvik war. Divisions in Heersgruppe nord suffered some 40% and some of those of the Rumanian army had suffered as much as 65% because of their hard fighting and bad equipments during the early stages of Barbarossa. But, or so we thought, the end to all this was close.

The cigarette

Apart from a few score of reinforcements to the regiment our company also received a new commander. Franz, our commander whom had led us trough training and the first months of the war had been killed by an artillery shell two weeks ago. The man whom took his place arrived together with a dozen brand new Spandau machine guns in one of our supply trucks. Descending from the passenger seat he leaped onto the ground throwing up a few small clouds of dust. The mud of the past weeks was by now a long gone memory and so dust settled on the noses of his troughly polished and shining, black boots. The Hauptsturmfuehrer (captain) took out a bright red handkerchief, an eagle holding a swastika in the middle of it , from his pocket and wiped the dust of his boots before he looked around. On his spotless cap we all could see the skull of SS-division ‘Tothenkopf’ and his sleeve was covered in a band with the SS-runen. What caught my eyes immediately was the shining medal on his breast hanging from a white, red and black strap. The medal looked like an iron cross but was none, its glittering told us it was a silver medal, it was a knights cross. ‘Our new commander was a decorated war hero, a die hard SS-Offizier!’
When he looked up again after whipping the dust of his boot he eyed the group standing in front of him looking in amazement at this new arrival. Some jaws had dropped others just blinked their eyes, not one of us dared to speak. ”SS-mann, he said, pointing at me, or actually at the iron cross I was wearing on my own breast. ”Take my bags and bring them to my new quarters then tell me where I can find the commander of the regiment.” Astonished I did not move but could only bring out a few words. ”Will you be commanding our company?” The Hauptsturmfuehrer looked at me curiously then he took a shinny cigarette case, also adorned with the eagle and the Swastika, from the inner pocket of his well trimmed jacket and lightened it. He looked at me for some more seconds while he drew once. Then took the cigarette from his mouth and threw it on the ground, putting the heel of his boot on it to make certain it was no more lighted. ”Did you not understand me soldier?” His eyes changed from the artic cold of a moment ago to a fiery blaze. ”I said: take my bags and bring them to my barracks, then get me to see the commander of this regiment.” I was taken a back by his overpowering words but still stumbled forwards while he continued his rage: ”Is it that they are decorating dumb fools in this division or are they already handing out medals to non-Arians, those not of the pure blood. Is that it?” The last question he shouted right into my ears, delight in his eyes as he humbled me before my comrades. ”The time of laziness, the time of relaxation has gone. ”Wiking will become a true SS-division like it should be!”

That was how I met our new commander, a man which would give us loads of problems but for us the problems of his strict discipline and the harsh discrimination on non Germans was as bad as we could have imagined. We would only learn what real hell was until we would fight again.

Hell is a cornfield

’War is hell.’ they say and everyone admits. But most of those whom admit do not really contemplate the real hell war is. And so I did not know it before Hauptsturmfuehrer joined our ranks. I had been ambushed, had experienced urban warfare and had fought in a little village. I had even killed a man in close-combat but until that day in August I did not know how much hell war can be.

In a continuation of the offensive I had not taken part in because of the food poisoning drama Belgorod had been taken. The Bolshevik resistance had been severe as ever but still a ruined city had fallen into German hands yet again. When I returned to ‘Wiking’ it was spread out for some fifteen kilometres not very far south of Kursk. Together with handful of Hungarian divisions our corps would take care of the southern part of the offensive. The date was set to the 14th of August but would be postponed two times, much to the chagrin of Heinrich Sigel, our Nazi hauptsturmfuehrer. He had drilled us until we where sick of us, he had inspected us time and again and punished us for every little piece of neglect, nitpicking about a scratch on a rifle-butt. But then finally the day we would make our assault came and he shone like the sun. Sigel was a certified madman but nevertheless many of followed him into death like the loyal puppets we where.

Before us where miles upon miles of rolling plains and pastures, a farmstead or a small house here and there. At the sound of his whistle, the same squeaking noise we knew from the drill-call of the last weeks, our company surged forwards. Tanks and armored artillery accompanied us on both sides, it was all a most grand spectacle. Until the Bolshevik artillery fired. High command had not deemed a preliminary bombardment necessary probably because they did not know where the enemy was. But when we left our positions the Reds knew exactly where we where. Shelled rained upon us like hail bursting left and right and after minutes a tank and two tracked vehicles where left burning on a field full of holes and filled with small lumps of dead or dying. Trough a stream we went and with our wet shoes we climbed out on the other side taking our first bursts of machinegun fire. Our accompanying tanks and halftracks opened up and fired upon an enemy they could not see. Having dragged ourselves out of the creek we entered a large cornfield and here it was I saw hauptsturmfuehrer Heinrich again standing on a large boulder waving us forwards as if no bullets flew past his head. Chips of rock flew away as his boots, which where spotless no more, took a hit from a bullet. I knew one of his toes must have gone as blood was oozing from the hole but he did not give a crimp, in fact it looked as if he had not even noticed his wound. I could not help but admire the mad courage and coolness of this man and so I followed his wave and flung myself into the claustrophobic confines of the cornfield.

