Legendary hero of the Great Patriotic War. Complete reconstruction of the feat of Alexander Matrosov

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

It was the 616th day of the war. On February 27, 1943, the Red Army soldier Alexander Matveevich Matrosov, covering the embrasure of the enemy bunker with his chest, became a legendary hero of the Great Patriotic War. In the USSR, everyone knew about his feat and, it seems, everything was known. But recently declassified documents from the Central Archives of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation make it possible not only for the first time to reconstruct that day in detail, but also to make important adjustments to the well-known picture of the battle.

Starting with the fact that Alexander Matrosov died during the storming of the village of Plethen, and not Chernushki, as it is written in encyclopedias and school textbooks to this day, with this publication, our observer was the first Russian historian to try to write the life and fate of an ordinary soldier into the chronicle of the war.

FRONT. Staff plan N 0057

Before me is the operational plan of the headquarters of the Kalinin Front No. 0057 dated February 8, 1943. On this day, Alexander Matrosov with a marching company is still just moving towards the front (on February 5, he was only 19 years old). The document has the highest level of secrecy: “Sov. secret. Especially important. Therefore, three copies of the plan were handwritten in purple ink and signed by the front commander, a member of the Military Council and the front chief of staff.

The plan provides for the creation of a front-line operational group: management of two rifle corps, 4 rifle divisions, 6 rifle brigades (in one of them - the 91st separate named after Stalin, Matrosov will serve), 2 ski brigades, 2 corps artillery regiments, 2 reserve artillery regiments main command, 2 anti-tank artillery regiments, 4 120-mm mortar regiments, one guards mortar regiment and 2 separate divisions of guards mortars, a tank brigade and one separate tank battalion, one engineer brigade and 2 separate engineer battalions1. A special plan provides for the provision of aviation, including long-range aviation².

It was the 616th day of the war. On February 27, 1943, the Red Army soldier Alexander Matveevich Matrosov, covering the embrasure of the enemy bunker with his chest, became a legendary hero of the Great Patriotic War. In the USSR, everyone knew about his feat and, it seems, everything was known. But recently declassified documents from the Central Archives of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation make it possible not only for the first time to reconstruct that day in detail, but also to make important adjustments to the well-known picture of the battle. Starting with the fact that Alexander Matrosov died during the storming of the village of Plethen, and not Chernushki, as it is written in encyclopedias and school textbooks to this day, with this publication, our observer was the first Russian historian to try to write the life and fate of an ordinary soldier into the chronicle of the war.

19-year-old Sasha Matrosov continued to lead into battle even after his death.

FRONT. Staff plan N 0057

Before me is the operational plan of the headquarters of the Kalinin Front No. 0057 dated February 8, 1943. On this day, Alexander Matrosov with a marching company is still just moving towards the front (on February 5, he was only 19 years old). The document has the highest level of secrecy: “Sov. secret. Especially important. Therefore, three copies of the plan were handwritten in purple ink and signed by the front commander, a member of the Military Council and the front chief of staff.

The plan provides for the creation of a front-line operational group: management of two rifle corps, 4 rifle divisions, 6 rifle brigades (in one of them - the 91st separate them. Stalin will serve Matrosov), 2 ski brigades, 2 corps artillery regiments, 2 artillery regiments of the reserve of the main command, 2 anti-tank artillery regiments, 4 regiments of 120-mm mortars, one guards mortar regiment and 2 separate divisions of guards mortars, a tank brigade and one separate tank battalion, one engineer brigade and 2 separate engineer battalions1. A special plan provides for the provision of aviation, including long-range aviation².

The plan of the military operation, during which Alexander Matrosov was killed. Photo: TsAMO RF

OPERGROUP OF GENERAL GERASIMOV. Readiness check

This is the third year of the war. The Red Army, in which shoulder straps were introduced after January 6, 1943, is already in a position to form such a powerful task force with the forces of the front. "The holy rage of the offensive" - written in the pre-war 1938, the poetic line of Konstantin Simonov turns into the prose of life. Before the task force under the command of Lieutenant-General Mikhail Nikanorovich Gerasimov (1894 - 1962), the task was set: “to seize the Loknya area and capture or destroy the Kholm group of enemy forces^“3.

