The trapped Germans in the large centre building ahead fired out from their barricaded windows, realising their only hope of survival and escape was in the street below as they used the remaining limited ammunition to shoot at the enemy in the buildings on either side of them.
Several bottles and grenades dropped from the front building side windows, the soldiers below glancing up in horror. The clattering within the armoured car before them spurred Hausser forward, pushing past the troops next to him to move down the side of the armoured plate. The smash within caused flames to rise into the air above the sides of the carrier, the Molotov cocktail shattering and igniting as screams filled the cabin. As the young officer struggled forward, the carrier swayed, the grenades detonating amongst the soldiers inside and throwing them against the interior metal plate. The driver killed, the vehicle shuddered to a halt, stalling, flames licking upwards with billowing smoke as the uniforms burned of the dead occupants.
Hausser glanced over the front of the carrier, the apartment door to his left some five metres away up three steps. Plaster and masonry from the windows facing him opposite exploded across the road as a new burst of machine gun fire raked the front of the building. Flames erupted across the street and across the top of the Panzer IV, the bottles of vodka shattering and erupting with their lit tapers.
The clatter on the bonnet before him caused him to look down, Tatu grabbing him from behind as he realised what it was. Hausser kicked out, falling backwards as the Romanian dragged him, the grenade bouncing forward across the square before them and exploding as they ducked down.
Struggling to his feet, explosions, machine gun, rifle fire and smoke surrounding them, Tatu looked up at the buildings opposite, bullets splattering across the fronts. He pulled Hausser up, ‘We go now!’
Hausser struggled forward towards the double front doors, coughing through the dust, his chest heaving against the cold and dust. Tatu glimpsed the doors were shut, but damaged, and drew a grenade from his coat, shouting to the men behind, ‘With us…now!’
With Hase behind him, explosive blast waves engulfing them, they reached the door, the rear machine guns peppering the buildings opposite. Hausser ducked to the side as Tatu kicked the door, bullets splattering against it from the inside. The officer lunged forward, dropping his head as he thrust the grenade through the slight opening, Hase pulling him backwards as bullets cracked through the door above him, the Russian inside realising which side of the doorway he was on.
The explosion rocked the doors, a muffled scream from inside. But they remained closed, the heavy steel and oak double doors barricaded on the inside. To the side of the armoured carrier, Udet and Petru fired over the bonnet at the windows in the buildings across the street, desperately attempting to protect Hausser, Tatu and Hase from enemy rifle shots. Smoke poured from the damaged armoured carrier’s front viewing slits, the pungent aroma of burning flesh and oil filling their nostrils. More German infantry joined them, the rifle and submachine gun fire peppering the exterior walls across the tarmac.
Udet glanced towards the double door, his eyes widening as the electric motors of the Panzer III turret whirred, the long barrelled gun beginning to swing round. Flames shot across the tarmac as another bottle exploded onto the cement, the soldiers above priming more grenades. Udet coughed, the smoke catching in his throat, his voice a high pitched squeal as he tried to shout, ‘Achtung! Hausser…clear the door!’
Hase spun round, the tone of warning alerting him. Seeing the Panzer III gun aiming directly towards the doors, he roughly grabbed and yanked Hausser back once more, the officer falling backwards off the steps as he attempted to kick the doors in frustration, his boot swinging widely. Tatu spun his body round to avert his face, Hase throwing his body across the officer as the Panzer III shuddered, the flash and flames belching from the gun barrel temporarily blinding Petru.
The explosion blasted over their bodies, the doors shattering inwards propelling debris and the barricades into the hallway beyond. Several screams came from inside, Tatu mounting the steps with one leap and advancing half crouched into the smoke filled room, the flashes from his PPSH 41 submachine gun silhouetting against his body and heavy jacket.
The Panzer IV turret jolted, flames still burning on the hull as it fired at the front doors opposite, the explosion propelling wood and masonry through the ground floor as the tank lurched forward, grinding its tracks to turn and fire its machine guns into the entrance.