I could hear the heavy low rattle of the machine guns of the enemy and then high sound of hours. I could hear shouts of anger and pain, shredded into silence by bursts of shell and grenades. I could hear everything but see nothing and so I stopped running and pointed my gun to the front as the shouts of Heinrich Sigel urged me on. ”Die hard men, die hard!” Stumbling forwards I ran into a comrade and the impact of our collision made us run in a parallel direction, towards the sound of the low heavy rattle. Into and trough the hissing holes, some of them filled with a corps and puddles of blood, grim faces looking up at me. ’Dying hard, what was that? Where there more ways to die then one?’
Corn disappeared in front of me and so my thoughts drifted away yet again while I still ran forwards my ears now buzzing with the noise of explosions. Not a moment before I knew the disappearing corn was effected by bullets ripping trough the field like a scythe during harvest the comrade besides me was caught by one of them. Half his face was taken of as he was thrown back into nothingness at my feet. I ran on, not thinking anymore, just running and then there was no more cornfield and I was able to fall onto my knees behind a little stone wall. In front of me, no more then 30 meters soldiers, what seemed like a whole army of the enemy, where working their machineguns and mortars. Punishing the wall in front of me and firing into the cornfield like it was all a big game I looked around once more and saw many more of the company huddled behind the stone wall. ”We have to get out of here before they come and get us!” one of them screamed in panicked while another turned and ran. I did the same, not even thinking about picking up my rifle again. The long shafts of corn where hitting me in the face and even if it did not aid me in any way I pushed them away before me.

Then, panting from exhaustion I crashed into a line of men led by the hauptsturmfuehrer. ”Why are you coming back, is the fight over yet? I can hear the guns, can’t I?” He screamed at me while ordering the rest of the troops trough the field in an orderly, disciplined fashion. I gestured as tear filled my eyes but he only looked at me with the cold eyes I had seen before. Then he stretched out his arms and gave me a brand new automatic machinegun. ”Follow the others and be worthy of the iron cross you wear.” I was startled but turned, gripping my new weapon and running the way I had came from. Within seconds I was back at the wall. This time the scene was altogether different. German soldiers where firing at the Reds crowding the low rise in front of them while a tank crushed a fence and fired into their midst. Fighting went on and this time I behaved as I ought to do, firing at machinegun- and mortar- crews and throwing my two hand grenades. Heinrich Sigel overlooked the brutal scene with clear satisfaction.
The carnage of the cornfield we had left behind was not on his mind, only the victory was. That morning we carried the field as we would day the same evening and yet again during victorious battles the next days until we arrived in Kursk to meet our comrades from the northern wing.

Dust, dust and dust

In Kursk the celebration of the victories of the last days was intense. Although not all of us had much to celebrate, the Hungarian divisions had apparently not been up to their task and so the main assault of the southern wing fell upon the shoulders of three German divisions. The casualty-lists told the tail. Gaps had fallen everywhere within 'Wiking' and our company, especially had suffered tremendously. Hauptsturmfuehrer Heinrich Sigel told us he had known beforehand we could make a proper assault yet he knew we could still improve in our fighting capabilities. Some us where filled with pride by his words and radiated this while others thought about the casualties, the dead and the suffering of the last days. I thought about my personal hell in the cornfields and would find myself waking up from a bad dream in which I wandered trough a claustrophobic cornfield for months.

The generals had not granted us much time to recuperate from the last days as we assembled, got a handful of reinforcements and new supplies of ammunitions. From Kursk the German army would march due east and as the Hungarian troops where transferred to the Crimea some Rumanians and many German divisions took over their position. Our march or rather ride, to the new field of operations was only interrupted by one single event. While driving trough a small Russian village shots could be heard.
The hauptsturmfuehrer ordered our truck and halftracks to halt as he descended and demanded to know what was happening. A polizie officer of the regular army told Sigel some supposed partisans where holed up in the cities church. The polizie unit was trying to get them out of it in order to find out if the Russians where really partisans but the Russians inside the church where too much afraid to come out. Heinrich brushed away the polizie officer whom outranked him and ordered one of our company to torch the churches roof with his fire-thrower. The soldier obeyed his command and within seconds the roof was ablaze while the polizie officer objected and ordered Heinrich Sigel to halt his actions. The stone cold hauptsturmfuehrer only answered; "I am not yours to command, if you have any objections you should write a letter to minister Himmler in Berlin. Until that moment I am only responsible to SS= officers." And with that he walked towards our truck and took a machinegun from one of the soldiers whom objected as he knew what was about to happen. In return he got a hard punch in the face which must have broken his nose. Sigel walked towards the church doors and once they opened and old men, women and children streamed out coughing from the smoke he fired into the crowd. The company looked in agony at the scene in front of them but no one dared to stop their superior.
As the scene fell silent again the polizie officer made one last remark. "We did not know if any of them where guilty at all maybe…." But Sigel turned his back upon him and retook his position in the halftrack at the front. As we left the scene I looked at my comrade besides me and the man with the broken, bloodied nose. We all knew we had to get rid of this men before many more innocents might die. A scene like this should never repeat itself nor should we be thrown into battle as carelessly as during the week we just went trough. Behind us a large cloud of dust obscured the church from view while the heath of noon made sure we should see more dust in the future.

