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STALINGRAD
SP
EC
No. 166
IA
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IS
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770306 154103
£5.00
NUMBER 166
© Copyright
After the Battle
2014
Editor: Karel Margry
Editor-in-Chief: Winston G. Ramsey
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Ever since the start of
After the Battle
over 40 years ago, we have wanted to do a feature
on the battle of Stalingrad — the most-famous and most-crucial battle fought on the
Eastern Front, decisive for the outcome of the entire war. However, in all these years,
the problems of presenting the story in our customary ‘then and now’ format seemed
insurmountable. Not only was it difficult to find enough photographs that stood a
chance of being matched up but, more importantly, we were acutely aware that the city
of Stalingrad had been largely destroyed in the months-long struggle and one would
need expert knowledge of the rebuilt metropolis (which in 1961 had its name changed
to Volgograd) in order to pinpoint the comparisons. So we are therefore immensely
fortunate to have established contact with Alexander Trofimov, seen here outside the
city’s State Panoramic Museum ‘Battle of Stalingrad’. Alexander, who is married with
two daughters and works for a metal-trading company, was born in Volgograd in 1970
and has lived there all his life. Ever since he was a youngster, he has been fascinated by
the momentous struggle that occurred in his home city and he has spent years studying
the details of the ferocious combat that took place there and exploring the battleground
— not only in the city proper but also on the wide steppe outside. He knows virtually
every corner of the former battlefield and we could not wish to have a better expert to
match up the photos of the battle. His photographic contribution to this story is such
that our American author, Mark Holoboski, another long-time student of the battle,
agreed to share authorship of this special issue with him.
CONTENTS
STALINGRAD
2
Front Cover:
The main memorial to the 1942-43
Battle of Stalingrad in present-day Volgograd is on
the Mamayev Kurgan, the hill that overlooks the city
and played such a crucial role in the struggle. This
statue is called ‘Hold on until Death’ and the face of
the warrior rising from the water (symbolising that
of the Volga river) was modelled after that of
Lieutenant-General Vasily Chuikov, the commander
of the 62nd Army, which so heroically defended
Stalingrad. In the background, crowning the hilltop,
stands the gigantic ‘Motherland Calls’ statue, 85
metres high. The memorial park was dedicated in
1967. (Alexander Trofimov)
Back Cover:
In 1999, the Volksbund Deutsche
Kriegsgräberfürsorge established a German War
Cemetery on a barren tract of land at Rossoshka,
35 kilometres north-west of Stalingrad. Remains of
German soldiers recovered from cemeteries and
mass graves from all over the area are being re-
interred there. The cemetery at present contains
over 56,000 individual graves with blocks of stone
inscribed with the names of a further 120,000
missing. (Janelf)
Acknowledgements:
The Editor would like to thank the
directorate and staff of the State Panoramic Museum
‘Battle of Stalingrad’ in Volgograd for helping Alex
Trofimov with his research and for making available
photos from their archive. He also extends his great
appreciation to Jason Mark of Leaping Horseman
Books for his expert help and for supplying photos
from his personal collection. In particular, we acknowl-
edge our debt to Jason’s groundbreaking and master-
ful book
Angriff. The German Attack on Stalingrad in
Photos
(Sydney, 2008). Mark Holoboski would like to
acknowledge the help and support of Vladimir Kalgin,
Sergei Petrunin and Russell Schulke over the years.
Photo Credit Abbreviations:
AKG — Archiv für
Kultur und Geschichte; ANP — Algemeen
Nederlands Persbureau; BA — Bundesarchiv; BA-
MA — Bundesarchiv-Militärarchiv; IWM —Imperial
War Museum; NIOD — Nederlands Instituut voor
Oorlogsdocumentatie, Amsterdam; SZ — Süd-
deutsche Zeitung Photo; USNA — US National
Archives.
The city that bore Stalin’s name was originally named Tsaritsyn. Its roots date back
to the late 16th century when a fortress was built near the confluence of the Volga
and Tsaritsa rivers to defend the unstable southern border of the country. A small
trading settlement soon grew up and this became the nucleus of the town. In the
19th century, the location became an important river port and commercial centre, its
population expanding rapidly from 3,000 people in 1807 to 84,000 in 1900. The first
railway was constructed to the town in 1862 and the first steel mill opened in 1875.
