28. Dezember 1943
| GEO INFO | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kitaigorodka | 
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After this unsuccessful counterattack, our front line can no longer be held. We ourselves have maintained our positions, but the enemy is so deep in our flank on the left that it threatens to cut off our protruding front wedge. So we have to fall back. The course of the withdrawal movement is set. At nightfall[1] the battalion staff and crew of Boshidar will leave the village and withdraw via Kitaigorodka to a new line of positions some six to eight kilometres to the rear. At the same time, the companies also leave their positions on the heights, leaving only one group in each company section as a rearguard. These rearguard groups are to disengage from their positions four hours later and then also withdraw. I have been appointed to lead this rearguard.
10 pm. A light veil of mist lies over the terrain, sent to us by a kind fortune. It is a somewhat eerie feeling to know that we are now completely alone in enemy territory. The hinterland is evacuated. Our units are already marching back for two hours and have opened up an empty space several kilometres deep behind us. On our left, the enemy is already deep in our flank. So this side is completely open. And I am still standing here with 24 men who have to secure a three-kilometre-long section of front, which moreover is cut in two by the hollow. There are still twelve men on each side of the hollow, up on the heights. By firing isolated shots from time to time, we feign an occupied front. But if it sprang to the mind of the Russian to attack now, it would become extremely critical. But we are not only threatened from the front, but also from the left, where the enemy is several kilometres away on our flank.
It's almost midnight. I am with the rearguard on the left side of the plateau. It's time to decamp. We've agreed on a white flare as a sign to gather, which I now have fired. The same signal must also go up on the other side of the valley cut. We look over eagerly. There it is! High in the air, a mild, yellowish glow suddenly penetrates the fog. It intensifies a little and then goes out as suddenly as it had lit up. So they have understood us. In the meantime, the group here has assembled and I give the relieving command: "Move out!". We leave the positions. We want to meet up with the group from the other side of the valley at the small wooden bridge outside the village. As our route is shorter, we get there first. But soon the other group is also approaching. Walking along the village road, we soon pass the row of houses in Boshidar. At the end of the village, we make a short stop to pick up the three men left behind in the village by the battalion staff as a rearguard.
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Now we are complete: 28 men. The small group starts to move. I am the last German soldier to leave the village, which we successfully defended until the last hour. They walk in front of me, a small group of soldiers. Like a centipede, the line trudges through the snow on the way back to Kitaigorodka. There is no sign of the terrain. We walk as if in a light cloud. I turn round to all sides and see only the flat, white expanse of snow, which merges imperceptibly and without a horizon into the milky mist. The pale light of the winter night lies over this white boundlessness. And in front of me, the dark queue that winds its way along, following the gentle bends of the path. So we plod along, while around us a merciful fog closes the curtain, hiding us from the enemy's view.
We must soon be in Kitaigorodka. It's a big village, you could see it on the horizon from Boshidar, and with the prismatic compass it wasn't hard to find even in the fog. I now take the lead of the queue. After a short time, the shadows of the first houses emerge from the fog. I divide the men into two groups. The first goes outside the village along the last row of houses with weapons ready to fire. The second group marches on, always abreast, along the village street behind the same row of houses. This way we have this row of houses between us and can take on any partisans. But everything remains quiet. The village is in a deep sleep. I walk with the outer group and look out for the road markings that the battalion wanted to put up for us to show us the way forward. Where the village road leads out into the open field again, there is already the first straw wisp attached to a stick. The two groups reunite and then we follow the marked route until dawn, when we come across our first guards, who are already awaiting us.
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- ↑ on 28 Dec (KTB PzAOK 1, NARA T-313 Roll 62 Frame 7297739/40, order: Roll 64 Frame 7300488/89)
- ↑ The original image shows Hungarian soldiers, whose 2nd Army has been destructed in January 1943 in the Ostrogozhsk–Rossosh offensive.