6.Armee der Wehrmacht and the Battle of Stalingrad 1942–1943

Adolf Hitler in München 'No ships come up the Volga any more...

High-ranked officers of 6th Army few months before its destruction 

6th Army marched with unwavering resolve towards its destiny at Volga

Battle of Stalingrad was fought in a pulverised urban landscape

Aerial view of the factory district of northern Stalingrad

Battle for the Barrikady Gun Factory in northern Stalingrad

The Battle of Stalingrad took place between Aug. 23 1942 to Feb. 2 1943. Marked by fierce close-quarters combat it remains the largest and bloodiest battle in the history of warfare. The initial objectives in the region around Stalingrad were the destruction of the industrial capacity of the city and the deployment of forces to block the Volga River. The river was a key route from the Caucasus and the Caspian Sea to central Russia. On Nov. 8 1942, Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler had his annual speech in München on the anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch. In the course of the speech he said that Stalingrad was an important point, there 30 million tons of traffic could be cut off including about nine million of oil shipments. Hitler mentioned that some say Stalingrad is a strategic mistake and that they will just wait and see whether it is or not. The overall tone was serious, although he did make a joke at some point in the speech. On Nov. 19 1942, the Soviet Red Army launched Operation Uranus, a two-pronged attack targeting the weaker Romanian and Hungarian armies protecting the German 6th Army's flanks. The Axis forces on the flanks were overrun and the 6th Army was cut off and surrounded in the Stalingrad area. About 250,000 German and Romanian soldiers and other volunteer subsidiary troops including some 35,000 Soviet volunteers fighting for the Germans were surrounded. Inside the pocket, there were also several thousand Soviet soldiers the Germans had taken captive during the battle. The German 6.Armee and 24.Panzer-Division showed remarkable discipline after being surrounded. The Israeli historian Omer Bartov noted that of 11,237 letters sent by soldiers inside of Stalingrad between Dec. 20 1942 and Jan. 16 1943 to their families in Germany, almost every letter expressed belief in Germany's ultimate victory, and their willingness to fight and die at Stalingrad to achieve that victory. Bartov reported that a great many of the soldiers were well aware that they would not be able to escape from Stalingrad. Top image: local Münchners enthusiastically greet Hitler on his ride through München. Standing in the back seat of his Mercedes-Benz 770 is his personal adjutant SS-Ustuf. Otto Günsche. The driver is Hitler's primary chauffeur SS-Ostubaf. Erich Kempka. Hitler's Stalingrad speech took place at the Löwenbräukeller at Stiglmaierplatz in the heart of München during the height of the battle of Stalingrad. Photo by Hitler's private cameraman Oberleutnant Walter Frentz. Walter Frentz Collection. Second image: Commander in Chief of the 6th Army General Friedrich Paulus observing the situation at the front north of Stalingrad through a Scherenfernrohr SF09 telescope in 1942. Credit: Facundo Filipe. c. Bundesarchiv. Third image: German infantry of the 6th Army on the west bank of the Volga before entering the suburbs of Stalingrad in 1942. Photo by Kriegsberichter Seibold. Credit: Facundo Filipe. c. Bundesarchiv. Fourth image: NCOs of the 24.Panzer-Division at Vokzalnaya Street near the Stalingrad-II station on the southern flank on Sept. 15 1942. Photo by Kriegsberichter Geller. Credit: Julius Backman. c. Bundesarchiv. Fifth image: aerial photo of the factory district of northern Stalingrad shows fuel stores on fire on the banks of the Volga on Sept. 17 1942. These depots were hit by the Luftwaffe on Aug. 23 1942. Despite repeated bombings Stalingrad was holding out. Credit: Facundo Filipe. c. Bundesarchiv. Bottom image: one of the most iconic photos of the battle of Stalingrad claimed to show battalion commander Hauptmann Wilhelm Traub occupying a ramshackle fortified position among the rubble of the Barrikady gun factory in northern Stalingrad on Oct. 19 1942. Traub took command of Pionierebataillon 305 of the 305th Infantry Division on Oct. 16 1942. He was declared missing in action during the winter battle of Stalingrad 1942-43. The German Wehrmacht offically listed him as dead by April 1943. The officer is wearing a helmet cover made from a Hungarian camo cloth and armed with a Soviet PPSh-41 submachine gun, a robust weapon ideal for fighing in urban area. Photo by Sorbian Kriegsberichter Kurt Heine, who himself ended up captured by the Soviets at Stalingrad. Heine was fortunate to survive and returned home in 1948. Credit: Olga Shirnina. c. Bundesarchiv.