The charge of the Walloons

No more then three days passed before we where yet again in the thick of a fight. This time we where not the one to make the assault but where instructed to follow a Walloon company* as a reserve. Our artillery and the Luftwaffe had softened up the enemy considerably and so no stiff, organized resistance was encountered. To the ordinary soldier there was not much difference in danger as small groups of Bolsheviks where encountered every now and then. Attacks had to be made in order to flush them out during which many prisoners where made. During one of the larger actions that day we got the change we so much longed for.

Hauptsturmfuehrer Heinrich Sigel, not able to hold us back when he heard the sound of bullets flying thick had to throw us in during a particular vicious fight. The Walloons had had a hard time so far losing many men to mines and other traps. When a group of Bolshevik tanks came up their ordeal became harder and harder. In the end they where able to destroy enough of the tanks to persuade the remainder to retreat and call of the counter-attack but those of their comrades whom where surrounded had played havoc on the unit we where to support. Sigel ordered us to the sound of guns and attacked in the midst of us. During the subsequent fight in a small piece of woods many of us got separated of each other. Three comrades I could trusted and I followed our hauptsturmfuehrer into the jaws of a machine-gun when Heinrich Sigel collapsed into the dust.
The first thing he mentioned when we approached him was the dust covering his new, spotless jacket. Only then did he mention to us, standing around him in cover behind some trees, he was wounded. ”Take me up. One of you, bring me to the rear, the others show me what the SS is made of.” But at his command not one of us moved, we looked from one to another until I my friend with the broken nose suddenly said; ”Let’s do it.” “Do what?” demanded the wounded Sigel, ”Do what? As we closed in and pointed our muzzles at his scared face his eyes lit up in defiance. ”You are not going to do that, you are to much of asset of cowards to do that! I will make sure every last one of you gets executed for this.” And as he grabbed at his side for his Luger pistol three shots rang trough the trees.

I ripped the knights cross of our hauptsturmfuehrers bloodied jacket and threw it towards the position of the enemy. The silver medal attracted a burst of machine gun fire but we laughed. ”This has never happened.” mentioned one of us said and indeed, it was as if it had never happened. And so Heinrich Sigel was now only a nightmare of the past.

* The SS Volunteer Sturmbrigade Wallonien was formed around the person of Leon Degrelle, French speaking Belgian counterpart of the Dutch Mussert, leader of the Nazi-oriented party (The ‘Rexists’). Unlike his Dutch counterpart Degrelle organized his party members into a military unit and went to the front as their commander. Although the Walloons where overlooked early in the war because the Germans did not see them as ‘Germans’, Berger allowed Degrelle to take his unit to the front. Attached to ‘Wiking’ the Walloons saw their first action on the Don front. Much later in the war SS Volunteer Sturmbrigade Wallonien was upgraded to a division.

(exhausted infantry)

The four Scharfuehrers

Two weeks of killing where behind us now and we where resting on the river Don. SS-division ‘Wiking’ was one of the first units to reach the great river. Its clear waters stretched before us for as much as three kilometers and even someone from Holland was astonished by the sheer size of this massive river. Our losses had been high yet again and now we had reached the Don, our goal, the war still wasn’t over. September was drawing to a close but Moscow and Saint Petersburg or Leningrad as those despised Bolsheviks call it where not captured. The newspapers where optimistic as ever, we won on all fronts they said but when would this war be won, when could I return home?

The questions haunted my mind when I heard the rustle of the grass as someone approached me on the lonely spot I had found to read the news. ”How are we doing?” our new company commander, Hauptsturmfuehrer Fredrich Reislander asked me. ”O, excuse me sir. I went to this place because I wanted to read the papers in quietly.” I apologized while wiping a tear from my cheek. ”Don’t have to apologize everyone needs some time for his own, especially after a few weeks as hard as the last.”
Hauptsturmfuehrer Reislander had been promoted from within the company and fortunately this forty year old former Obersturmfuehrer (first lieutenant) was not a fanatical Tothenkopf Nazi like our former commander. ”But how are we doing, is Germany still victorious on all fronts?” He smiled as he asked me again. ”They say some thirty new divisions are being trained, amongst them they have hundreds of the most powerful tanks. They also say the national government of Russia will be inaugurated in Moscow before Christmas. Will the war be over by then?” I uttered the question as if Reislander was own my father. ”I am sorry to hear you believe Goebels’s nonsense. I had thought you would see the difference between reality and the madness made up by those Arian Nazi bastards in Berlin. They should shoot them all in the back like Sigel, shoot them in the back and let us finish the job properly.”