This is the third war of the general after the First World War and the Civil War, he showed himself worthily at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, commanding the corps and the army in the battles for Leningrad.

The operation for Gerasimov's fighters is designed for 10-12 days, should begin on February 20 and take place in two stages. On February 23, on the day of the 25th anniversary of the Red Army, the task force was to seize an important transport hub in the hands of the Germans - an urban-type settlement and the Loknya railway station (now in the Pskov region) and, building on the success, strike against the southern flank of the army group " North".

The check of the readiness of the troops of the operational group for the offensive, carried out on February 17-18, showed the expediency of postponing the start of the operation from February 20 to February 24. And the commander of the Kalinin front, Colonel-General Maxim Alekseevich Purkaev (1894 - 1953) made such a decision⁴… He was worried about the coming thaw, which affected the supply of ammunition. Purkaev's decision was approved by Stalin, although a few days earlier he had refused a similar request to another commander.⁵.

Was General Purkaev's operational plan realistic? Yes!

FRAME. Resistance nodes of the Germans

On January 17, 1943, the troops of the Kalinin Front of Purkaev took Velikiye Luki. On January 18, the blockade of Leningrad was broken. On February 2, the last centers of resistance in Stalingrad were suppressed on the banks of the Volga. The command of the Kalinin Front planned to arrange a new Stalingrad for the Germans on a smaller scale: taking Loknya, encircle and destroy the German troops in the area of the town of Kholm, Novgorod Region.

The 91st separate rifle brigade named after. I. V. Stalin (hereinafter referred to as 91 OSBR), which was part of the 6th Stalin Volunteer Rifle Corps of Siberians (hereinafter referred to as 6 sk).

On February 12, 1943, the Red Army soldier Sailors arrived in the brigade as part of a marching company. Alexander was assigned to serve as a submachine gunner of the 2nd separate rifle battalion (osb). It is an honor. Then only every fifth infantryman received a machine gun, the rest were still armed with rifles. There were 36,130 personnel in the 6th brigade, of which 24,644 were armed with rifles and only 5,342 with machine guns.⁶… The submachine gunner, according to the requirements of the "Combat Manual", "can only be the best, selected fighter. Speed, courage, surprise and independence in actions should always accompany the submachine gunner."

The considerations of the commander of the 6th SC, Major General Stepan Ivanovich Povetkin (1895 - 1965), set out by him on February 7, provided: “The initial areas for the offensive are engaged in secret (night throw) …^“7… The brigade in which Matrosov was to serve was tasked with “decisive destruction of the enemy (manpower and his strongholds)^“8.

By the beginning of the offensive, the 6th SC was numerically superior to the Germans: “4-fold superiority of forces in the number of bayonets, 4-fold in the number of guns, with an average density of guns per 1 km of the front - 19 and in the direction of the main attack 41, 8 guns was achieved^“9… But these numbers shouldn't be misleading. In the heavy battles of November-December 1942 on the Rzhev-Vyazemsky ledge, a corps of 37,500 people lost 25,400, and by February 1943 only 33.5% of the corps fighters had combat experience, and 66.5% were recruits, including and Sailors. At the same time, according to a certificate signed by Colonel Mikhail Aleksandrovich Aleksankin (1899-1957), chief of the intelligence department of the Kalinin front headquarters, “within a year the enemy created a number of resistance nodes at the front line of defense, interacting with each other with a well-organized fire system. Resistance nodes were created by the enemy at all heights of tactical importance, as well as in settlements^“10.

Alexander Matrosov and his fellow soldiers had to break these knots.

BRIGADE. Baptism by fire of recruits

Let us refer to the "Journal of military operations of the Kalinin Front" for February 1943 and other archival documents.

On February 16-17, at night, from the Zemtsy station, 91 OSBR begins to make an 83-kilometer march with three night crossings and a subsequent advance into the forest in the Smat region. All these days and nights, Alexander Matrosov is busy with hard soldier labor: he clears roads, prepares crossings across the Lovat River, equips approaches to them, builds bridges. Fighters move in forests and swamps, in deep snow and off-road.

