How tankers warmed up in winter during the Second World War

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

Every "Kolya from Urengoy" these days is well aware that almost all Wehrmacht tanks were fully equipped with standard heaters, while the defenders of the "totalitarian socialist" Motherland were forced to freeze on long winter nights! But if you read the memoirs of Soviet and German tankers, the situation looks completely different.

From the side of the enemy, one of the most eloquent sources of information on this score is the well-known tank ace Otto Karius.

Let's go from afar. The first regular heater for the fighting compartment on Soviet tanks appeared only in the 1960s on the T-64 tank. In the Third Reich, the first full-time heater for the interior of the car was developed only in October 1944, in fact, at the end of the war.

The German heater was called "Kampfraumheizung" and, judging by the surviving documentation, relied only on the PzKpfw V Panther tanks, although it may have been installed on the "Tigers".

However, given that by the fall of 1944, the Wehrmacht was no longer doing very well at the front, and the German industry suffered from a shortage of resources and constant Allied bombing, such heaters were hardly widespread. The situation was similar for the tanks of the USA and Great Britain - there were no stoves for the crew there.

Both Soviet and German tankers had two main ways to keep warm in a tank throughout the day. The first is winter clothing. Moreover, if you believe the memoirs, then the Soviet fighters had an order of magnitude better.

Already mentioned at the very beginning, the tank ace Otto Karius (1922-2015), the author of the popular memoir "Tigers in the Mud", repeatedly complained about the quality of the winter clothing of the Wehrmacht tankers and admired the warm clothes of Soviet tankmen. The second heating method during the day is the warmth of a running engine.

Moreover, the Germans in this regard unexpectedly showed great ingenuity: they drilled a small hole in the bulkhead of the engine compartment and threw a rubber hose that conducted hot air from the engine directly into the crew compartment.

During long stops, Soviet tankmen dug trenches under the tanks, in which small ovens were placed. At the same time, the tank was covered with a tarpaulin, and a pipe was taken out of the trench from the stove to remove the poisonous gas. Very quickly it became warm under the tank and you could sleep peacefully.

The stove also warmed the car itself, allowing it to start much faster during severe frosts. During short stops, Soviet tankers simply covered the engine compartment with a tarpaulin, lay down on top of it and covered it with another sheet of tarpaulin from above.

Such a "sandwich" allowed sleeping right outside in the warmth for several hours. According to the memoirs of Soviet tankmen, tarpaulin is a soldier's best friend. As for the stoves-stoves for tanks, they were both produced in factories and made by tankers already at the front in repair shops from what was.

It was much more difficult for the German tankers in this regard. The Nazis planned to end the war even before the first frost, and therefore they did not have any special ovens.

In the first year of the war, the Germans also covered tanks with tarpaulins, burned small fires under the cars when the fire died out, climbed in and slept for several hours in an improvised tent. However, according to the memoirs of Otto Karius, the command banned this method of overnight stay after the successful raids of the Soviet assault aircraft. Karius generally recalls winter as the worst time for a tanker, since for many, the only way to heat was a regular blowtorch.

Moreover, due to the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning and fire, the command forbade the use of them.

Unfortunately, German (including memoirs) sources on this score are less rich. However, in general, Soviet tank crews remember winter as a difficult, but still not a monstrous time in terms of living conditions. The Germans, on the other hand, most often remember the winter war as the most difficult one from the point of view of everyday life.

It should also be added that both Soviet and German crews were warmed up in winter by any available means. Including used the so-called "spirit lamps": metal containers with dry alcohol, which were originally created to warm the engine compartment of trucks.

By the way, the most interesting memories were left by the Soviet tankman Dmitry Loza, the author of the memoir “Tankman in a Foreign Car”. Dmitry Fyodorovich fought in the "Sherman" delivered by Lend-Lease. So in American tanks during the Second World War, there were no heaters either.