My mouth fell open at once and I gazed at my commander in utter disbelief. .”Do not worry for me boy, I do not say this to anybody around. There are very few people I can trust over here, most of them would turn be over for being ‘disobedient of my superiors’. He said those last words in a funny mocking voice and so the fear in my mind cleared a bit, he did not know what we had done, he just did not like the Nazi’s. ”No, no. I am sure I can thrust you after what you have done to Sigel.
I chocked myself in the little piece of bread I was eating as Reislander looked into my eyes. [i]”But, but,…” was the only thing I could say, my head read from the choking and restraning myself from running away. ”We did not kill him.”
”Aha!” He smiled. ”You are giving yourself away with the ‘We’. How should I know there where four of you?” ”Four, but I was on my own.” I said trying to protect my accomplishes in vain. ”Don’t worry boy I will not do a thing to you, in fact I am grateful you did so I had not to do it myself. Sigel was mad, hadn’t I told you?” He was silent for a few moments but I was worrying every more. My time had come, I would be shot now. Shot because we killed an officer, no one would tolerate that.

”The man was mad, clearly mad. He would have killed the entire company if he had not been stopped. And you did just that for which I am gratefull as I still have a company to command now” Hauptsturmfuehrer Reislander said while he handed al little flask of cognac to me from which I drank most grateful. This was all too much for me but Reislander went on.
He cleared his throat and then made the proposition. “I will promote you to Waffen-SS Scharfuehrer (sergeant) as I did to your three accomplishes. I need men just like them. We want to ride out this war as safe and as whole as possible and you are just the men I need to do that.”
“But how do you know?” I asked our commander. ”Scharfuehrer Mikael told me. He was feeling guilty as hell and told me about the revenge he had taken for his broken nose. In the end he broke and told me all, about the four of you, where and when. But instead of arresting him like he had thought he received my gratefulness and a promotion, just like you.”

And so I became a Waffen-SS Scharfuehrer. Not for being a hard soldier but for saving a company.

Russia, the land of snow and ice

As September turned into October so did Summer turned into winter. In Russia there are no such subtleties as autumn or spring. Guderians forces, our division of motorized infantry and the 3rd and 14th panzer-divisionen had arrived at the great river Don. The campaign was over as our goal was reached and so, we set up our camp. Tents where brought up for the first time in weeks but only to be occupied for a few days after which we started building underground shelters and half-burrowed log-cabins. The dirt would protect us from enemy artillery shells from across the river as well as bombs from the Russian sky.
In this position we our division was reinforced by a new regiment, (Pz.) Artillerie Regiment 5 , our own motorized artillery. Some of the guns where tracked and armored, others had tractors nevertheless they where modern and those 105mm SPA "Wespe" artillery pieces would wreak havoc amongst any Bolshevik opposing us.

For all that we new our stay at the Don would be a quite, lazy and relaxed one. We would enjoy a well deserved rest at last. But, as our new company commander, Fredrich Reislander, probably knew beforehand, the winter would not be a time in which to rest. The summer had been ours, the time in which the German superiors technology reigned on the fields of Russia. The winter would be the time for the Bolsheviks to get their revenge.

We build and build and before long had build ourselves a happy little village complete with street names, ours was the ‘De Ruyter-straat’. Our new artillery as well as some of the more veteran artillery units with ’Wiking’ set up superb positions from which they could produce a terrible crossfire at every point of the three kilometer wide river. To add to the possible destruction ‘nests’ for our heavy and light machine-guns had been build and reinforced small earth bunkers. ”Let the Bolsheviks come and we will slaughter them.” was the thought on everybody mind. But, we would come to them first, and do so very, very soon.

Winning the battle against the ‘other’ enemy

The cold of early October struck us like a frozen knife. Before we knew we where unable to do anything but huddle in our bunkers besides a fire. Our hours on watch where the worst of all. During a night watch we where not allowed to make a fire and so all warm blankets rotated for those whom had to stand guard at those horrible moments. On the other side of the medal the temperatures below freezing point made our company into a tight group of comrades. As said before we shared our blankets with the unlucky ones whom had to stand in the freezing cold and occasional snow at night. But, we did more. The weak amongst us where passed over for guard duty and received some extra food from their comrades.
Sometimes large packets of food reached one of us from home. To the entire bunker such an occasion was a celebration like Christmas as all within was shared. Some of the nights where good, we sang song and told each other stories but for every good night there where three cold and lonely ones. During those cold months real friendships evolved amongst the soldiers of ‘SS-division ‘Wiking’.