Destruction of Axis forces in and around Stalingrad

Stalingrad Airlift - LW's doomed effort to resupply 6th Army, Dec. 1942

Supreme Commander of  AOK 6 surrendering to the Red Army, Jan. 1943

Soviet Red Army soldiers in the devastated city of Stalingrad, Feb. 1943

Down-trodden captured POW of the once-mighty 6th Army, Feb. 1943

Dead Italian soldier on the outskirts of Stalingrad, Feb. 1943

The encircled German Sixth Army were not only starving, but running out of ammunition. Nevertheless, they continued to resist stubbornly, in particular, the so-called HiWis, Soviet citizens fighting in the Wehrmacht, had no illusions about their fate if captured. Of the around 90,000 who surrendered in Stalingrad, only about 5,500 ever returned to Europe. Already weakened by disease, starvation and lack of medical care during the encirclement, they were sent to labour camps all over the Soviet Union, where most of them died of mistreatment and malnutrition. 27,000 German POWs died within weeks. It was not until 1955 that the last of the handful of survivors were repatriated after a plea to the Politburo by Chancellor of West Germany Konrad Adenauer. Over 11,000 German soldiers refused to lay down their arms at the official surrender on February 2 1943, presumably believing that fighting to the death was better than a slow end in Soviet camps. Since the beginning of the Italian campaign in Soviet, about 30,000 Italians had been killed and another 54,000 died in Soviet captivity according to Italian Ministry of Defence. After the Italian Eighth Army's near destruction during the Battle of Stalingrad, Benito Mussolini disbanded what was left of the 8th Army and the surviving Italian troops of which 34,000 were wounded and frostbitten were unceremoniously brought home to Italy. Only minor Italian units participated on the Eastern Front past that point. The Romanian Army lost about 159,000 men killed and missing and wounded between November 1942 and January 1943. This represented 16 of the 18 divisions engaged at Stalingrad. The Romanian armed forces were not capable of recovering after such catastrophic losses, and from this point onward, they would only fight desperate defensive battles on their way back to Romania. The Hungarian 2nd Army was virtually eliminated as an effective fighting unit by overwhelming Soviet force during the Battle of Stalingrad. Of an initial force of about 200,000 Hungarian soldiers and 50,000 Jewish forced laborers, about 100,000 were killed and 35,000 wounded and 60,000 taken POWs. Only about 40,000 returned to Hungary after the defeat at Stalingrad. Credit: Wikipedia i.a. Top image: a German Junkers Ju 52 transport approaches a snowed in landing strip at Pitomnik inside the Stalingrad pocket in Dec. 1942. Another JU 52 prepares to take off. The Luftwaffe was tasked in late 1942 with resupplying the forces trapped in the cut-off city. These were apocalyptic conditions. The Luftwaffe lost 488 planes during the Stalingrad airlift: an average of 7.07 planes a day. Credit: Facundo Filipe. c. Bundesarchiv. Second image: the newly appointed Generalfeldmarschall Friedrich Paulus surrenders to Soviet 38th Motorized Rifle Brigade on Jan. 31 1943. Partly seen behind Paulus is Chief-of Staff Generalleutnant Arthur Schmidt along with Adjutant Oberst Wilhelm Adam. The talented Feldmarschall Erich von Manstein had told Paulus that the relief would need assistance from the 6th Army, but the order to initiate the breakout never came. Paulus who was a poor choice to lead the German 6th Army remained absolutely firm in obeying the orders he had been given. Photo by Jewish-Russian correspondent Georgy Lipskerov. Credit: Facundo Filipe. Soviet Union Stock Photo. Third image: Soviets in a moment of calm in Stalingrad, second man from the left is carrying a German MP 40 SMG. Photo by Jewish-Uzbek correspondent Georgi Zelma. SU Stock Photo. Fourth image: Soviet soldier armed with a Russian PPSh-41 SMG marches a German POW into captivity and most certain death in the forced labor camps. The picture is thought to have been taken in the final days of the Stalingrad onslaught. Credit: Jaris Almazani. SU Stock Photo. Bottom image: Italian soldier lies dead next to a Fiat-SPA CL39 on the outskirts of Stalingrad. Photo by Jewish-Ukrainian photojournalist Arkady Shaikhet. Credit: Olga Shirnina. SU Stock Photo.