Hase and Hausser scrambled to their feet, their bodies surging with adrenalin as several German soldiers including Udet charged past, the attacking cheers echoing in their ears. The young officer could hear the muffled bursts of submachine gun fire and lunged forward, wary Tatu was ahead and alone, his voice breaking as he shouted to the soldiers around him, his arm rising, ‘Alle Innerhalb! Angriff!’ Raising his MP40, he charged forward into the smoke, debris crunching under his boots.
Hase and Petru stumbled after their commander, the soldiers behind charging with them as they swept into the building. Opposite, smoke rose from the barrel of the Panzer machine guns, the gunner reloading as the tank lurched backwards, the tracks squealing. German infantry surged into the building, the bodies of Russian soldiers lying motionless, soaked in blood across the entrance hall. The velocity of the forward machine guns and powerful explosion dismembering some, shattering others, the floor soaked in blood as German boots stamped through the crimson liquid.
Tatu clambered up the narrow staircase at the rear of the entrance hallway, firing bursts above from his PPSH 41 as he advanced. Behind him, he could hear the boots in the hall, doors being kicked open and the rifle and submachine gun fire. A muffled explosion, the grenade tossed through an open door, the Russian soldiers inside firing and killing the German trooper as the grenade detonated amongst them.
Udet pushed up the stairs, seeing the overcoat of Tatu near the top as the Romanian lobbed a grenade into the first floor hallway. The Romanian quartermaster ducked back as he saw the Russian infantry at the end drop their knees to fire, their bodies thrown backwards with the impact and blast wave of the explosion. Shrapnel tore through their flesh as they slumped against the walls, two killed, the other mortally wounded. Udet neared the top of the stairs, Tatu pushing him roughly back behind him with one arm as he strode forward, dropping the empty magazine from his submachine gun onto the floor and slapping another into the base of his weapon. The Romanian fired into the body at the end, the wounded Russian trying to raise his rifle as the bullets shattered his ribs, his body juddering from the impacts.
Hase stared wide eyed in shock at the bodies in the hallway, one young Russian soldier lay staring up at him, his hands around his stomach, intestines spilling onto the floor…a floor soaked in blood. The Russian coughed, spitting blood from his mouth as tears filled his eyes, his head slumping forward. Broken furniture and body parts lined the hallway, the explosion tearing through the entrance. As he advanced, another soldier twitching on the floor to the right, a severed hand lying on the left, the nausea rose within him, Petru pushing him forward. The muffled blast in one of the rooms at the far end as the German soldier outside slumped to the floor, blood spurting from his neck as he screamed, dropping his rifle. The blast crashed against the other side of the door, soldiers ducking instinctively nearby.
Another German infantryman kicked out at the wood, spraying the room beyond with bullets from his MP40 as the damaged door swung inwards. His body twitched and spun round, the rifle shot from the lone surviving Russian soldier within cutting through his shoulder as he collapsed backwards. Another grenade followed the first, the German infantryman behind tossing the stick into the room at an angle and dragging his wounded countryman to the side. The scream of hatred from within was cut short, the explosive blast throwing billowing smoke and dust out into the corridor.
Hauser lunged through the cloud, gritting his teeth as he heard the pitiful moans from behind, the German wounded being dragged into the buildings. The soldi
ers followed close behind him, boots slamming against the floorboards. He pointed to the right, a darkened recess leading to the rear entrance, ‘Clear the entrance to the river…barricade it! I want the windows criss-crossed with barbed wire, that’s what the Russkies do!’ Several soldiers followed his direction, the young officer grasping the bannister rail on the narrow staircase.
Crashing above, the doors being smashed open on either side by the advancing Germans. Most rooms were empty, the small Russian unit heading for the upper levels. Several single shots rang out, a couple of submachine gun bursts, the few defenders overwhelmed by sheer numbers.
Hausser mounted the stairs two at a time, hearing more muffled fire on the floor above, the forward German infantry smashing into the rooms on either side of the corridor. Shouts and screams, gunfire and muffled explosions spurred him on. Below them, several Russians had escaped onto the waterway beyond the buildings, their bid to escape made even more urgent as sporadic rifle fire followed them along the embankment.
