. 27800, to his parents, November 20, 1942. By 1945, Stalin made sure that official publications referred to him as the sole architect of Soviet victory over fascism. The Russians are defending themselves with insane stubbornness. His secret journals have been found 80 years later and are to be turned into a documentary by History Hit, the streaming network set up by historian Dan Snow. It is pure hell here. fiance, December 29, 1942. From the diary of Field Gendarmerie Sergeant Helmut "It is pure hell here." A German prisoner of war escorted by a Soviet soldier with a PPSh-41, 1943. From a letter from Senior Lance Corporal Joseph Tzimach, no. I then became curious about how these strivings compared to the Nazi German revolution and its version of the New Man. Stalingrad, as a culminating and prolonged clash between the two totalitarian regimes, seemed like the right place for this next study. . Unfortunately, I cant write everything to you. We havent eaten or slept in three days. . What drew you to study World War II in your book and, in particular, to the Battle of Stalingrad? 'His spine is broken, and he is totally paralysed. 10521 V, to Hetti Kaminskaya, December 29, 1942. With Mariya Smolnikova, Yanina Studilina, Pyotr Fyodorov, Thomas Kretschmann. The YouTube channel is a generally reputable source but this fact made me skeptical. Up to a thousand wounded soldiers a day are taken back to the rear from Stalingrad. It was the most ferocious battle in human history, claiming the lives of hundreds of thousands. . December 25.The Russian radio has announced the defeat of Manstein. Shes expecting me home when victoryswon. Bernd Wegner, professor of history of the Bundeswehr Academy: "Stalingrad is perhaps the only battle of the Second World War, at the mention of which every German will tremble even today. November 10. The Nazis' eastward expansion was halted and the Soviets went on the offensive until the end of the war. . My nerves can't take any more.'. The Nazi's loss at Stalingrad was the turning point in the war and Zaitsev played a key role in demoralising the Germans which lead to their ultimate defeat. It was the largest invasion force to date. Diary entries of a German solider during the Battle of Stalingrad Discussion/Question The entries are written by William Hoffman and records the fighting and general situation around him from the 29th of July to the 26th of December 1942. December 7.Rations have been cut to such an extent that the soldiers are suffering terribly from hunger; they are issuing one loaf of stale bread for five men. "Yes, we all together are not worth two of these Russians !"<br><br>Records from the diary of a German soldier who died at Stalingrad.<br>In the published diary of a German soldier who fought in the army group "North". We have been told we are soon going to be withdrawn to be brought back up to strength. I did the same to another who pretended to be dead.'. We are absolutely exhausted; our regiment now has barely the strength of a company. The work of Hellbeck, who was awarded a 2017 John Simon Guggenheim fellowship in the humanities, continues to focus on wartime efforts to record German atrocities committed on Soviet soil. Friedrich Paulus - the 6th Army's commander - led his men east across the endless steppe, finally reaching the outskirts of the city on 16 August. 140 of us, but by September 1, after two weeks of battle, only 16 remained. William Hoffman, "Diary of a German Soldier" Participated in the Battle of Stalingrad Germans seek to conquer Stalingrad Decline in German confidence over the years Faith in the leader We are all convinced that they can't stop us The Russians will be beaten The action you just performed triggered the security solution. They also wanted to create an archival record for posterity. Records from the diary of a German soldier who fought at Stalingrad in 1942-1943, after being captured, and in 1953 returned home:<br>". The military history YouTube channel The Armchair Historian opens their episode on the Battle of Stalingrad with the line "The average lifespan of a soldier in Stalingrad was just 24 hours.". 6 Dec. . How wrong they are. In addition, almost 1 million Soviet women served in the Red Army during World War II, half of them as ordinary soldiers and the other as nurses, phone operators, or laundrywomen. All are fleeing in panic. They evidently decided to bury us in this hellish place once and for all. Click here to find out more. Tomorrow, exactly tomorrow, October 6, 1942, we will be on the other side of the river . As Stalingrad was about to fall into German hands in September 1942, the Red Army came up with a plan for a counter-attack that would eventually smash the enemy. by Odessa2 21 Aug 2003, 19:03, Post morning we manage to advance 20 metres, in the evening the Russians throw us At that time we actually cut up a dog, and the vodka really came in handy. . Our battalion is fighting in the suburbs of Stalingrad. I briefly jump onto the tank to look at Weigand. Germans fire the 105 mm howitzer leFH 18 in the area of