Thaw and muddy roads lead to the fact that the Red Army soldiers carry all the material part and ammunition on their hands, dragging artillery on the straps, which “caused an extra waste of effort, time and manpower. Water boundaries of the r. Lovat, r. Loknya with steep, steep banks had to be overcome, ferrying the baggage train and artillery on hand. Lack of roads from the river. Latching to the combat formations of units made it difficult to transport ammunition and food and caused a constant backlog of artillery, which greatly affected the maneuver of the infantry^“11.

On February 23, units of the 6th Army Corps, under the cover of the vanguards, are engaged in laying and improving column routes in their zones of action. On the day of the 25th anniversary of the Red Army, the fighters have no time for a holiday. The plan for advancing the vanguards to the line of deployment and attack was postponed for one day. The sailors are busy with strenuous physical labor all day. He has no time to rest. “The commanders of the units, the time remaining at their disposal should be used to improve roads and crossings, check material security, build sledges, runners, drags, skis for transporting artillery mortars and machine guns in off-road conditions^“12.

On February 24, the concentration of the task force was recorded by the Germans. “At 13.20 an enemy group of up to 70 people unsuccessfully tried to conduct reconnaissance … Up to 20 Germans were killed, 3 were taken prisoner, the identity is being specified. In the sector of the 6th Rifle Corps, the forward battalions came into contact with the enemy …^“13

February 25 “on the Kholm-Loknyansky direction - Gerasimov's task force at 10.00 went on the offensive. … The enemy offered strong fire resistance. On 6 sk from 12.00, after a short artillery preparation, he went over to the offensive on the entire front and by 17.00, overcoming stubborn enemy resistance and off-road conditions, he was fighting. … 91 OSBR continued the battle for Chernoe^“14… The vanguard of the brigade, its 3rd battalion, “leading the attack on Chernoe, met stubborn enemy resistance, artillery, machine-gun and mortar fire was stopped^“15.

The "sailor" 2nd battalion was sent to his rescue, which made a forced flank march on the night of February 25-26, bypassing the village of Chernushka Severnaya from the east to attack the Germans from the north.

Hurrying to complete the assigned combat mission, as stated in the report of the political department of the 91st brigade, “the battalion commander, Captain Afanasyev, and his deputy for political affairs, Captain Klimovsky, did not send reconnaissance and lateral security. The battalion walked in a chain, the enemy missed part of it and cut off^“16… However, during a difficult battle, battalion commander Afanasyev did not lose control of the unit and completed the task. Here is what was recorded on February 26 in the combat log of the 91st brigade: “During the march, the battalion was dismembered by the enemy into 3 groups. After a stubborn battle, the battalion groups merged with each other, while the mortar company lost its materiel, the battalion commander Captain Afanasyev was wounded. … The enemy stubbornly resisted, firing medium mortars, artillery and heavy mortars at our battle formations^“17.

The first baptism by fire was received at Chernushka by the recruit Sasha Matrosov.

BATTALION. Wicker Front

On February 26, by the light of a smokehouse, he writes a letter to a girl he knows. “And now I want to talk with you about everything that I feel, that I am worried. Yes, Lida, and I saw my comrades die. And today the battalion commander told the story of how one general died, he died, facing the west. I love life, I want to live, but the front is such a thing that you live and live, and suddenly a bullet or a splinter puts an end to the end of your life. But if I am destined to die, I would like to die like this our general: in battle and facing the west. Your Sashok."

Lines written after a grueling two-week march. After a fierce fight. Is it sentimental here … But how many are able to formulate ideas about the meaning of life at the age of 19 so succinctly?

From the combat log of the Kalinin Front for February 26:

“On the Kholm-Loknyanskoye direction, Gerasimov's Task Force continued the offensive. The 91st brigade met stubborn enemy resistance at the Black, Brutovo line … During the period of battles, according to incomplete data, trophies were captured: 19 different guns, self-propelled guns - 3, cars - 5, machine guns - 23, walkie-talkie - 1, motorcycles - 3, bicycles - 50, a warehouse with ammunition - 1, a warehouse with food - 1. Captives were taken - 31 soldiers and 1 officer, 14 of them were killed on the way^“18.

The last figure vividly characterizes the greatest degree of bitterness experienced by the advancing Red Army soldiers and bearing heavy losses.