Standing besides large fires we warmed ourselves during daytime, conversating with one another. We wondered when our winter uniforms would arrive as some of us were anticipating their arrival every time a truck arrived.
On one of those warmer clear days in late October Hauptsturmfuehrer Friedrich Reislander approached our little group, three of his four new Scharfuehrers and some SS-manner (privates). He send us on a foraging mission towards a nearby Russian village. We would get a motor, a halftrack and a truck and the job for the fourteen of us would be to retrieve as much clothing as possible. Before we left we where warned for one thing; “Do not make the villages martyrs”. I knew this was the reason he had send us, he did not wish to have any trouble with the local populations, no partisans killing or kidnapping his soldiers, no trouble.

That afternoon the little column of us set out for the village, the ride would only be one of seven kilometres but due to the thick layer of snow trough which we had to plough, it would be a three hour ride.
As we arrived at the village it was as if we had come to a ghost town but one of the soldiers had noticed some smoke coming from one of the houses as we approached. And so we searched the houses one after another carefully. In each house we left one blanket and one coat as to make sure the inhabitants would not freeze to death and so there was not very much for us although we thought it would be enough for the company. We left having never seen any of the village’s inhabitants but sure not one of us was going to freeze to death.

Failure in the snow

During the last weeks of October and the first of November a terrible shock befell ‘Heeresgruppe Sud’. The winter had only just announced itself when the Bolsheviks embraced it as a new powerful ally. As the power of the German army was based on its material superiority this edge was now seriously blunted. Most of our heavy equipment could only be moved with difficulty while our motorized units slowed down to a crawl in the thick snow.
‘Wiking’ was one of the motorized divisions which would suffer from the new landscape of southern Russia. But for the first weeks of winter we where safe and cosy encamped at the banks of the Don.

While the left wing of the eight army was pushed back the positions of some of its most northern regiments, bordering our position ,where not attacked. Except for a few minor incursions and a fight with a gunboat on the Don our regiment, regiment ‘Westland’ did not suffer from the October offensive.
By the 8th of November the German front in the region of Rossosh collapsed and some 50,000 soldiers where retreating in disarray leaving behind a gap a 100 kilometres wide. Form this moment on ‘Wiking’ occupied a vulnerable position at the head of a wedge deep into the enemies territory. Guderians second panzer armee was the only part of the front still on the Don apart from a corps near Rostov. The only thing we experienced while this tragedy was taking place was the sound of intense rumbling to the south.

On the 13th of November our camp on the Don was busy again. The sky was clear and the temperature pleasant. Trough a thick layer of snow SS-regiment ’Westland’ moved trough the west moving across the roads we had taken east months ago.

The first months of the winter war of 1941 had been hard for Hitler’s forces. They where taken by surprise by the harsh Russian winter and the communist abused this surprise and their knowledge and understanding of the same season to great effect. Within that same season the communists and winter saw each other as allies in combat against the Germans. As soon as the first snows had fallen immobilizing the German armoured divisions and heavy frost had grounded the German Luftwaffe Soviet forces surged forwards on all fronts. They fought as if it was their moment of revenge. On several places the German lines where broken and terrible slaughter occurred. Let us move across the front from north to south.

Some 250 kilometres south of Leningrad a almost three months of fighting collared the snow red. In a comparatively small region several Soviet armies attacked overrunning the German defences only to be thrown back in confusion when the German armies counterattacked. This seesaw battle continued for three successive months as the Germans and Soviets fought for control. In the end the exhausted Soviets and Germans fell back on their former positions. Some 400.000 men on both sides had died.

Further to the south, on the Don near Rossosh, the German front was thrown back 150 kilometres before they rallied. Several divisions where all but destroyed. Due to the enormous gap in their lines it took the Germans long to organize a counterattack. In doing so their front to the north of the gap had to be withdrawn. The northern part of Heeresgruppe Sud suffered some heavy casualties during those months, casualties which could not be replaced before the Soviet offensive of January which led to the battles of Bryansk.

Still further to the south the combined Rumanian armies where unable to hold the Crimea. Seven divisions, including the Rumanian high command, where besieged for three weeks in Sebastopol. It took Soviet commander only a week to force them to surrender.

In late November all defeats some of the lost ground was retaken but the losses suffered could not be replaced. December and the first half of January where times of relative quietness, the only enemy to be fought was winter. This battle was another battle lost by the Germans although many of them where able to adept to the new situations.”

On the second day of the march Guderians army was turned south towards Belgorod, it would be our task to contain the enemies breakthrough and retake the Don-front. Heavy fighting was ahead of ‘Wiking’ and we would not see the Don again for another seven months.