the grain elevator. After marching through the night we have established ourselves in a shrubcovered gully. by Weiss Wurst 21 Aug 2003, 18:01, Post Post . . .. August 10. . In the blocks captured two days ago Russian soldiers appeared from somewhere or other and fighting has flared up with fresh vigour. It was the most ferocious battle in human history, claiming the lives of hundreds of thousands. Mr Schaefer said: 'These diaries are absolutely unique and quite amazing. The entries are written by William Hoffman and records the fighting and general situation around him from the 29th of July to the 26th of December 1942. the personnel army "lost weight", total mobilization was announced in all spheres of German life. When looking for confirmation of this fact the Britannica article on Stalingrad lists that the lifespan for a Soviet . hellish place once and for all. Making up for colossal losses in people, equipment and ammunition sustained by the German armed forces as a result of the perishing of the 6th Army will require huge effort and a lot of time. to no avail. 'They tell the story of the campaign through the eyes of a German junior officer in a way in which it has never been told before. . I read the ultimatum, and a burning malice toward our generals boiled up in me. There have been a number of cases of self inflicted wounds and malingering among the men. The ruthlessness of the German advance was borne out on June 27, 1941, when his crew spotted a Russian soldier who played dead before opening fire on the passing German infantry. . August 12. For more information, please see our . by Oleg Grigoryev 21 Aug 2003, 22:48, Return to Holocaust & 20th Century War Crimes. On June 4, at the Battle of Midway, Island, American planes destroyed all four of the attacking, Japanese aircraft carriers and established American naval. Entries from the diary of Officer F. P. of the 8th Light Small-Arms Force of the 212th Regiment: . We killed thousands of Russians and Jews with wives and children around Kiev and Kharkov. His fascinating 2015 book, Stalingrad: The City that Defeated the Third Reich, and the Battle that Changed World History (PublicAffairs; also available in German, Russian, Swedish, Finnish, Spanish, and Chinese editions), tells the story of this battle from the Soviet side. We shall obviously be seeing them next in the other world. . . Hetti, I have already cut up four dogs, yet my comrades cant eat their fill. by Oleg Grigoryev 21 Aug 2003, 22:03, Post The Fuhrers orders were read inevitably soon be over. Maj. Gen. Ivan Burmakov and Lt. Col. Leonid Vinokur, two of the Russian officers interviewed after the Battle of Stalingrad. We dont have a single officer, and the non-commissioned officer had to take over the command of the division. There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase, a SQL command or malformed data. Fragment of Lieutenant General Alexander von Daniels testimony, commander of the German 376th Infantry Division: . . January 5. The majority of the writings date from November We are no longer accepting comments on this article. . It was night but we saw many crosses with our helmets on top. 'Both legs are only attached to the body by thin strips of sinew and flesh. . Here it is: http://imgur.com/a/22mHD . The battle commenced in August 1942 and finally ended in February 1943 when the last of the German forces surrendered. . . Portion of the testimony of captured Captain Kurt Mandelhelm, commander of the 2nd Battalion of the 518th Infantry Regiment of the 295th Infantry Division, and his adjutant, Lieutenant Karl Gottschaldt, January 15, 1943: . It was in fact the worst tragedy ever to befall a whole Army in the history of mankind. . How wonderfully we could live if it werent for this damned war! These historians hoped that the published interviews would mobilize readers for the war. He wrote: 'We found the bodies of many Russians who hadn't been able to walk further and had been shot by the guards. Large-scale help is coming up for us, and the Russians will be beaten. Quoted from the testimony of captured Private First Class Joseph Schwarz, 10th Company of the 131st Infantry Regiment of the 44th Infantry Division, January 2, 1943: . Just weeks before, in response to the Germans rapid advance toward Stalingrad, Stalin had issued the Not A Step Back order that forbade his soldiers to retreat under any circumstances. Maybe they should start a travelling museum showing cities firebombed or discussing the rapes of their own women, daughters and grandmothers. In what way was it a battle that changed world history? All Rights Reserved What were the main ways in which survivors remembered Stalingrad? Does that get to you? Yesterday Russian katyushi [small rocket launchers] and then tanks halted our regiment. and rage. Stalingrad was fought on a global stage, and may have been the worlds first media war, as we would call it today. 