Vasily Grossman: Life And Fate

'We certainly did tighten the screws,' said Yershov. 'That's for sure.'

'We didn't tighten them enough,' said General Gudz. 'We should have gone further still. Then Hitler wouldn't have reached the Volga.'

'It's not for us to give lessons to Stalin,' said Osipov.

'True enough,' said Mostovskoy. 'And if we perish in prisons or damp mines, then that's that. We must just think of something else.'

'Such as?' asked Yershov loudly.

Everyone exchanged glances, looked away again and fell silent.

'Oh Kirillov! Kirillov!' said Yershov abruptly. 'The old man's quite right. We should rejoice that the Fascists hate us. We hate them and they hate us. Right? But just imagine being sent to a Russian camp! That really would be hard. But as for this…! We're stout-hearted lads! We'll give the Germans a run for their money!'

General Chuykov, the commander of the 62nd Army, [7]had lost all contact with his troops. Most of the wireless sets had gone dead and the telephone cables had all been severed.

Sometimes it seemed as though the gently rippling Volga was something fixed and stable, and that the quaking earth was huddling against its still margins. From the left bank, hundreds of pieces of Soviet heavy artillery kept up a constant barrage. Round the German positions on the southern slopes of Mamayev Kurgan, the earth whirled into the air like smoke. These clouds of earth then passed through the sieve of gravity, the heavier lumps falling straight to the ground, the dust rising into the sky.

Several times during the day the soldiers had fought off attacks by German tanks and infantry. Their eyes were bloodshot and their ears deafened.

To the senior officers cut off from their troops the day seemed interminable. Chuykov, Krylov and Gurov had tried everything under the sun to fill in the time: they had invented work for themselves, written letters, argued about what the enemy might do next, drunk vodka with and without something to eat, and had listened in silence to the roar of the guns. An iron whirlwind howled over the bunker, slicing through anything living that raised its head above the earth's surface. The Army Headquarters was paralysed.

'Let's have a game of fool!' said Chuykov, pushing aside a large ashtray full of cigarette-ends.

Even Krylov, the chief of staff, had lost his composure. Drumming his fingers on the table, he said: 'I can't imagine anything worse. We're just sitting here – waiting to be eaten!'

Chuykov dealt, announced, 'Hearts are trumps,' and then suddenly scattered the cards. 'I can't bear it!' he exclaimed. 'We're just sitting in our holes like rabbits.' He sat there in silence. His face was agonized and full of hatred.

As though predicting his own end, Gurov murmured thoughtfully: 'Another day like this and I'll have a heart attack!'

He suddenly burst out laughing and said: 'At the divisional command-post it's impossible even to go to the bog during the day. I heard that Lyudnikov's chief of staff once jumped down into the bunker and shouted out: "Hurrah! I've been for a shi…!" He looked round and there was the lady-doctor he was in love with.'

The German air-raids stopped at dusk. A man arriving in Stalingrad at night, deafened by the guns, might well imagine that some cruel fate had brought him there just as a major offensive was being launched. For the veterans, however, this was the time to shave, to wash clothes and write letters; for the turners, mechanics, solderers and watchmakers this was the time to repair clocks, cigarette-lighters, cigarette-holders, and the oil-lamps made from old shellcases with strips of greatcoat as wicks.

In the flickering light from the shell-bursts you could see the banks of the river, the oil-tanks and factory-chimneys, the ruins of the city itself. The view was sullen and sinister.

In the dark the signals centre came to life again. Typewriters clattered away as they copied dispatches, motors hummed, orders were tapped out in Morse code, telephonists exchanged messages as the command-posts of divisions, regiments, batteries and companies were once again connected up… Signals officers who had just arrived gave measured coughs as they waited to give their reports to the duty-officer.

Pozharsky, the elderly artillery commander; General Tkachenko, the sapper in charge of the dangerous river-crossing; Guryev, the newly-arrived commander of the Siberian division; and Lieutenant-Colonel Batyuk, the Stalingrad veteran whose division was disposed below Mamayev Kurgan, all hurried to report to Chuykov and Krylov. At the front line itself, letters folded into triangles were handed to postmen… And the dead were buried – to spend the first night of their eternal rest beside the dug-outs and trenches where their comrades were writing letters, shaving, eating bread, drinking tea and washing in improvised baths.

This was the beginning of the most difficult period for the defenders of Stalingrad. In the confusion of the street-fighting, of the different attacks and counter-attacks, of the struggle for the 'House of Specialists', for the mill, for the State Bank – and for each square, courtyard and cellar – the superiority of the German forces was indisputable.

The wedge the Germans had driven into the southern part of Stalingrad was widening every day. From positions beside the water, German machine-gunners were able to cover the left bank to the south of Krasnaya Sloboda. The staff officers responsible for plotting the position of the front line on the map saw how inexorably the blue markers moved forward from day to day, how the band separating the red line of the Soviet defences from the light blue of the Volga grew steadily thinner.

The initiative at this time belonged to the Germans. For all their fury, the Russian counter-attacks could do nothing to halt their remorseless advance. From dawn to dusk the sky was filled with the whine of German dive-bombers, pounding the earth with their high-explosive bombs. And hundreds of men lived day after day with the same terrible question: what will happen tomorrow – or next week -when the thin band of the Soviet defences is reduced to a thread, when this thread is snapped by the iron teeth of the German offensive?

Late that night, General Krylov lay down to sleep in the bunker. His temples throbbed and his throat burned: he had smoked dozens of cigarettes that day. He licked his dry palate and turned over to face the wall. As he lay there, half-asleep, he remembered the fighting in Odessa and Sebastopol: the shouts of the Rumanian infantry as they attacked; Sebastopol and its naval splendour; Odessa and its cobble-paved courtyards cloaked in ivy.

Once again he was back at the command-post in Sebastopol. General Petrov's pince-nez was gleaming through the mist. The gleam broke into a thousand splinters and he saw the sea. A grey cloud, the dust raised by shell-bursts on the cliffs, floated above the heads of the soldiers and sailors and stood over Sapun Mountain.

He could hear the waves lapping unconcernedly against the launch. Then a gruff voice from below: 'Jump!' He leaped into the deep – and landed on the hull of the submarine… He took his last look at Sebastopol, at the stars, at the fires on the shore.

The war kept its hold on him even while he was asleep… The submarine was taking him to Novorossiysk. His legs were numb, his chest and back were damp with sweat, the noise of the engines was beating against his temples. Then the engines cut out and the submarine settled quietly onto the sea-bed. The closeness inside was unbearable; the ceiling, criss-crossed by dotted lines of riveting, was crushing him…

Then he heard a roar and a splash. A depth-charge had exploded. The submarine lurched and he was thrown out of his bunk. He opened his eyes and found everything in flames. There was a stream of fire running towards the Volga past the open door of the bunker. He could hear shouting and the rattle of tommy-guns.