There were some Hetzers right in front. They did not have movable turrets, so the whole vehicle had to turn in order to aim the gun. Soldiers were using them as cover, running behind the three or four Hetzers, thinking that most firing was coming from ahead. We, however, had the impression that the fire was coming mainly from the right out of the gaps between the buildings, or the windows, so we passed along the left-hand side of the tanks, and were correct. There was no panic, just dull routine procedure. Each told the other what to look out for. No one smoked, for matches and cigarettes would betray you in the dark. A motorcycle sidecar wheel was stuck so close to one of the tanks that the passenger would be crushed if it moved. We could only alert the crew to this after some agonising minutes, as our knocking sounded just like infantry fire to the crew inside. All were hoping that the column would break free, as there was supposed to be only slight Russian resistance to be overcome up ahead.
We suspected that the spearhead would be immediately ahead of us around the slight bend in the road, not knowing that the road had been blocked off by the Russians in Teurow. As nothing was moving forward, we decided to take a break, and climbed through the window of a building on the right-hand side of the street. In the dark we noticed and sensed that the room was completely full of soldiers. There were only two places still free on the floor right next to the window opposite, the most dangerous place in the room. A soldier was sitting on a chair, which I had not noticed when I tried to sit down. Shortly afterwards the building was hit by a shell and the room filled with dust. ‘Is anyone hurt?’ somebody called out. From the floor, where 15 to 20 men were sitting tightly packed together, came the answer, ‘No.’ I felt some crumbly moisture on my helmet and struck a match. Then I saw that the soldier on the chair had been decapitated. It was the soldier sitting on the chair, where I had wanted to sit. I extinguished the match to loud cries of protest. Heiner and I did not linger any longer. We did not feel any safer in the street, but hoped to make some progress. Since the attack was still being held in check, we went back to the railway and crept back over the embankment to the edge of the woods. As we could get no idea what was happening, we went back into the chaos on the street with its many dead and wounded, and no movement either forward or back, although everyone wanted to move on.
Where the village ended and the street became the main road again, there was a pinewood on the right, which we reached safely. We then checked every foxhole and the like, in this manner covering several hundred metres until we came to a house on the main road, whose steps led down to a wash cellar.
What we could not know was that the breakthrough was taking place only 3,000 to 4,000 metres away, where troops were crossing the autobahn with all the available heavy tanks and almost all the SPGs, but with heavy losses. According to General Busse there were some 30,000 to 40,000 of them.
Totally exhausted, we crept into the house’s wash cellar, thinking that we had found a safe shelter. The threat of being taken prisoner was with us every moment, and we wondered how the Russians would react. As officer cadets we had no NCO lace sewn on our uniforms and only had to unbutton our epaulettes to remove our rank insignia.
It was already becoming light when we went down the steps. Although we expected to be taken prisoner, it happened sooner than we had expected. After about twenty minutes the demand came in German: ‘Come out, Ivan is here, leave your weapons!’ Seydlitz-Troops?
As I emerged, I saw only Russian uniforms and Mongolian faces, several of the soldiers having only a cord instead of a belt around them. One of them took my Finnish dagger with its beautifully decorated leather sheath that I wore on my belt and had forgotten to remove, and thumped me with his rifle butt because of it. In the background I saw Russian soldiers advancing in line abreast through the woods on Halbe.
We had not noticed this dawn counterattack. We prisoners – about ten men – now marched off in the direction we had wanted to take, but under an escort that we would certainly have avoided. We went a few hundred metres through a wood past some dead German soldiers, and were surprised how far they had come.[36]
Günter Führling’s encounter with Seydlitz-Troops in Halbe is corroborated by SS-Major Hartrampf, commanding the vanguard of the northern wedge, who visited a police post on the edge of the village and was told that it was clear of the enemy, but when he went forward to find out why his tanks were not moving, the policeman accompanying him disappeared, and he suspected that he and his men must have been Seydlitz-Troops posing as policemen.[37]
The remains of the SS Panzergrenadier Division Nederland, down to about 300 men, also broke out near the village. SS-Major-General Jürgen Wagner divided his men into three groups for the break-out, the first under SS-Captain Tröger of 1st Battalion, 48th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment General Seyffarth, the second under SS-Second Lieutenant Reischütz, and the third under SS-Second Lieutenant Bender.[38]
Since movement within the pocket could not be concealed from the Soviets, they pressed hard upon the weak securing units from east of the Dahme. As there were no longer any heavy weapons available, the German troops had to resort to their own resources and counterattacked in classic style, using hand grenades, spades and sub-machine guns. Among them was the Mathiebe Combat Team from 1st Battalion, 86th Grenadier Regiment Schill, which retook the area around the Streganz brickworks and held on to it. This defensive battle, which also included the retaking of Hermsdorf by the combat team, went on all day.
SS-Lieutenant Bärmann of the 32nd SS Tank-Hunting Battalion wrote:
Our divisional staff were in Hermsdorf, where a general was directing traffic with a pistol in his hand. Only in this way could panic be prevented, and the streams of traffic flow in orderly fashion.
The headquarters moved on to the Hammer forestry office, which first had to be cleared of its Russian occupants, but they had to leave 2,000 wounded behind in Hermsdorf in the care of their last two medical officers and some medical orderlies.[39]
The outward flow of troops and refugees remained sluggish, being constantly interrupted by attacking aircraft and heavy artillery fire. Nothing was known of developments at the break-out point. Stragglers and soldiers who had distanced themselves from their units mingled with endless streams of refugees moving this way and that all day long through the narrow pocket, attracting the Russian aircraft like moths to a flame. The dead and wounded could no longer be tended to or made safe. Apart from the lack of ammunition, there was also a lack of bandages and medical supplies. Doctors and medical orderlies were scarcely to be seen.[40]
The SS-second lieutenant of Battlegroup Becker, which was still within the main pocket, continued his account:
On 28 April we moved as the last unit and, after a few kilometres, occupied a new position on a small height near a village. The Russians came across the open ground and attacked us with loud cries. Aircraft pinned us down and it became a bitter fight. We had to repel their attacks four times, mainly in close combat with some indescribable scenes.