Battle of Stalingrad: Casualties and losses

Kompanieführer Oberleutnant Friedrich Winkler

Unidentified soldier of the 6.Armee

According to archival figures, the Soviet Red Army suffered a total of 1,129,619 total casualties; 478,741 men killed or missing and 650,878 wounded. These numbers are for the whole Stalingrad area; in the city itself 750,000 were killed, captured, or wounded. The Soviet authorities executed approximately 13,500 Soviet soldiers during the battle, equivalent to almost two rifle divisions. The total number of civilians killed in Stalingrad and the regions outside the city is unknown. The German 6th Army suffered 282,606 total casualties from August 21 1942 to the end of the battle, including around 90,000 taken prisoner and herded into Joseph Stalin's Gulags in February 1943. Fewer than 5,500 survived Soviet captivity. The 4.Panzerarmee which guarded the outside perimeter of Stalingrad suffered 17,293 total casualties. According to historian Karl-Heinz Frieser Axis troops from Hungary, Italy and Romania who helped protect the northern and southern flanks of the 6th Army suffered 328,000 total casualties and the losses among Soviet turncoats Hiwis range between 19,300 and 52,000. Left image: Oberleutnant Friedrich Konrad Winkler somewhere in the northern sector of Stalingrad in October 1942. He took command of 6.Kompanie of Grenadier-Regiment 577 of the 305.Infanterie-Division during the ferocious battles for the Barrikady Gun Factory in the northern industrial district of Stalingrad. The regiment was destroyed in January 1943. Winkler wears standard 6x30 binoculars with a leather eyepiece protective cover fitted and the Iron Cross First Class, the Wound Badge with much of the black paint worn off and the Infantry Assault Badge in Silver with part of the wreath broken off. Friedrich Winkler was promoted Hauptmann on December 1 1942. He was born on August 22 1909 in Worms (one of the oldest cities in Germany situated on the Rhine river) and captured in Stalingrad after the 6th Army had capitulated on February 2 1943. He died soon after, at the age of 34, between February 8 and 10 1943 at POW Camp Beketowka. Photo by KB Kurt Heine. Credit: Facundo Filipe. The right photo is said to have been taken during the siege of Stalingrad. This German soldier trapped in the Stalingrad pocket has never been identified. Credit: Jaris Almazani. Commons: Bundesarchiv.

ϟϟ-Panzergrenadier-Division „Wiking“ pulled back from Caucasus

Exhausted Waffen-SS Volunteer in the Hell of the Eastern Front

Battery of Soviet Katyusha rocket launchers  

The encirclement of the German 6th Army at Stalingrad meant that the Caucasus was relegated to a secondary theatre, and when the attempt to relieve Stalingrad failed in the face of further Soviet advances, the entire Caucasian position itself began to come under threat. German dictator Adolf Hitler had sacrificed one of his largest and finest armies through his command to hold out at Stalingrad. The Soviet defensive power had now suddenly become offensive. It was not possible to rule out a second, even greater catastrophe after the loss of the 6th Army. SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Wiking was ordered to fall back to bolster the retreating 4.Panzer-Armee. On Dec. 30 1942 part of Wiking's SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment Westland was brought to Zimovniki area by train in order to organize a defensive line. The SS volunteers caused the Soviet mass attacks, which took place two to three times daily, to collapse directly in front of the main battle line. The thermometer showed minus 30 °C on New Year's Eve 1943. Westland held Zimovniki for seven days, fully aware that surrender to the Soviets meant summary execution at best and brutal interrogation and torture to death at worst. In a series of strongpoints the Wiking battlegroups operated near the far southern flank of 4.Panzer-Armee. Top clip: Die Deutsche Wochenschau. Bottom still: a battery of Soviet M-30 Katyusha launchers fires at German positions in the winter of 1942-43. The Germans nicknamed them Stalinorgels, since the weapon itself resembled a pipe organ. Credit: Facundo Filipe. RIA Novosti archive.