Hausser reached the first floor, grasping his MP40 before him as he advanced, the shouts of German infantry in the corridor and side rooms. Then he tensed, hearing Udet’s strained voice at the end, out of sight in the darkened stairwell, ‘Herr Leutnant! Herr Leutnant!’
Hausser marched down the corridor, several weary German soldiers slowly emerging from the rooms on either side nodding to him. Nearing the end, he saw the three Russian bodies, a German soldier lying with them, Udet and Tatu crouching at the foot of the stairs.
Tatu indicated with his head upwards, ‘They have barricaded the floor above Hausser and have two heavy machine guns…there is no way through.’ He nodded towards the German body, ‘He was too keen.’
Hausser nodded grimly, glancing round at the soldiers in the corridor as they stared at him, muffled fire coming from outside and the building opposite. Then he marched back down the hallway, his face determined, ‘Guard the stairs!’ He indicated to the rooms on the right, ‘Use your bayonets…break through the walls to the next building and we go up that way! It will be dark soon…let’s keep the Russians awake all night.’
Chapter Seventy Seven: Bloody Rattenkrieg
The soldiers hacked slowly and carefully at the masonry walls, their bayonets and few remaining entrenching shovels cracking and splintering the plaster and bricks before the debris dropped to the floor. Clearing a section of the adjoining wall to the apartment block next door to waist height, they stepped back, wary of alerting any Russian soldiers in the next room. There was now only one section of brick remaining before they broke through, the soldiers awaiting their countrymen in the next couple of rooms to catch up before smashing into the next block.
Leutnant Hausser stood in the darkened corridor outside, his arms leaning across his MP40, the strap tensed round his neck. Tatu paced the corridor impatiently, the sentries at the end guarding the stairs glancing cautiously upwards towards the top of the steps, the Russian machine guns in the hallway beyond deterring their advance. Hase and Udet sat with Petru on the ground floor with the other German infantry, eating a meagre breakfast before the assault resumed.
Outside the snow fell relentlessly, the burnt out Sdkfz 251 on the street below becoming slowly enveloped in a white blanket, the burnt and shattered bodies left inside until their surviving countrymen had cleared the enemy occupied floors around them. Muffled shots and machine gun fire had continued most of the night, the cold light of dawn forcing defenders and attackers away from the windows once more.
In the German held house at the back of the square, the newly arrived soldiers had strengthened the defences. Moving up cautiously under the cover of darkness, treating the wounded and providing valuably needed, although meagre, food and supplies. The Panzer III, Panzer IV and remaining armoured cars had retreated to the crossroads some distance away, their crews still scrutinising the Russian held floors intently. Their guns trained on the windows, ready to fire or advance in support if needed.
Tatu finally stopped before Hausser, glaring at the officer, his voice a whisper, ‘When will we do this…it is taking too long?’ Muffled gunfire erupted outside, the fighting flaring up all along the riverbank.
The commander raised his hand for Tatu to be quiet, raising a finger to his lips and indicating above, ‘When we can break through all the walls at once…we will overwhelm them, limit our casualties.’
Tatu sniffed in displeasure, glancing at the soldiers in the hallway around them, ‘We are hungry Herr Leutnant…the sooner we clear the buildings, the sooner we can take any rations the Russkies have!’
Hausser smiled, realising the reason for the Romanian’s impatience, ‘We will go soon enough…I have no interest in throwing our men into a narrow opening if we can attack several at once. They would be cut to pieces!’
Tatu grunted, raising his eyes, ‘My stomach is rumbling Hausser…these Russkies must have some food hidden somewhere!’
Hausser’s smile broke into a grin, his hand rising onto Tatu’s shoulder, ‘We are all hungry, my friend. Be patient…it will not be much longer.’ His eyes widened, the hand rubbing across his own chin stubble, ‘Go and talk to the others downstairs, I will call for you when they are ready to break through. Give them one of those Romanian motivational talks, bolster them…then they will be ready to go when we get the word.’