During the Russian Civil War, the city was besieged by counter-revolutionary ‘White’
forces. The Soviet defenders under Josef Stalin repulsed three assaults, and after the
Whites finally captured the city in June 1919, Stalin led a brilliant counter-attack in
January 1920, winning a pivotal victory in the revolution. To honour his role in its
defence, the city was renamed Stalingrad in 1925. Under Stalin, the city became a
centre of heavy industry, its new industrial plants exporting tractors, guns, textiles,
timber and chemicals to all parts of the Soviet Union. By 1939 the city of 500,000
inhabitants stretched over 25 kilometres along the Volga’s west bank. Representa-
tive of the modern metropolis was the Square of Fallen Heroes in the city centre.
2
ALEXANDER TROFIMOV
The battle of Stalingrad formed one of the decisive turning
points in the Second World War. The advance of the German
armies to the great city on the Volga in August 1942; the
stubborn and heroic defence of the besieged and shell-bat-
tered city against overwhelming German superiority by the
Soviet 62nd Army in September-November; and the subse-
quent encirclement and demise of the 6. Armee in the winter
In classic accounts of the Second World
War, the Battle for Stalingrad has been
viewed as the great turning point of the con-
flict, which gains even greater interest given
the fact that the battle, which came to be
synonymous with street fighting and
destruction, was never supposed to happen.
There certainly was to be an urban fight that
year, but much farther north at Leningrad
(see
After the Battle
No. 123). While the
assertion that Stalingrad being the turning
point has been the subject of recent debate,
with some historians choosing instead to cite
the later Battle of Kursk as the definitive
loss of German initiative in the East, it can-
not be understated that the loss of both Stal-
ingrad and of the German 6. Armee, in the
dramatic fashion in which it occurred, was
the first true systemic shock to the German
leadership, military and citizenry during the
conflict. Even more vital to the Allied cause,
the battle served as a tremendous morale
boost for a resurgent Red Army that had
hardly known anything more than defeat
and retreat during the previous year and a
half. By the time of the surrender of the
Stalingrad pocket on the icy morning of Feb-
ruary 2, 1943, the once stumbling and off-
balance Russian bear was finally awake, and
on all fours. The prospect of a Nazi empire
in the East dissipated with each quenching
ember of the still-glowing ruins of Stalin-
grad.
Right:
A perfect match, taken by Alex
Trofimov seven decades after the battle.
of 1942-43, ending in total capitulation on February 2, 1943,
decisively turned the scale of the conflict on the Eastern
Front. After Stalingrad there could be only one end to the
war. Symbolic for the German catastrophe on the Volga is
this image of German POWs being marched past one of the
most iconic buildings of the struggle: the heavily embattled
Grain Elevator in the southern part of the city.
STALINGRAD
By Mark Holoboski and Alexander Trofimov
3
ALEXANDER TROFIMOV
NOVOSTI
The advance on Stalingrad began in earnest with the German
armies crossing the Don river. Before sunrise on August 21, the
LI. Armeekorps of the 6. Armee launched two amphibious
assaults across the Don some 60 kilometres north-west of Stalin-
grad, the 76. Infanterie-Division on the left establishing a bridge-
head near Akimovskiy and the 295. Infanterie-Division on the right
another one near Lutchenskiy. Engineers immediately began con-
In 1942 Stalingrad was a sprawling indus-
trial and transportation hub running for 25
kilometres along the western bank of the
Volga river, not dissimilar in shape to that of
a question mark. By the time the German 6.
Armee arrived, its population had doubled
because of the influx of refugees from the
western regions to a total of around 900,000.
The city was the location of three of the
largest armaments factories in the Soviet
Union. In the north there was the pride of
Soviet industry, the great Dzerzhinsky Trac-
tor Works, churning out its famed ‘chisel-
nosed’ T-34 tanks in great quantities. Then
came the Barrikady Gun Factory laden with
artillery barrels while in the south, producing
small arms and metal parts, was the Red
October Plant.
In transportation terms, being situated on
the mighty Volga and, to a lesser extent, on
rail lines running to the Caucasus, central
Asia, the greater Moscow region and
beyond, Stalingrad was indeed an important
struction of pontoon bridges at both sites, the idea being to push
all three divisions of the XIV. Panzerkorps — the 16. Panzer-Divi-
sion and the 3. and 60. Infanterie-Divisions (mot.) — across for the
final drive to Stalingrad. The bridge at Lutchenskiy was completed
in the afternoon of the 21st and the one at Akimovskiy the follow-
ing morning. Here panzers of Panzer-Abteilung 103, the tank unit
of the 3. Infanterie-Division, cross the span on the 23rd.
The locations where armies crossed rivers and built bridges are usually well
documented in the unit reports and records, making it relatively easy to find the
sites, especially when there are distinctively-shaped ridges lining the river as occurs
here near Lutchenskiy. This is the view from the east bank.