ϟϟ-Panzergrenadier-Division „Wiking“ and Rostov-on-Don Bridgehead

SS-SturmG.Abt.5 Wiking

SS Volunteers in foxholes as the mercury plunged to -30C

SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Wiking fell back through Zimovniki and Proletarskaya. On January 16 1943, the German Bridgehead on the East bank of Manych was only held by the division. During those days in the middle of January 1943, a race against time started. A period began that saw a steady withdrawal from sector to sector, from Zelina and Yegorlykskaya towards Bataisk. Who would reach the bridges over the Don at Rostow first? Would it be the German forces in the Caucasus flowing back in an orderly fashion to the North and Northwest or would it be the Soviets who were constantly being reinforced. The casualties continued: companies shrank to platoons, platoons to sections. The value of those days cannot be measured highly enough in the race against time for holding open the area from Bataisk to Rostow for the withdrawal of the German formations across the Don. At 15:30 hours February 4 1943, orders arrived for the withdrawal to Rostow. The bridgehead over Don at Rostow was held open until the beginning of February 1943. Thanks to outstanding performance of the Wiking, the Soviets did not achieve their objectives – breakthrough and encirclement. Credit: former SS-Sturmbannführer Ewald Klapdor: Viking Panzers. Top image: two early production Sturmgeschütz IIIs secure a road in frozen wastelands of Ukraine. The assault guns are believed to belong to SS-Sturmgeschütz-Abteilung 5 of the Wiking. Photo by ophthalmologist and surgeon Paul Anton Cibis on a later occasion. After the war Cibis came to the United States and performed research for the U.S. Air Force and studied the effects of atomic weapons testing on the eye. Credit: Richard James Molloy. c. Bundesarchiv. Bottom image: Waffen-SS Grenadiers waiting in their foxholes for the onslaught. Photo taken on January 16 1943 during the Soviet winter counter-offensive. Credit: Julius Jääskeläinen. c. Bundesarchiv.

ϟϟ-Panzergrenadier-Division „Wiking“ and Soviet Mobile Group Popov

Light and medium Panzers of the Wiking Division

SS-Obersturmführer d. R. Hans Flügel of SS-Panzer-Abteilung 5

On February 8 1943, the SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Wiking passed through Amvrosievka on its march toward Stalino, now Donetsk, taking a well-earned rest there. SS-Gruppenführer Felix Steiner flew ahead of the division on February 10 1943 and found an urgent radio message for his division at the headquarters of the 1.Panzer-Armee: TO: SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Wiking. Urgent! Powerful enemy forces, Armoured Group Popov, across the Donetz near Isjum advancing southward toward Krasno-Armaiskoje. SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Wiking to immediately pivot west. Attack in the direction of Krasno-Armaiskoje. Mission: Contain Armored Group Popov. /signed/ von Mackensen. A new advance guard was formed. It was led by the commander of SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment Nordland. The artillery was regrouped. The Germania, wich had been at the front, had to turn around. The Wiking rolled in the direction of Krasno-Armaiskoje. In the morning of February 11 1943, the Westland was turned sharply to the north with orders to block the road to Krasno-Armaiskoje. Credit: Peter Straßner. Images: SS-Obersturmführer d. R. Hans Flügel, Commander of Wiking's II.Kompanie. Flügel eventually rise to SS-Hauptsturmführer d. R., and in this rank he was awarded the Knight's Cross on Oct. 16 1944 while in command of Wiking's II.Battalion. He ended the war with the rank of SS-Sturmbannführer d. R. and died aged 70 on March 1 1989 in Naila in Bayern. Commons: Bundesarchiv.