The Bolshevik thunder, repelling the spear-head

Our period of quietness, our little lull of peace was ruddy disturbed by the Bolsheviks during their ‘Rossosh offensive’. Guderians 2nd panzer armee including SS-division ‘Wiking’ moved to the east and the south where we where ordered to fill the gap and stem the tide of Red soldiers. For the first days we only encountered wounded soldiers and broken units but before long artillery fire could be heard in the distance.

And still we rode south towards Belgorod, in order to safe a broken army from utter destruction. Our two supporting divisions of infantry where positioned on a line stretching from our former front on the Don. ‘Wiking’ would be the mobile link between our old position and the two Panzer-divisionen to the south. In so doing our army swept into the gap with the 3rd panzer on the most southern position and the 4th panzer on the inside, next to us. Four days after leaving the Don we encountered first resistance. The snow had hampered our movement but still we where able to reach a speed of forty kilometres a day, until we made contact with the Bolsheviks.

Hauptsturmfuehrer Friedrich Reislander, our company commander ordered us trough a snow-covered field not more then a hundred miles northeast of the city of Belgorod. Bolshevik tanks had been spotted on the horizon but more important a battalion of infantry, part of the 137. rifle division as we found out was spearheading this part of the advance into the ‘Rossosh gap’. We where the first organized defence they had encountered for a few days and so their cohesion was lacking. Thus, we where able to break them and throw them back on their armoured support and that was the moment we encountered a new Bolshevik weapon of terror.

While we moved across this snow-covered field, sweeping up a handful of prisoners from a Bolshevik battalion our ears where shattered by the screeching noise of incoming rockets. The sound was terrible, terrifying and so many of us jumped to the ground while others stood as if glued to the ground by fear.
A score of tremendous explosions rocked our position and several of our men where killed outright, then the real terror of this weapon kicked in as almost half our company ran.

The katyusha’s had shattered our company and for the first time since we where on the front we where utterly defeated. Half of the company was fleeing for the cover of a low hill in the rear while the other half was either dead or lying still on the ground in the ploughed field. In front us, the few of us whom remained alive in the field a wall of Red soldiers moved against us, left and right a few tanks supported their assault. Shells exploded amongst our position and one of our overturned halftracks exploded into a ball of fire raining down little part of wood and metal on us.

Slowly we retreated from crater to crater and one time I had to duck into a water filled hole of mud when a shell exploded near me. The rattling of machineguns made us seek cover and pinned us down, now the Bolsheviks came closer and closer we where completely unable to move forwards or retreat.
If some of our panzers had not shown up at this moment of the fighting our company would have ended up as prisoners or worse. Within seconds two of tanks of the enemy had been disabled and the supporting fire of ours was enough to encourage us. I was not the only one whom dared to stick his head out of the mud hole I was occupying.

For a few more minutes we remained in this field until we where able to retreat towards the rear, having repelled the first of many determined Bolshevik assaults. SS-regiment ‘Westland’ retreated a few kilometres to a good defendable ridge. Here we dug in and awaited the next attack of the 137. rifle division, having to endure another katyusha attack and an hour of artillery bombardment but we held our line and where there to fight another day. A thing which could not be said for the seventeen men we left behind on the field where we suffered our katyusha attack.

Preparing for the inevitable

The next day we where occupying a long ridgeline running from North to south. Due to the battle we fought yesterday, actually due to the men we lost that day we where now able to prepare a proper defense behind which we should have a decent change to repel the Bolshevik attacks which would come certainly. The work had continued all night and suddenly Hauptsturmfuehrer Reislander was not so much of a friendly commander anymore. He shouted at everyone of us and encouraged us to dig on when blisters made every single dig a moment of agony. “The pain you now feel is nothing compared to the pain you will suffer if you do not dig like the devil himself is breathing over your shoulders. We will strengthen this position all night and by the end of tomorrow you will all thank me. Go on dig!” We knew our task was hard but it had to be done, he was right, we had to dig trenches and foxholes to defend ourselves and so the regiment created a fortress on this ridge in just one night.

The echoes of axes in the groves to our rear supported our grunts while panzer engines made the noise complete. As far as I could see the plan was simple. In front of the ridge we would create obstacles combined with a few concealed anti-tanks experts. They would sneak out of their hiding place in the snow once the Bolshevik tanks had passed them. Behind them, on top of the ridge was the infantry. This was where we where dug in to repel the main attack and the Red infantry. Then, to our rear stood the artillery, supported by small groups of tanks and a few assault guns and halftracks this should be enough to hold them back, or so we hoped.

My task in this battle would be to make sure a group of three machine guns directed their fire against the greatest concentration of the enemy infantry. Holes where dug where the teams could work their guns and be protected from anything but a direct hit. The holes where strengthened by logs and an occasional sandbag and all was covered with a little layer of snow in order to conceal the line from the advancing enemy.