17189, dated November 13, 1942 to Private First Class Karl Weitzel: . The most informative letters were published in 1944 by the 173.236.223.132 What great spaces the Soviets occupy, what rich fields there are to be had here after the wars over! .. They drove into the weakly guarded flanks of the German Sixth Army. By accepting all cookies, you agree to our use of cookies to deliver and maintain our services and site, improve the quality of Reddit, personalize Reddit content and advertising, and measure the effectiveness of advertising. . August 27.A continuous cannonade on all sides. The Russians inside are condemned men; the battalion commander says: The commissars have ordered those men to die in the elevator. If all the buildings of Stalingrad are defended like this then none of our soldiers will get back toGermany. . That has a tremendous impact.. December 18.The officers today told the soldiers to be prepared for action. . by Lawrence Tandy 21 Aug 2003, 22:24, Post The battle for the elevator is still going on. which both sides took severe losses. The most important condition for a soldier to join the party was not doctrinal knowledge, say, the ability to recite party textbooks, but proof that the soldier had killed Germans. . Diary of a German Soldier (161 results) But now we have to roam around this horrible Russia, and for what? Reese's account shows how the Nazi war machine corrupted ordinary people. 16:56 GMT 17 Jun 2021. This diary covers the period from April 1942 to March 1943, the momentous year when the tide of battle turned in the East. By February 1943, German forces in the Soviet Union were back to their po-, sitions of June 1942. . Willy Peter Reese, an infantryman who fought on the Russian front and died in 1944 aged 23, kept a diary of how German soldiers killed scores of prisoners of war . . . We stay in our cellar; you cant go out into the street. Born in Bonn, West Germany, Prof. Hellbeck, 51, is also founder of an online project, facingstalingrad.com, at the heart of which is a series of in-depth interviews conducted jointly in 2009-2010 with photographer Emma Dodge Hanson with surviving veterans of the fateful battle from both Germany and Russia. Excerpt from a letter of Private First Class Walter Oppermann, no. More Soviet soldiers died in the five-month battle than Americans in the entire war. German. I read the ultimatum, and a burning malice Archival documentation tells me that at least some Soviet historians read the interviews, but it seems that they were at a loss about how to integrate individual, subjective voices, as they called them, into a mandated objective (communist) history of the war, and so the documents were overlooked and forgotten. by PAK 21 Aug 2003, 22:11, Post A German soldier rests at Stalingrad. Our battalion has gone into the attack four times, and got stopped each time. We had no peace all night from the Russian artillery and aero planes. . September 26. Stalingrad is a grave for the German soldiers. . I send letters home, but there is no reply. In just the last two days, our battalion has lost 60 killed, injured and frostbitten men; more than 30 men have escaped; there is only enough ammunition to last until evening; the soldiers have not eaten at all in three days, and many of them have frostbitten feet. . October 10. The only hope is to be wounded and taken back to the rear. I found this post in the history subreddit on, you guessed it, reddit. Stalingrad is a 1993 German anti-war film directed by Joseph Vilsmaier. Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa on June 22, 1941 with the aim of invading the Soviet Union to secure future German interests. Force of the 212th Regiment. How wonderfully we could live if it To join the party was a matter of honor and prestige for him and other soldiers. This could not fail to influence our decision. The entries start at July 29th 1942 and end December 26th 1942. superiority in the Pacific. My book shows in great detail how Red Army soldiers were inducted into the Communist Party. Spirits were so high that Leutnant Sander even took a bottle of champagne with him to toast his division's first attack. The film is the second German movie to portray the Battle of Stalingrad. September 16. Russian soldiers stood at the entrance to the basement of the. . already cut up four dogs, yet my comrades cant eat their fill. The Fiihrer knows where the Russians weak point is. This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks. On November 8, Hitler, announced that the German Sixth Army had taken Sta-, lingrad, but in fact, on November 19 and 20, the Soviets. BERLIN: A guilt-ridden account of an ordinary German soldier's experiences in World War two is countering a recent trend among historians to portray Germans as victims of the war. We can already see theVolga; firing is going on all the time. . When we got to Stalingrad, there were 140 of us, but by September 1, after two weeks of battle, only 16 remained. . It was largely because of its symbolic charge that the battle for Stalingrad turned into a decisive showdown between the two regimes. Victory is not far away. . Our division has a cemetery near Stalingrad where more than 1,000 people are buried. We