The American was turning purple and the defending hands were weakening in their effort to push the weapon away.
An small American NCO raised his knife, intent on plunging the blade into the Guardsman’s back, his face suddenly betraying shock as his strength left him in an instant, one of Artem’yev’s bullets ripping through the man’s chest.
He fell to the floor, dead before he had covered half the distance.
At the courtyard doorway, out of which the US troopers had charged, Artem’yev saw an enemy.
The young GI stood holding a .30cal by the triggers and barrel, pointing it into the courtyard, undecided, or just too plain scared to make a decision.
The area was rapidly emptying of American resistance, and soon the decision to fire would be more easily made.
Artem’yev put a bullet through the boy’s stomach, dropping him to the ground in agony.
The last two GI’s were overwhelmed and killed quickly, one earning numerous kicks for slashing the throat of the rifle soldier.
A grenade bounced off one wall and exploded.
One of Artem’yev’s men squealed in pain as three fragments took him in the chest and stomach; another silently absorbed the agony of hot fragments in his thigh and arm.
Artem’yev fell against the wall and slid down it, leaving a red trail as he went.
One fragment went straight through him at the joint of neck and body, the bleeding instant and profuse.
Another slashed open his broken arm, just below the elbow.
With his injuries, the assault group lost its impetus, and the few survivors did what they could for their comrades, but advanced no more.
Elsewhere, the remainder of his Guardsmen drove back the surviving armored infantry, forcing the surviving US tanks to fall back and, by ten minutes to four, Strassfeld was wholly in the hands of the Red Army.
The snow fell thickly, covering many of the horrors.
Whilst the battle had raged in Strassfeld, Hardegen had pushed his men and tanks hard against Müggenhausen.
The promised Soviet artillery support had arrived, and was hurting the Task Force badly.
Sometime during the attack, he was unsure as to when the defining moment had occurred, Hardegen realized that his force was being beaten, and that to preserve what was left he needed to get in closer and cling to the enemy infantry for all he was worth.
As he rushed his troops forward, orders to the mortars called for the rapidest of rapid fire, and US bombs starting doing grisly work amongst the enemy infantry.
Only ‘Bismarck’ and one other Easy-Eight had made it to the edge of the village, the ISU-152’s proving to be awesome adversaries.
The attrition in vehicles had been extreme, and the arrival of six T-34’s from the 12th Guards Heavy Tank Regiment[2] had threatened to turn the tide.
The newly arrived Jackson had earned its keep, dispatching four of the tanks in as many minutes, proving the worth of its 90mm gun.
One of the ISU’s put a heavy shell on target, and the M36 tank-destroyer was transformed into pieces of flying scrap within a micro-second.
Hardegen’s tank killed it with its second attempt, bringing his total kills in the brief combat to five.
The mixed infantry group had charged recklessly into Müggenhausen, and immediately encountered the same problems as the nightmare endured by the armored infantry in Strassberg.
The clerks and cooks tried, and no-one could have asked more of them, but they were not proper combat soldiers, and the casualties they took reflected their weaknesses, as well as the strengths of the guardsmen who fought with them.
The German unit had been there before, many of the men were veterans of the Russian front.
If it was at all possible, the close combat between the Kommando and Guards infantry was even more bestial than that elsewhere across the frontage of CCA’s defeat.
The sight of hated uniforms spurred Artem’yev’s men to superhuman effort; the vision of the old enemy drove the Kommandoes to incredible effort. The two combined left little room for decency and humanity, both of which took a back seat to the imperatives of survival and revenge.
Soviet artillery continued to sweep the field, and Hardegen had decided to press forward and stay in support of his infantry, rather than leave them without armor and face annihilation.
The two Shermans stood as a redoubt, and provided a rallying point for the US soldiers in Müggenhausen, standing proud around the junction of Rheinbacher and Rochus Strasses.
The 191st Artillery was keeping Hardegen’s force alive, the excellence of their craft combined with the skill of the observer, Lieutenant Higgins.
An enemy rush manifested itself, and both Shermans opened up, lacing the snow and rubble with tracers, each of which was accompanied by three equally damaging but invisible friends.
The rush died in an instant, almost as if the men had immediately been recalled.
Hardegen narrowed his eyes, expecting some sort of trick.
His ears warned him first, their unspoken warning reinforced by red smoke rising from the enemy positions.
His eyes searched the snowy sky and found his nemesis immediately.
Two enemy aircraft were already lined up for an attack.
Rising up out of the turret hatch, he sensed rather than felt the zip of bullets around him, as the Soviet infantry force saw his intent and tried to put him down.
He fired the .50cal, knowing he was out of range, but using the device to warn those around him.
The two Shturmoviks, IL-2’s of some age, recently recommissioned to try and make up the shortfall in Soviet striking power, drove in side by side and opened fire, each of them field modified to take improvised mounts for RS132 rockets.
They carried sixteen each, putting thirty-two in the air, targeted on an area some three hundred by four hundred yards.
Hardegen gritted his teeth and kept the .50cal going, walking his tracer stream into the left-hand aircraft without noticeable effect.
The rockets started to arrive amongst the American force.
Higgins’ halftrack took a direct hit, killing the valiant artillery officer instantly.
One rocket seemed intent on coming down the barrel of his machine-gun, and Hardegen felt panic rise.
He controlled it and watched as the thing flew past and exploded behind his tank.
Swiveling the gun, he saw his bullets strike home behind the cockpit of the foremost Shturmovik.
Other rockets exploded, obscuring his view of the enemy aircraft, but he knew he had wounded it badly.
Something flew across his line of vision, this time from right to left, his imagination suggesting that more enemy aircraft had arrived, until the sight of a mangled body skidding across the snow told him otherwise.
The rockets had knocked the stuffing out of the defenders, and caused many casualties in the tight packed ruins and gardens.
The two Illyushins turned lazily and commenced a bomb run.
Each carried four hundred kilos of bombs, the leader four one hundred kilo general-purpose weapons; the second aircraft bore eight, each fifty kilos fragmentation bombs.
It was immediately obvious that the leading aircraft was using ‘Bismarck’ as an aiming point.
“Toss red smoke,” Hardegen shouted to anyone in range; some even heard him and complied.
Blue smoke rose from the Soviet positions, showing that the man in charge there knew his job.
Another pannier of ammo had been passed up and Hardegen slapped the top of the .50cal down hard, having slipped the new belt home.
2
12th GHTR were well-known scroungers of running tanks and are documented as having up to nine T-34’s on their strength at any one time, in addition to their full compliment of IS-II’s.