AKATOV
AKIMOVSKIY
LUTCHENSKIY
KALACH
KARPOVKA
BEKETOVKA
The battle area between the Don river and Stalingrad. This
German intelligence map shows the Soviet defences in front of
4
the city as they appeared on August 3. We have indicated the
places that feature in our story.
ALEXANDER TROFIMOV
JASON MARK/LEAPING HORSEMAN BOOKS
BA BILD 101I-454-1079-30
Left:
In late August, PK photographer Schüller from Luftwaffe-
Kriegsberichter-Kompanie 8 pictured a motorcycle combina-
tion on what the Germans called the Donhöhenstrasse (Don
Heights Road) on the river’s west bank. The sign on the right
points to the three bridges across the Don. The northernmost
crossing, at Akatov, leading into a bridgehead captured by the
384. Infanterie-Division on August 15-16, was little used, the
position being maintained largely to protect the other two
warehousing and trans-shipment port. Some
30 million tons of goods (timber, oil, coal,
grain and heavy industrial products) were
moved annually over the Volga during its six
ice-free months, and with its network of
canals and tributaries, could reach industrial
and population centres ranging from the oil-
fields of the Caucasus to the northern sea-
ports of Leningrad and Archangel. In effect,
the Volga connected the White, Black,
Baltic, Barents and Caspian Seas, which was
strategically vital for such a landlocked coun-
try as the Soviet Union. Even more signifi-
cant to many strategic planners and laymen
alike, was the fact that the Volga was the last
great natural obstacle to the landmass of
Asia, being a mere 150 kilometres from the
Russia-Kazakhstan border, and over 2,000
kilometres from Berlin.
Indeed, one of the first panzer crewmen to
set foot on the shores of the Volga in late
August would later recall: ‘And then, sud-
denly, a broad silvery ribbon, the Volga. We
knew this was the goal. The ultimate goal of
the war maybe. And beyond the Volga, to
the east, we saw the vast deep forests stretch-
ing into the horizon shrouded in mystery.
And then this boundless view into the
expanse of Asia, nothing but forests . . .
forests, steppes and endlessness. It was an
exciting feeling.’
An old proverb states that ‘Russia can
only be conquered if the enemy crosses the
Volga’, and while the notion of setting foot
upon Asian soil might have seemed a roman-
tic dream to many, Hitler’s true goal for 1942
was to conquer the oilfields in the Soviet
Caucasus to the west of the Caspian Sea and
south of Stalingrad. As long as German lines
advanced close enough to shut down its vast
industrial output, the actual occupation of
Stalin’s city was initially considered by the
Führer as being unnecessary.
THE GERMAN 1942 SUMMER
OFFENSIVE
Hitler’s summer campaign to conquer
Caucasian oil began on the morning of June
28, 1942. The plan called for a north-to-south
breakthrough of the Soviet defences, stag-
gered over several days.
Operation ‘Blau I’ would be the assault by
Generalfeldmarschall Fedor von Bocks’s
Heeresgruppe Süd. Comprising the 2.
Armee, 6. Armee, 4. Panzer-Armee and the
Hungarian Second Army, they would
emerge from their jump-off positions just
east of Kursk and Belgorod and head
towards Voronezh and the River Don.
Right:
The same spot on the Volga’s
west bank near Latashinka.
bridgeheads further south. All traffic and supplies for the divi-
sions of the XIV. Panzerkorps fighting east of the Don were
channelled through the bridges at Akimovskiy and Lutchen-
skiy.
Right:
Normally pictures taken in the endless steppe of
Russia stand little chance of being matched up but the sign
enabled Alex to locate this one with certainty. This is the old
Donhöhenstrasse, looking north at the turn-off to Lutchenskiy
(the official Russian name of the village is Luchenskiy).
On the morning of August 23, the 16. Panzer-Division attacked to break out of the
Don bridgehead, spearheading the advance of XIV. Panzerkorps. Bursting through
the strong Russian defences, the panzers rolled forward against little opposition and
by early afternoon were approaching Stalingrad. A screen of 37 anti-tank guns,
emplaced near the northern suburbs of Spartanovka, Rynok and Latashinka (and
operated by female gun crews), tried to hold up the advance but was smashed by the
panzers and panzergrenadiers in close combat. In the early evening, at 1835 hours,
the lead units of the 16. Panzer-Division reached the banks of the Volga just north of
the city. Here the crew of an SdKfz 232 heavy armoured car from Kradschützen-
Bataillon 16 scours the opposite bank from the high ground overlooking the river.
5
ALEXANDER TROFIMOV
JASON MARK/LEAPING HORSEMAN BOOKS
ALEXANDER TROFIMOV

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