We where certain they would come. Yesterday we had blunted their spear head and now they where gathering troops to take this little obstacle and continue destroying our army they had defeated so utterly. All day long, as we broke our backs on the defenses German soldiers, exhausted, underfed and barely alive passed us. They where the last whom had escaped the enemy, all those whom where behind them had been captured or killed. The stories they told us where tales of horror and suffering. The Bolsheviks had surprised them during a blizzard, slaughtered thousands. Before long our officers intervened, the stories where not meant for our eyes. And from that moment on every refugee entering our lines was brought to the rear immediately.

Not long after midnight we where allowed to sleep and most of just lay on their backs in the mud and snow. We knew what horror would visit us at first light but we did not care now, the only thing on our minds was rest, sleep and so all of us huddled in a bundle of worn blankets and fell asleep without further ado. We where exhausted, worn, having had but little rest and labored much. How much of us would live for another night?

The sound of battle

While I was still far away in another world Strumscharfuehrer von Epp, the man with the broken nose, put his hand on my shoulder and whispered at me. ”We have to wake up the men, we have to be ready.” I opened my sleepy eyes and looked at him, nodding as to confirm his suggestion. Then I looked at my watch and noted it was just past seven in the morning, just an hour till twilight and the attack we all though it would bring us. Immediately I put away my blanket, put a crust of bread in my pocket and started to wake the men in the trench. One after another they took their position in the line and waited for the inevitable, eating the little food they had left to ease the hunger in their stomachs.

Three quarters of an hour passed before the eastern horizon turned red and the sun rose. Some light showed us the landscape around us and a few messages streamed back from the first lines. They would come, great movement was seen. The guns where manned, ‘wouldn’t they open the day with a heavy bombardment, wouldn’t they use the stunning rays of the sun?’. Silence was all across the line except for one of my comrades whom was singing a song in a very low voice, many where anxious, other could not stand the pressure and cried or looked around themselves like wild animals. Some wrote but many looked to the sky in the east which was turning a brighter colour of red every moment. A dull bang in the far distance was followed by some scattered movement in the trenches and then a shattering explosion threw up snow and dirt.

Within moments the air was filled with shells, explosions rent the air as men sought cover. Dirt and pieces of shell flew everywhere. We where huddled to the ground for minutes, face in the dirt while all around us shook. As we heard the rattle of machinegun trough the ear-splitting noise of the artillery we knew it was our time to act. The forward lines where attacked and most of the foxholes cleared with ease. The first men retreated to the main line as in a Napoleonic fashioned battle. As the fields in front of the ridge filled with Bolshevik men storming towards us our artillery opened on them. We saw them running at us trough grey fountains of dirt, dodging shrapnel and shell. One by one the machine guns and then the rifles of the main line opened on them to make the inferno complete. But their bombardment had done its damage and some portions of the line where deprived of defences. This became even worse when a few salvoes of rockets from the Stalin organs exploded amongst us.

As the enemy ran from foxhole to ditch and crater to stone our panzers received fire and one or two where disabled immediately. Others drove out of their covers and reversed to the back of the ridge while some charged downhill into the chaos. At the sight of these iron monsters the last bit of Bolshevik morale cracked and so the first wave retreated, leaving behind dozens of their comrades. Some of them where not able to get away from the battle scene and sought cover in the holes and craters of the first line. We had defeated the first line but already we could hear the rumbling sound of their heavy tanks.
Overcome with excitement some of the men left their cover and charged after the retreating enemy. Now the artillery fire had stopped we would have to create ourselves a new first line. I took seven men and ordered them to a few positions. Here we put our machineguns at a ready to counter the next assault. Together with a shacking soldier as young as myself I occupied a foxhole in the direct assault path of the Bolsheviks. In the few minutes left to me I tried to make him feel at ease as best as I could but I was not feeling like staying in this position myself very much.

A shattering explosion of a grenade, showering us with snow, announced the second wave for us. This one would be supported by a dozen tanks. As soon as the enemy came in view the soldier besides me tried to run for the ridge but I took him by his belt and put him back in place, his icy cold hands on the trigger of the machine gun.
The rumbling grew louder and louder while bullets flew across the steppe from every side. Chaos was all over the field.

Three minutes and as many hundred machine gun bullets later a giant T-34 sped for our foxhole and the only thing we could do was drop on our belly, face in the dirt. It was too late and we had to hope he would bypass us. After that, whom knows, maybe we would be able to run for it, otherwise we could try to stay in the hole. But no speculation could prepare us for the claustrophobic experience which we where about to have.

Instead of bypassing our little hideout the tank halted on top of it and while it fired a grenade at our comrade in the distance it began turning circles with one of its tracks. “We have to put a grenade between its tracks.” My comrade shouted at me as he grabbed for one of them. Just in time I was able to take the long grenade from him as we would certainly have died in the explosion. The tank turned and turned around one axel as dirt and snow filled the hole. Every moment the iron hull came closer and closer to our faces as he dug deeper and deeper. We screamed and looked for a way out of this hell but none could be found.