are advancing towards Stalingrad along the railway line. August 25, 1942. While it would be more than another year before the Red Army liberated the death camps in Poland, the Battle of Stalingrad disrupted the Nazi death machine. themselves. precisely this reason that we need to exert all our strength in order to win It's these diary entries for a German soldier in 1942, named William Hoffmann. Thats what everyone is saying. Diary of a German Soldier William Hoffman 4.50 4 ratings2 reviews Want to read Buy on Amazon Rate this book The following entries in the diary of William Hoffman, a German soldier who perished at Stalingrad, reveal the decline in German confidence as the battle progressed. Hitler, they were certain, would meet Napoleons end. . He goes by the name of William Hoffman and I feel that his writing really captures the initial enthusiasm of the German forces on their . In just the last two days, our battalion has lost 60 killed, Today, after wed had a bath, the company commander told us that if our future operations are as successful, well soon reach the Volga, take Stalingrad and then the war will quickly end. In three weeks we have occupied about five and a half square miles. In a total war for refusing to . Schwarz, 10th Company of the 131st Infantry Regiment of the 44th Infantry Trapped inside this crucible were the 22 divisions and over 160 different units of the German 6th Army and part of the 4th Panzer Army, numbering to about 330,000 soldiers. for a long time. But the regime took further steps: Visiting the Treblinka death camp in eastern Poland just one month after the defeat at Stalingrad, Heinrich Himmler ordered the exhumation and cremation of all the bodies of the 700,000 Jews who had been killed there. Portion of a letter from Senior Lance Corporal Joseph Tzimach, no. . The Russians are so close to us that our planes cannot bomb them. You dont see them at all, they have established themselves in houses and cellars and are firing on all sides, including from our rear-barbarians, they use gangster methods. January 15. . I would eat a cat; they say its meat is also tasty. We are preparing for a decisive attack. What is also remarkable is how the Soviet military command was able to secretly deploy an army of 1 million soldiers along these flanks in the weeks leading up to the operation. They no longer take cover from Russian shells; they havent the strength to walk, run away and hide. . In his interview, Gen. Vassily Chuikov described how he shot several commanders, as their soldiers watched in line formation, for retreating from the enemy without permission. My nerves can't take any more.'. Russian snipers hit anyone who shows himself carelessly from behind shelter. The elevator is occupied not by men but by devils that no flames or bullets can destroy. Many of the interviewed soldiers at Stalingrad agreed that the nurses performed exceptionally. The turning point of World War II came at Stalingrad. Even civilians were considered vital defenders of Fortress Stalingrad and not allowed to evacuate until several days after the beginning of the bombardment. There was an enormous membership drive over the course of the war, so much so that by the end of the war, the Red Army was predominantly communist, and the party had features of a military organization. The Russians lauded the 'everyday heroism' of their troops, while the Germans cast the Soviet soldiers as subhuman beings who fought without any respect for life, even their own. what should be done? . . From the very beginning, observers on all sides were fixated on the gigantic clash at the edge of Europe. by Whisper 21 Aug 2003, 18:52, Post He expects victory of us. .. Lieutenant Kraus was killed yesterday, and there is no company commander. Up to that point, German propaganda had confidently predicted a new order for Europe under Germanic rule; after Stalingrad, it began to sound alarms about the future of Germany, Europe, and civilization.. .. The Russian victory was a major turning point in the war. I had a letter from Elsa today. The interviews, as well as rare photographs and letters shared by the veterans, show how differently the battle is remembered on both sides. . The 83-year-old remembers exactly how he opened the letter, reading with amazement that his father's remains had finally been found. An extract for August 24 described the horrific aftermath of one fight his crews engaged in. . There are barely 30 men in the company. The Russians lauded the everyday heroism of their troops, while the Germans cast the Soviet soldiers as subhuman beings who fought cruelly and without any respect for life even their own. Generals boiled up in me none of our soldiers will get back toGermany Lieutenant Kraus was yesterday. About how these strivings compared to the rear spine is broken, and may have a... To another who pretended to be dead. ' 1945, Stalin made sure that official referred. Post in the history of mankind Whisper 21 Aug 2003, 22:24, Post a German Soldier at! 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