Q: Panzer in Stalingrad, Red October?

[Sgt AA]

Hi!

I recently read some books about the assault on the Red October in the late October. Some writer talks about "a wall of steel" from the german side. Does anyone know anything about how many tanks that was involved in this battle?

I only find records of a company StuG.

It would be great if you can help me out with what model was represented and do you have any numbers from the russian side too it will be much appriciated.

[Heinrich505]

Sgt AA,

I did some checking with the reference books I have, but didn't have much luck with specifics. The "wall of steel" seems to be a combination of several thousand Stuka air attacks, as much artillery as could be scrounged, and anywhere from 200 to 300 tanks.

The 14th and 24th Panzer Divisions supported the 100th Jäger, 60th motorized, and the 389th Infantry. In action reports, by 11:30 AM a German NCO reports that 180 tanks broke through to the stadium of the Tractor Plant. Russian situation reports claim upwards of 100 Facist tanks have broke through. This comes from Will Fowler's "Stalingrad, The Vital 7 days," as well as translations from "Stalingrad, Anatomie Einer Schlacht." Also, a NCO of the 305th Inf. Div. speaks of self propelled assault guns in quantities never seen before (probably StuGs) .

In Janusz Pickalkiewicz's "Stalingrad, Anatomie Einer Schlacht," there are many photos of Panzer Mark III tanks and Sturmgeschutz III assault guns. On page 176, German troops relate how the StuG assault guns drove to point blank range to fire into Soviet strongholds.

Interestingly enough, specifics about the type of panzer are not related. The list of books I consulted are:

"Stalingrad, The Vital 7 Days" Will Fowler

"Stalingrad, Anatomie Einer Schlacht" Janusz Pickalkiewicz

"Stalingrad, The Infernal Cauldron" Stephen Walsh

"Enemy At The Gates" William Craig

"Stalingrad" V.E. Tarrant

As an aside, and not to be taken directly as a reference, the Avalon Hill Game, Advanced Squad Leader put out a specific game devoted to the assault on the tractor plant, called "Red Barricades." I know the staff routinely did some serious research into putting together their games and scenarios. In this compilation of battles, the armor assigned to the German side was Panzer Mark III, some Panzer Mark IV, both long and short 75mm, and mainly Sturmgeschutz III, usually the B version with a kurz 75mm gun. There were also 150mm howitzer versions of the StuG. Again, not to be taken as absolute sources, but something I throw in as an observation.

As another aside, German tanks and assault guns were torn between using HE to destroy the Soviet positions or armor piercing to handle the dug-in T-34s or the counter attacks by Soviet tanks. Many refused to take the chance of driving around a building corner and blundering into a Russian tank, only to have an HE round in the breach, so they shot up Russian strongpoints with AP, which had no effect, leaving the infantry to assault the unreduced, and mainly undamaged positions.

I tried looking on the internet, but didn't come up with specifics either. Sorry about that. Hope this was a little helpful. If you can find some specific history of the 14th Panzer Div., that might call to an order of battle at the time of October 14th, 1942.

Regards,

Heinrich505

[John Kettler]

Sgt AA,

Have you tried contacting our Stalingrad ubergrog Russ Schulke. He runs the amazing site

www.fireonthevolga.com

and contributed some incredible stuff to those working on Stalingrad scenarios. See the post here to grok what I mean.

http://www.battlefront.com/cgi-bin/bbs/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=recent_user_posts;u=00022237

Regards,

John Kettler

[Michael Dorosh]

Jason Mark's books on the Red October fighting should have decent data? There was a special type of assault gun, mentioned in the Avalon Hill game, that Mark actually has photos of. I understand his books are the cat's ass.

For what it is worth, 24 Panzer Division was destroyed within the city itself; I would envision a number of PzKpfw III and IV in that case but have no access to the books. I know "the Leaping Horsemen" had previously been the 1e Kavallerie Division and still retained golden yellow piping and cavalry rank honorifics, but that is as far as my knowledge takes me.

Death of the Leaping Horseman and Island of Fire are highly recommended from what I hear - a friend who married a Russian girl own them but I've yet to lay hands on them myself.

[Heinrich505]

John and Michael,

This was not my thread, but thanks for the information and direction. Those were very nice threads. I've been an informal student of the Stalingrad inferno for longer than I can remember. I plowed through "Stalingrad, Anatomie einer Schlacht" with a German-English dictionary in my hand, looking up translations on just about every third word, such was my devotion. I'll have to save up some serious bucks to snag a copy of "Island of Fire." I almost threw for Carrell's Stalingrad book, and regret not grabbing it then. If you have more sites to recommend, I'd be grateful. I had no idea the ones you guys suggested existed. I was happy to see that some of the books on Russ's site are also in my "library."

Heinrich505

[Sgt AA]

Thank you all, valuable information. My sources so far was mainly Anthony Beavor and Stephen Walsh.

"On October 20th the German 79th Infantry Division was brought forward to take part in the attack on the “Red October” metallurgical works. They, along with the 14 Panzer Division, were tasked with taking the complex on 23rd October"

From north to south there was the IR.54, IR.208 and IR.212 that performed the assault.

Thanks a lot!