Along the frontline of the pocket, little remarkable happened on 2 February. At Kvitki, the Germans continued to press on, but made slow progress. Similarly the Soviet attempts at cutting off Olshana persisted, but made little progress, although heavy fighting continued near the sugar factory between Olshana and Verbovka, where civilians had sought refuge in cellars and buildings. Civilians were often reluctant to leave their homes, which is understandable, but which meant that they were often wounded or killed by fire aimed at soldiers.349
Far in the north the Soviet 27th Army intensified its attacks, after having probed the front line on the previous day. The northernmost point of the pocket was at Sinyavka, and from there to Pilyava in the southeast, Soviet forces crossed the Rossava River and established a bridgehead more than ten kilometers wide and a few kilometers deep. This threat again caused Lieb to scramble forces from various sectors. Late in the evening he decided that there had to be a retreat from some front sectors, notably by pulling back from the Dnepr.350
The main idea with encirclements was to put the enemy units at a disadvantage, which would cause them to fight less effectively due to, for example, supply shortages. Ideally the surrounded soldiers would consider the situation hopeless and surrender after little or no resistance. Indeed, the morale of the enemy soldiers had been a tempting target long before the encirclement battles. In the interwar period there seems to have been a rather strong belief in the effectiveness of propaganda, both for peacetime purposes and in war. A surrounded force might be particularly susceptible to such efforts, and the Red Army tried to convince the surrounded German soldiers that they should surrender rather than continue fighting.
At Stalingrad a number of high-ranking German officers had been captured and some of them had been convinced to cooperate with their captors. The first sign of their activity at Korsun was a gas mask box found by German troops during a local counterattack. It contained a letter from General Korfes, who had commanded the 76th Infantry Division when it was destroyed at Stalingrad. The discovery was soon followed by Soviet artillery firing propaganda shells, containing a call for surrender from the “Free Germany Committee,” which consisted of German officers captured at Stalingrad. So far the propaganda effort was meager, but the Germans were soon to see more attempts to convince them of the futility of resistance.351
In any case, the encirclement itself was a very clear threat to the Germans, and many precautions were taken as a result of the situation. Meiser was ordered to collect diaries, letters, and money and burn them, to ensure that everything was fully destroyed. He was happy to have sent his diary home just before it was too late, but still he kept a small note book, to record at least something of what was to transpire over the following days. It was actually forbidden to make such notes when inside a pocket, but Meiser disregarded the ban. Instead he concentratxed his energy on collecting money and eventually rounded up more than 60,000 Reichsmarks. This impressive amount of money was useless inside the pocket and was duly burned.352
As no ammunition remained for the howitzers in the battalion, Meiser belonged to, its name was changed from IV./Art.Rgt. 389 to Kampfgruppe Stelzner, after Major Stelzner, the battalion commander. The lack of ammunition meant that a considerable part of the manpower of the battalion was combed out to form infantry, while the remaining soldiers had the task of caring for the howitzers and safeguarding them.353
Since little information trickled down to the rank and file inside the pocket, rumors and wild schemes became prevalent. The soldiers hoped, correctly, that there would be a relief attempt from the outside, but knowledge about how well it progressed was scarce. Some of Meiser’s comrades suggested to Lieutenant Sorajewski that they should try to break out themselves, to approach the relief force coming from the south. Sorajewski turned them down, stating that such an attempt had little or no chance to succeed, and would amount to leaving the other surrounded soldiers in the lurch.354
The thaw had continued and the ground became progressively muddier, which made the original timetables too optimistic. Lieb had intended to attack Kvitki on 3 February, but first he had to report that the attack had to be delayed at least to 13.00hrs, then he had to postpone the attack to the following day. The regrouping required far more time on the muddy roads than had been initially assumed.355
It was naturally easier to attack if the forces were already in position, but still by no means easy. In the north the 27th Army continued to widen the bridgehead taken on 2 February, reaching Kopnatovo and Martynovka. Also the protracted struggle for the sugar factory between Olshana and Verbovka continued. Still, the Germans held on to Olshana, and a corridor to the rest of Gruppe Stemmermann, but their position remained exposed, especially as Soviet units managed to penetrate into Verbovka.356
The air supply operation continued, as did the Soviet efforts to shoot down the slow German transport aircraft. Corporal Grotjohann accompanied a transport aircraft that flew from Uman to Korsun on 3 February. The first flight went well. His aircraft landed at Korsun, unloaded the cargo, filled the aircraft with wounded, and took off to land safely at Uman. Soon it was loaded once more and another attempt to fly to Korsun was made. This time Soviet fighters appeared, but the pilot evaded them and landed safely on Korsun’s airstrip. Grotjohann was sent to help repair another aircraft, but it was not easy to reach it in the thick mud. Grotjohann recalled that for almost every step he took, he had to pull his boots up from the sticky mud on the way to the other end of the airfield. When he had almost made it, Soviet IL-2 ground attack aircraft strafed the airfield. On the flat airstrip there was not much cover to be found from the numerous small bombs. Many of them seemed to be duds and Grotjohann remained unscathed when the IL-2s disappeared. He went back to the aircraft he had arrived with, only to find that the crew had just counted 80 hits from machine gun bullets. The left landing wheel had been shot through and no replacement wheel was available at Korsun. There was no alternative but to wait until a new wheel could be brought to the strip by air.357
Grotjohann and the rest of the aircrew were invited to sleep at the hospital, where they received dinner and straw sacks to sleep on. All of them slept very well, except a sergeant who spent the night hunting lice. In the morning he claimed 96 kills. Grotjohann and the rest of the aircrew had to wait another day before the spare wheel arrived. The mud made the work to fit the new wheel arduous, but the poor flying weather saved them from strafing Soviet aircraft while working to make the return flight to Uman possible. Finally everything was ready, and with relief Grotjohann and the rest of the aircrew could safely fly to their main base.358
On 3 February, von Vormann’s troops began to attack from the bridgehead at Iskrennoye, but it was difficult to compensate for the delay caused by the collapsed bridge. With temperatures around 5°C the thaw continued, but the sky was relatively clear. Mud on the ground was little hindrance to aircraft that had taken off, and when the Germans detected Soviet troop concentrations near the bridgehead air strikes were directed on them.