On February 27, the “sailor” 2nd battalion, with its left flank, joined the right flank of the 4th battalion and launched an attack on the village of Plethen (Severnye), with the task of destroying the enemy defending the villages of Chernushka and Chernaya with a blow to the flank, and capture them.

The 4th battalion was advancing from the front to the village of Plethen. On the outskirts of the village of Plethen, the Germans created a powerful stronghold: the approaches to the village were covered by three bunkers. The pivot was the key to the whole position. Without destroying the enemy bunkers, it was impossible to solve the assigned combat mission, however, any attempt to take the bunkers head-on would lead to heavy losses.

The 2nd battalion, secretly passing through a dense forest, bypassed the strongpoint from the flank, went to the edge of the forest, turned its front on the Pletin - and came under heavy machine-gun fire from enemy bunkers. The Germans foresaw the possibility of such a maneuver and prepared for it.

The bunkers had a good view, “with the lines shot at a distance of infantry weapons, especially under heavy fire there were exits from the edges of forests and groves, hollows and all approaches^“19.

FIGHTER. Seconds of the Red Army soldier Matrosov

The day before, during the night march, the mortar company of the 2nd battalion lost materiel - all nine 82-mm battalion mortars. However, the battalion had a platoon of anti-tank rifles (PTR), which consisted of three squads of three PTR in each. The new "Combat Regulations" of 1942 provided for the use of a PTR squad as part of an assault group. The assault groups managed to destroy the flank bunkers. But the machine gun from the central bunker continued to fire at the hollow in front of the village of Plethen. Attempts to suppress it from the PTR were unsuccessful.

And then in the direction of the bunker crawled submachine gunners Pyotr Ogurtsov and Alexander Matrosov. To their main tasks in an offensive battle, "Combat Manual" referred to "quick, daring and unexpected actions on the flanks and behind enemy lines, as well as in the intervals of his battle formations with the aim of inflicting losses on him with fire, creating panic, disrupting control and communications, and blocking routes. withdrawal "…

Ogurtsov was seriously wounded, and Matrosov managed to get close to the embrasure from the flank. From a distance of about 30 meters, he threw two grenades one after the other. The bunker fire stopped. The Red Army men of the 2nd and 4th battalions rose to attack, but were stopped by the fire of a seemingly destroyed bunker. Without feeling the slightest hesitation, Matrosov got up to his full height, rushed to the bunker with a jerk - and closed the embrasure with his body.

It was not an act of despair, but a completely deliberate choice: for a few seconds the fire from the bunker stopped. These seconds decided the outcome of the battle. The German machine gunner, who had experienced a severe psychological shock, had his field of view for a few moments, the body of Matrosov interfered with aimed shooting. And when the machine-gun burst threw him away from the embrasure, the advancing Red Army men had already managed to reach the dead (unaffected) space of the bunker.

The attack resumed.

All the attacking squads of the two battalions, acting in strict accordance with clause 73 of the "Combat Regulations", went on the attack and captured the bunker: "Any weakening of enemy fire and increasing their fire should be considered an order for the immediate advance of the squad forward." The village of Plethen was taken by a frontal attack by the 4th Battalion and a flank attack by the 2nd Battalion. The path to the village of Chernushka was opened, and at 13.00 the forces of the 4th battalion took the village²⁰… A few days later, when the results of the operation are summed up, it turns out that the soldiers of the 6th SC destroyed 156 enemy bunkers, including the one on the embrasure of which the Sailors lay with their chest²¹.

The 36-year-old senior lieutenant Pyotr Ilyich Volkov, a native of Nizhny Tagil, sent to the 2nd battalion by the political department, tore a sheet from a notebook and wrote a report: “To the head of the political department of the 91st brigade of Siberian volunteers … I am in the second battalion. We are advancing … In the battle for the village of Chernushki, Komsomolets Matrosov, born in 1924, made a heroic deed - he closed the embrasure of the bunker with his body, which ensured the advancement of our shooters. Blackies are taken. The offensive continues. I will report the details upon my return. Agitator of the political department of art. l-nt Volkov.

The officer did not have a chance to return: on the same day, February 27, Volkov was killed. The village of Chernushka will be included in the award list of Alexander Matrosov, who died near the village of Pletin, and in the history of the Great Patriotic War.