Destruction of Mobile Group Popov and the Massacre of Grischino

StuG III supporting infantry on the Eastern Front

Workers' and Peasants' Red Army in Eastern Ukraine

Red Army soldier taken prisoner by Waffen-SS

On February 14 1943 the Soviets at Grischino were attacked by only Wiking's SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment Germania, wich succeeded taking up defensive positions. Meanwhile the enemy tanks attemted to enter Gubin daily, but they were driven out again and again by the Finnish Freiwilligen-Bataillon der Waffen-SS. The fighting there was a fight for every building. On February 18 1943, Wiking attacked Krasno-Armaiskoje from the south with regiment Westland in the northeast and Nordland in the south, supported by the division's panzer battalion and a kampfgruppe from 7.Panzer-Division, it destroyed the remaining forces of the Soviet IV Guards Tank Corps there. At the same time, Germania and Nordland, which had moved quickly through Krasno-Armaiskoje, smached the Soviet 7th Ski Brigade, which was defending Grischino. The volunteers of the Nordland were eyewitnesses to a teerible sight. In the villages were numerous German soldiers, Organization Todt members and Wehrmacht Woman Auxiliaries who had fallen in the hands of Mobile Group Popov and had been mutilated and sexually assaulted in a barbaric fashion. The Wehrmacht Untersuchungsstelle (Wehrmacht criminal investigating authority), announced that among the victims were 406 soldiers of the Wehrmacht, 58 members of the Organisation Todt (including two Danish nationals), 89 Italian soldiers, 9 Romanian soldiers, 4 Hungarian soldiers, 15 German civil officials, 7 German civilian workers and 8 Ukrainian volunteers. On February 19 1943, Grischino was also in German hands. The majority of Mobile Group Popov, especially its tanks, had been destroyed there and at Krasno-Armaiskoje. Above and beyond that, the threat to the southern wing in this sector had been averted. The fighting for Grischino had been hard on both sides and cost SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Wiking heavy losses. Division Commander SS-Gruppenführer Felix Steiner expressed his praise to Wiking on March 4 1943: In these days, you have truly fought for and advanced the future of your homelands. It will one day thank you. Today, however, I want you to be satisfied with my thanks and unbridled recognition as well as your pride in your accomplishments. Credit: Peter Straßner: European Volunteers and Wikipedia inter alia. Top image: German Sturmgeschütz III assault guns. The swastika flags have been draped over the vehicles as an aid to air recognition. Credit: Régis Klimenko. Commons: Bundesarchiv. Middle image: Soviet Red Army in Eastern Ukraine in early 1943. Soviet Union stock photos. Bottom image: Soviet soldier surrenders to two Waffen-SS grenadiers, of which one is carrying a captured Russian PPSh-41. Commons: Bundesarchiv.

Soviet Red Army Liberation of Eastern Ukrainian Donbas Region

Ukrainian farmers meet the new masters of Eastern Ukraine

Soviet-backed communist partisans with a German POW

Kramatorsk in Ukrainian Donetsk Oblast liberated by the Soviets

The Nazi occupation instilled terror and hatred in nearly all strata of the Ukrainian population. Still, the return of the Soviet Red Army was perceived quite ambiguously in Ukraine. The return was accompanied by purges of collaborationists. The residents of the eastern Ukrainian Donbas region were the first to experience the fury and hatred of the “liberators” towards those “who had served the Germans”. The NKVD and the Soviet-backed communist partisans carried out mass arrests the day after the Red Army entered the area in spring 1943. The repressive blow targeted those who had served in the police, worked in German administration or economic services, as well as girls who had been translators or had some other contacts with German soldiers. Women who were pregnant or had children with Germans were immediately killed together with their children. All forms of assistance to the enemy were treated as “treason to the Motherland” without further legal devising. Special boxes were hung on walls in which citizens were supposed to deposit their denunciations of those who had "served the Germans". In fact, everyone who had not actively fought against the Germans could be viewed as “guilty” by Joseph Stalin's regime. Later on, everyone who had remained in the occupied territory was declared suspicious. Another important factor that made the Ukrainian population pessimistic about being liberated from the German occupation was the Soviet military mobilization. Following the Red Army's return to Ukraine, it became more a rule than an exception to send poorly armed soldiers with little or no military training into battle. Ukrainian émigré writer Mykhailo Doroshenko described in his memoirs how the Red Army had driven people without weapons into action. They were ordered to obtain weapons for themselves as they engaged in battle with the enemy. In fact, reports show that even the Germans could not understand why the Ukrainian population was treated this way. Credit: the author Vladyslav Hrynevych. Top image: Soviet-backed partisans and residents of a liberated village in Ukraine. The Kolkhoz members were hard pressed to rebuild their work force by the forced collectivization. Credit: Konstantin Fiev. PD. Middle image: according to the caption, an interrogation of a German POW by Red partisans. In addition to fighting the Axis, Red partisans fought against organizations which sought to establish independent non-communist states in Eastern Europe. Both top photos were taken in February 1943 for Soviet Pravda by Ukrainian-born propaganda photojournalist Yakov Ryumkin. Credit: Georgiy Stanislavskiy. PD. Bottom image: workers of the Kramatorsk Machine-Building Factory wrench the signboard of the German Friedrich Krupp A.G. steel company as the region has been recaptured a second time by the Red Army in 1943. Credit: Olga Shirnina. USSR propaganda photo credited I. Yushko. PD.