Tank Rider: Into the Reich with the Red Army

Our rest at the ‘resort’ did not last long. One day Colonel Koretski called me and ordered the battalion to depart, giving me a truck and explaining the route to me. We left the ‘resort’ with sadness. I found the battalion in a village, where it had stopped for a mid-day rest, and reported my arrival to both battalion commander Kozienko and company commander Chernyshov. I accommodated my soldiers and went to the house where some officers gathered for lunch. They greeted me with joy, almost shouting ‘Hurrah’ – the officers were a bit tipsy and were fooling around. They made me sit down at the table, and poured a shtrafnaya or punishment glass for me (a punishment glass is an extra glass of wine or vodka that a person has to drink if he or she is late for a party – translator’s comment). I noticed that besides Vyunov, Kes, Guschenkov, Belyakov, Tsikanovski and Mochalov there was a strange Lieutenant in the house. I was introduced to him – this was Fedor Popov, with whom we fought till the end of the war. A brave, middle-sized, physically fit and modest person, he became a good comrade to me. Besides him, Lieutenant Grigori Mikheev arrived in the company in those days to replace wounded Petr Shakulo as a platoon leader. A native of Siberia, he was a big and physically strong guy; later we became good friends. He came to us from the signal platoon. He was dismissed from that office for drunk driving, when he lost control over the truck of the signals platoon and the truck capsized. However, they put it back on wheels later, no one was hurt, but Mikheev was punished and appointed platoon leader in a motor rifle company.

On the evening of 4 February we started our tank raid. The battles that followed were bitter; the Germans resisted stubbornly, holding on to every village and hill. The enemy threw Vlasov’s soldiers against us – we would defeat them as well, but I should say they fought better than the Germans. The Germans deployed Panzerfaust anti-tank missiles en masse against our tanks. It was a dreadful close-range weapon against our tanks and other vehicles. A Panzerfaust easily penetrated a T-34 tank, its explosive energy was enormous, and it could even penetrate a JS-2, if it hit the side.

As usual, I travelled on tanks with my platoon far ahead of the battalion. Once, before we could reach a small village at the road, we came under heavy fire. The soldiers quickly dismounted, while the tanks drove back a bit. I moved forward a little with my platoon, but had to lie down in a ditch because of heavy fire. Snipers were firing. Besides that, I saw anti-personnel ‘spring-mines’ and anti-tank mines. If you touched the wire from a ‘spring-mine’, it would jump up to 2 metres and explode, killing men with its contents. Anti-tank mines were placed on the highway.

Vyunov arrived with his platoon, but he acted smarter – he did not move along the asphalt highway, but moved a bit to the right and advanced through a young forest. Eventually his soldiers also had to lie down in front of the village. Chernyshov came running; I had not seen him for a long time. As always, he started to shout: ‘Forward, Bessonov, forward!’ I told him: ‘Wait, Nikolai, look around. Can’t you see the mines on the road and snipers firing? Vyunov’s position is better now, he should attack the village.’

We shouted ‘Forward!’ to Vyunov, but either he did not hear us or was also pinned down by snipers, but at all events his soldiers remained on the ground. Chernyshov wanted to run there, and I tried to talk him out of it, putting it bluntly: ‘They will kill you.’ I recommended he go back and bring up the heavy JS-2 tanks, but Chernyshov did not listen to my advice: he jumped up and before he made two steps from the ditch, a shot sounded in the air and Nikolai fell down. We pulled him into the ditch and bandaged him. He was wounded in his chest. After that we carried him at the rear. All this time Chernyshov was unconscious. This incident happened around 8 or 10 February and he had to stay in hospital until 18 April, 1945.