German General Describes Final Soviet Attacks – 1942

Robert Beckhusen

On Jan. 11, 1942, the few surviving tanks of the Panzer-Abteilungen 103, a tank battalion, sat in the snow alongside soldiers from the 29th Infantry Division west of Stalingrad as the Soviet forces closed in. After the German 6th Army won the fight for the city, a Soviet counterattack surrounded the German army, eventually destroying it.

Maj. Gen. Hans-Georg Leyser of the 29th Division watched as perhaps three dozen Soviet tanks came over the hill, which he later described as “almost reminiscent of the Middle Ages.”

“I observed the following scene from my command post: the Russians attacked over [Kazachi] Hill, particularly in the direction of my right neighbour, not — as we were accustomed to seeing — in a dispersed formation, but tank following tank, each covered with infantry and flying enormous red flags, followed by infantry in thick columns.”

The tanks were Churchills — heavy-armored, British-made machines. “At first we felt like we were a spectator of a great human drama in a giant theatre,” Leyser added. “Our infantry weapons were out of range and the few remaining anti-tank guns had an effect on these masses like mosquito bites.”

**Above — a Soviet Churchill tank. Photo via Russian Internet. At top and below — ‘**

Panzer-Abteilungen 103′

tanks near Stalingrad. German military photos