A terrible crash shook everything around us and threw a thick layer of snow over our bodies. Both of us passed out for the moment and as we opened our eyes we heard the whistle and impact of bullets. The tank had been taken out by our artillery and now the scattering crew was finished of by machinegun fire. As the metal on metal sound ebbed away the shaken soldier besides me crawled out of the only remaining little hole. Trough his fear he could not stay put for another second and thus he dragged himself out of our cramped spot until he suddenly stopped and fell, face first into the snow. My reaction was quick, I asked him what happened, not understanding why he did not crawl on out of our hole, past the mangled machine gun.. When he did not answer I gripped his shoulder and turned his face towards him. A empty bloody eye stared at me but the thing which frightened me most was that which was not longer there. The soldier whom had been besides me seconds before had lost its jaw and the entire left side of his face. I dropped him back and with a sick sound his face smacked on the saw and dirt again, colouring it slowly red.

Over the next period some bullets slammed into the hull of the tank while a single explosion rocked the metal monster. But I stayed in this little cramped spot, not knowing what to do or how to survive. And then all ended. The inferno had died out, the storm had passed over and we had won. The Bolshevik offensive was brought to a standstill.

Fighting and freezing

After the battle on the ridge regiment ’Westland’ fought on the frontline for another week. During this time severe casualties where suffered by the regiment and its parental division; Waffen-SS divison ‘Wiking’. But, during the week in which the Bolshevik offensive was fought to a standstill the Bolsheviks suffered thousands of casualties in death and wounded and even more in prisoners. Next to this they lost every sort of equipment including scores of tanks.

After the battles for the breach on the Don which lasted throughout November and into December ‘Wiking’ was ordered back north towards Kurks. During this period the division received some reinforcements to replace those whom had fallen during the first half of the winter. Of the 17,400 men of early October we had lost almost 3,500. From Kursk ‘Wiking’ was used in an abortive attack on Ostrogozhsk. A campaign which did not end in total failure because we recaptured some ground. Alas, we where very far from our objectives at the end of January.
1942 had started as a relative quiet period and we where only battling the other enemy, cold, snow and low supplies. Some of the men suffered from frostbite, some lost a limb or worse. Only in February we received some new, warmer, winter uniforms but those could never be enough for the entire division. And so we had to share what we had with each other. During this period we thanked our commander, Reislander, for his precognitive sights in sending us to the Russian villages for clothing and blankets because this far in the winter all villages had been plundered and ransacked. The plight those villagers had to endure was incredible and it was no strange thing partisan activity grew more common every month the winter progressed.

By the midst of February ‘Wiking’ was moved north as a part of Guderians 2nd Panzer Armee.The first battle of Bryansky had been lost and our front had been pushed back considerably yet again. Our forces would be used in a counterattack. Apart from some small fighting this would be the first battle we would experience since the closing of the Don breach, months ago.

The first and second battle of Bryansky
During the first battle of Bryansk the German 7th army commanded by Von Epp was pushed several hundred kilometres trough Bryansky and even more west into Klintsy. Several regiments where lost again in yet another battle against the Communist troops, the plight of winter and chaos. As the retreat ended in a severe blizzard which stalled the Soviet advance and the German retreat divisions and armies where gathered from the north and south in for a counterattack. The vital province of Bryansky had to be retaken. Many divisions did not reach the scene of battle before it got well underway and so it ended in an utter failure and even more chaos on the German front.
Immediately the Armeegruppe Mittel and Armeeguppe sud prepared the second battle of Bryansky which would prove to be a three week slug match, a seesaw battle in which both sides suffered considerable losses. At the end of this battle, late March the region of Klinsty was recaptured and a reasonable front re-established but not without decimating all troops involved. Most of the divisions which had fought in this momentous struggle where not able to conduct any offensive operations for months and it was due to this the weight thrown into the Stalingrad offensive was not as much as the German high command had hoped.

The winter battles had been hard and the German armies had suffered considerably from two enemies at the same time. During this long season the southern front was pushed back some 150 kilometers and the middle front almost a hundred. The Crimea stronghold of Sebastopol was yet again in Soviet hands and the Romanian army defending it had been surrounded and destroyed.
A total of fourteen divisions and many smaller units where lost during the entire winter, of the former almost three quarters had been from Germanies allies. Although this ‘irevocable’ loss in men and material was heavy it was not as much as the losses suffered by the Soviet army during the summer of 1941. But we have to keep in mind the Soviets where able to replace all losses suffered while the Germans could only replace a small part.

The end of Winter, a period of mud and bog was used by the Germans to move troops south, their next offensive would move against Stalingrad.