Armin Scheiderbauer - Adventures in My Youth

In that fighting in the sector of the 252nd Infanteriedivision , in addition to the units already mentioned, there were also involved a reconnaissance battalion, the SS Fallschirmjäger Battalion 500, 2 assault gun brigades, army artillery units, and several 8.8 cm self-propelled guns. The Division was mentioned on 15 August in the Wehrmacht report. In July/August the enemy had sent in against the 9th Armeekorps , and thereby also the 252nd Infanteriedivision , their 5th Guards Tank Army with the 3rd Guard Tank Corps and the 29th Tank Corps. Their forces too seemed to be exhausted. The Lithuanian people were particularly friendly and ready to help the German troops. The time in positions that then began was used to reorganise the troops and to re-fill the command posts.

Finally the remnants, or rather the ruins, of Grenadierregiment 461, the 3rd Battalion, Artillerieabteilung 252 and the 2nd Pionierkompanie arrived back with the Division. With the newly arrived replacements came Oberst Dorn, recovered again from his wounds, who took over the command of Grenadierregiment 7. Major von Garn took over command of Grenadierregiment 461 and Major Herzog took over command of Grenadierregiment 472. In magnificent summer weather the unit was welded together again. By combing through all units to the rear, by lightening the load on vehicles, and reducing the amount the men carried, the unit was made mobile.

On 5 August the Russians, with strong infantry and tank forces, took possession of half the town, including the raised Osthügel with the hospital, visible from afar, and the convent. They also commanded the low ground adjoining it to the south and the high ground beyond it. From my command post there was played out before my eyes the enemy tank attack across the lower ground. The tanks approached the firing positions of our artillery on the western edge of the low ground, where, well camouflaged in bushes, the howitzers stood in position. From my window I observed how seven tanks were destroyed by the gunners’ direct fire. They were firing with impact fuses. The last tank had approached to within 50 metres of them.

With my Battalion staff I had struck lucky again. The battalion was at first held in reserve. Later one company after another was taken away and placed under the command of the battalions of the old regiment. In the absence of our own battalion sector my activity was confined therefore to passing on as quickly as possible the orders assigning units to other commands. I had to ensure that the companies in question got quickly and surely to the appropriate battalions.

Meanwhile, the town was under heavy fire. I had immediately reported the repulse of the tank attack to Major von Garn whose regimental command post was in a house in the town from which the plain could not be seen. We on the other hand were in a sawmill on the western edge of the town, where the street to Vidukle crossed a stream. The gate to the sawmill was still and deserted. The inhabitants and workers had disappeared. In the smoke-room of the house there was hanging a row of massive sides of bacon. The men of my staff immediately tucked in to them. Fathers of families took advantage of the forced break and made up packages to send home. The one-storey building of the sawmill was partly covered with trees and from several windows allowed an uninterrupted view across the low ground to the heights beyond.

My friend Helmut Kristen had taken up quarters with his company 100 metres to the south of the sawmill in a little farm. In the blazing midday sun I took a walk to his farmyard. He too was enjoying the enforced rest. In the shadow of a nut tree we drank a bottle of Bordeaux which came from the army supply dump at Globokie. His little dog was hanging his head. He was obviously sick and apathetic, while we were enjoying life. The little dog died a few days later of distemper. Loving care and even a consultation with the artillery vet had not been able to help him.

Our command post in the sawmill proved no longer to be ideal. Again and again individual artillery shells were exploding in the vicinity. Finally eight tank or anti-tank shells smashed through two walls of the room above my head. So the transfer of the command post 300 metres further westwards to a little house on the road to Vidukle was indicated. But even there we were not secure. For the first time since the previous June, we received getting on for 100 replacements for the battalion. They were 18 and 19 years old Kölsche Jungs . During the time in which they were being allocated the Russians dropped some shells on the road in front of that house. Most of the poor young lads did not even take cover they were so shocked. Three of them were killed instantly. Two others were wounded. The others were shivering with shock for a long time, while we old and experienced men, as if by nature, it seemed to me, got up unscathed.

During the night the Russians had dropped leaflets over the town, most likely from a slow-flying biplane, one of which I had found on my way to the regimental command post. It was a safe transit for deserters and concerned itself with the events of the 20 July. ‘Hitler called on the hangman Himmler and ordered him to ruthlessly annihilate the German generals and officers who spoke out against Hitler. Hitler is also pushing experienced generals to one side and putting in their place crooks and adventurers from the SS , with no talent. Leave the front, get back to Germany, and you, too, take part in the fight against Hitler and his bloody clique! Up and to it!’ Then came a personal note, ‘To our comrades in Regiment 7’, with a description of the casualties of the 11th Company which mentioned the names of men killed and wounded. ‘Why do you want to be killed or to be shot up and crippled at the last minute? Just to prolong the existence of the doomed adventurers like Hitler and his clique?’ The situation was not as simple as the leaflet made out. Nobody thought that it was simply a matter of the survival of ‘Hitler’s clique’.

On 14 August the counter-attack began to re-take Raseinen. Regiment 7 and the units under its command, with the addition of a Tiger and Panther Abteilung , two mortar regiments, and two Army artillery units supported the attack. Oberst Garn was back in command. His Adjutant was Hauptmann Nicolai, my friend from the spring in Schweidnitz. Major von Garn, promoted to Oberstleutnant , had to hand over the command and temporarily lead the Panzergrenadier regiment in a counter-attack on Schaulen. I was sorry that he was not allowed to command the attack on Raseinen. It would have been a worthy conclusion to his career as a regimental commander in the ‘7th’.

The supporting units had been brought up the previous night into the most forward trenches. The Tigers and Panthers, those excellent tanks, were assembling behind houses and ruins close to the main line of resistance. It is true that my confidence in the assault and fighting ability and versatility of the tanks was lessened when I saw that their crews consisted of young men. Thin little chaps with children’s faces, in the midst of it all, they looked lost. They had not yet grown up together and not yet grown together with their vehicles and cannons. That was the impression given by the men of our old escort, the Swabian assault gun Abteilung .

The attack went according to plan and was successful. The Russians were thrown out of the town with heavy casualties and moderate casualties on our side. Only the convent could not be taken. The 23 years old Hauptmann Ahlers from the Fusilierbataillon was indeed able to get into the church with a few men, but came under fire from the chancel and from behind the altar and had to get out again. Several T-34s were standing in the convent courtyard, protected by thick walls. All the same they were encircled and cut off.