And the information of the deceased senior lieutenant Volkov about the feat was included in the report of the political department of the 91st brigade on February 28: “The enemy stubbornly resists, as a result of which we have losses … 1327 people. Of these, killed: command personnel - 18, junior command personnel - 80, privates - 313 … The Red Army soldier of the 2nd battalion Komsomolets Matrosov displayed exceptional courage and heroism. The enemy from the bunker opened strong machine-gun fire and did not allow our infantry to advance. Comrade Sailors received an order to destroy the enemy's fortified point. Despising death, he closed the embrasure of the bunker with his body^“22.

FRONT. Great turning point

The offensive of Gerasimov's task force did not reach its goal and was stopped. Loknya will be released only a year later - on February 26, 1944, the city of Kholm five days earlier. However, I would not call the offensive operation of February-March 1943 unsuccessful. It has become a successful example of an indirect strategy. It was on February 27 that the German command issued an order to withdraw the troops of the 9th Army, the main forces of the 4th Army and the 3rd Tank Army from the Rzhev-Vyazemsky ledge, which until that moment remained a bridgehead for the shortest rush to Moscow. On March 3, troops of the Western Front of the Red Army entered the city of Rzhev …

Of course, the reduction of the front line by the Germans was the enemy's reaction to the loss of huge forces on the southern wing of the Soviet-German front - near Stalingrad and on the Don. But undoubtedly the contribution, albeit indirect, was made to this great turning point by the heroic task force of General Gerasimov.

DICTIONARY OF WAR

6th sk - 6th Stalin Volunteer Rifle Corps of Siberians

91st OSBR - 91st Separate Rifle Brigade named after I. V. Stalin

2 osb - 2nd separate rifle battalion

Bunker is a wood-earth firing point

Alexander Matrosov was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, and he himself became the first Soviet soldier to be forever enlisted by the order of the People's Commissar of Defense in the unit's lists. In order No. 269 of September 8, 1943, it was written: “The great feat of Comrade Matrosov should serve as an example of military valor and heroism for all soldiers of the Red Army. … Read the order in all companies, batteries and squadrons."

From that day on, the hitherto unknown 19-year-old soldier became a Hero for all time. A gigantic figure, whose immortal glory overshadowed in a great time of history the fame of other commanders and commanders of the Great Patriotic War.

1. Plan for the operation of the OG (operational group) Lieutenant General Comrade Gerasimova // TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 783. Document 57. L. 3.

2. TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 783. Doc. 57. L. 3.

3. TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 783. Doc. 57. Sheet 1.

4. Considerations for the offensive operation of the 6th SC in the area of Holm, Loknya // TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 783. Doc. 1215. L. 74.

5. Shtemenko S. M. General staff during the war. M., 1975. S. 169.

6. Journal of military operations 6 SK for the period from 20.2.43 to 7.3.43 // TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D. 22. L. 74.

7. Considerations for conducting an offensive operation of the 6th SC (rifle corps) in the area of Kholm, Loknya // TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 783. Doc. 1215. L. 73.

8. TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 783. Doc. 1215. L. 74.

9. TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D. 22. L. 74-75.

10. Defensive structures on the Kholm-Loknyansky direction // TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 937. L. 86-86 rev.

11. TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D.22. L. 80.

12. TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D. 22. L. 76.

13. Journal of military operations KalF (Kalinin Front). February 1943 // TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 961. L. 29.

14. TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 961. L. 31.

15. Extract from the combat operations log 91 OSBR for the time from 20.2.43 to 10.3.43 // TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D. 19. L. 81.

16. Quoted. Quoted from: Belan N. Matrosov's Lot // Soviet Russia. 2005.26 February.

17. Extract from the combat operations log 91 OSBR for the time from 20.2.43 to 10.3.43 // TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D. 19. L. 81.

18. Journal of military operations KalF (Kalinin Front). February 1943 // TsAMO. F. 213. Op. 2002. D. 961. L. 33-34.

19. TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D. 19. L. 79 ob.

20. TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D. 19. L. 77 ob.

21. TsAMO. F. 860. Op. 1. D.22. L. 80.