The Romanian quartermaster gritted his teeth, ‘Very well…but it had better not be long…my stomach is painful…and so are these men’s.’ He waved his hand around the corridor, the bedraggled soldiers nearby nodding slowly in response.
A soldier slipped out of the doorway nearby, nodding to Hausser as he whispered, ‘I think we are ready, Herr Leutnant.’
The young commander nodded, Tatu stiffening next to him in anticipation. Hausser nudged the Romanian quartermaster, ‘Check the two walls behind you, I want the breakthrough all at the same time.’
Tatu nodded, turning on his heels and stepping into the room behind him. Hausser indicted to one of the soldiers before him, his voice lowered, ‘Get the men from downstairs to move up quietly…’ He indicated, pointing to the floor above, ‘…Remember the Russkies are listening!’
The soldier nodded, saluting formally, Hausser returning the gesture. As the trooper made his way down the hallway, the commander turned and indicated to the men at the end, his hand pointing towards the stairs leading to floor above. The three soldiers slipped forward, stepping up the staircase and unscrewing two Stielhandgranate. As the stairs below creaked, they tossed them forward into the corridor above, a burst of machine gun fire echoing around the rooms from above.
Leutnant Hausser strode into one of the rooms, glancing across the exposed brickwork at the end and nodding with satisfaction, his voice a whisper to the soldiers before him, ‘Be ready…when I give the word, smash through to the next block as soon as you can. Throw a grenade into the room beyond and then storm the building. Keep moving…don’t give the Russkies time to build their defences. The soldiers nodded grimly, glancing upwards as the floorboards above creaked, dust drifting downwards over them.
Hausser grimaced and indicted to two of the four men, ‘Keep your rifles trained on the ceiling, the Russians are moving around above…pass the word to the other rooms. The soldiers stepped back towards the walls, raising their weapons nervously, another moving towards the room next door.
Machine gun fire erupted above, the Germans on the stairs trying to provoke the Russians in the corridor, the rattle of the firing concealing the sounds of the German soldiers moving up the stairs. As a freezing breeze swept down the street outside, one soldier slipped from the building, running low towards the tanks on the crossroads, his breathing laboured as he darted across the snow.
Slowly the soldiers crept into the rooms, checking their weapons and glancing upwards, their countrymen training rifles on the ceiling above. Tatu glanced across the nervous faces in his room, his adrenalin beginning to rise, ‘Keep shooting and moving…we drive them out on one sweep!’
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nbsp; Petru slipped into another room, glancing at the bedraggled soldiers before him. Nodding as he crept towards the exposed brickwork, he indicted for Hase to adopt a position opposite him, on the other side of the intended opening.
Udet nervously pulled the bolt back on his rifle, double checking the chamber. Moving half crouched into Hausser’s room, he glanced up at the dust drifting down from the ceiling above, raising his weapon to point at the smeared and cracked plaster above. The officer glanced up in response, shaking his head as the firing from the darkened corridor above escalated. As the troops crept into the room with them, he gritted his teeth…the Russians were moving in the room above them.
He glanced round, pointing to one of the soldiers at the door, his voice subdued, ‘Tell the other rooms to fire above as we break through…we go in one minute…as soon as the first shot from this room rings out. I think the Russkies are planning a surprise for us!’
The trooper nodded grimly, glancing upwards as he stepped back into the gloomy hallway and moved to the side. Hausser nodded to Udet, the young Berliner crouched to the side of the exposed wall, ‘When we break through, you throw the grenade…then go in after me, understand?’
Udet diverted his stare briefly from the ceiling, his eyes wide with anticipation and nodding his understanding, the commander smiling grimly as their eyes met. The expression fell from his face, the splintering of wood above causing them all to stiffen. Hausser instinctively crouched, slipping his MP40 from round his neck as the rifles in the room tensed. Muffled explosions outside, the two German tanks opening fire on the Russian held floors above them. The rattle of machine gun fire from both the floor above and the street as the armoured cars moved forward once more.
Bloody Stalingrad Page 67