Officially, neither the camp nor its inmates existed.
Chapter 66 – THE LUNATIC
War does not determine who is right, only who is left.
Allied Forces – 4e Compagnie, 2e Battalion, 152e Regiment, and disorganised remnants of 12e Dragoon Regiment, all of 14e Infantry Division of French 1e Army, Remnants of 2833rd Combat Engineer Battalion, 540th US Engineer Combat Group, of US 7th Army, 522nd[Nisei] Field Artillery Battalion, all of US 6th Army Group.
Soviet Forces – 3rd Battalion, 11th Motorised Rifle Brigade, and 1st Battalion [less one company] 186th Tank Brigade, all of 10th Tank Corps, and Special Tank Company, 44th [Motorised] Engineer Brigade, and 76th Guards Mortar Regiment, all of 5th Guards Tank Army.
The deluge had been constant since night had turned into day, deadly objects of all shapes and descriptions dropping from the sky onto the positions occupied by Lieutenant Mercier’s grandly named ‘4th Compagnie Battle Group’.
A grandiose term for a modest group consisting of the survivors of his own 4e Compagnie, 2e Bataillon, 152e Infantry Regiment, swollen by stragglers and remnants from other units of the doomed 14th French Infantry Division plus thirty leaderless US engineers from the 2833rd Combat Engineer Battalion..
He was supposed to be acting as a mobile reserve for his battalion, blessed as he was with a number of American trucks and ‘liberated’ civilian vehicles.
Instead, Soviet artillery and ground attack aircraft had pinned him in place, his casualty list growing, seemingly every minute bringing a report of more casualties.
The radio had been active, but none of the urgent messages were for his unit. Requests for orders were rebuffed or ignored.
Mercier was one of the few ‘proper’ soldiers in the unit, or indeed, the division. It had been formed from mainly FFI elements as France was liberated and the powers that be wanted to be seen to contribute more manpower to the destruction of Nazi Germany. In truth, the French Military probably never imagined that the weak FFI based units would ever see real action, and certainly not of the type visited upon them by the battle-hardened Russian troopers.
In Southern Germany, they had been virtually welcomed as bordering on Liberators at times, the alternative of Soviet Occupation being far too horrible for most to contemplate.
Now things were very different.
On the 9th August, his division had found itself in the front line and on the receiving end of heavy Soviet ground and artillery attacks.
The 14th Infantry disintegrated under the pressure, some stalwarts managing to form defensive positions as the Soviets flooded past them, others running as fast as their legs could carry them.
US Cavalry and French armour had arrived and temporarily halted the attacks, but they had recommenced, displaying even more fury, and the defences were constantly breached and pushed back.
What was left of an organised 14th Division had been concentrated in the area between Hattenhofen and Fürstenfeldbruck, holding a frontage of ten kilometres. They had been bolstered by the addition of two battalions of the 2e French Armoured’s 3e Regiment de Marche du Tchad, competent motorised infantry, sadly now without much of their transport following heavy combat and air strikes.
The remnants of the 12e Regiment de Curiasseurs had been organised into a large company and were positioned around Adelshofen, ready to counter-attack when necessary.
The Soviet attack fell upon the forces gathered along the Augsberger Straβe running south-east from Mammendorf, vast quantities of high-explosive being delivered by the artillery of 5th Guards Tank Army.
10th Tank Corps, new commander in place and logistical issues sorted, drove hard and fast into the French lines.
2e French Armoured Division, anchored to the 14e at Mammendorf had to give ground, or be outflanked.
To the south, a composite team from the 45th US Infantry Division, covering from Fürstenfeldbruck to Gröbenzell, similarly folded back, but not before a company of M-10’s from the 645th Tank-Destroyer battalion savaged the flank of 10th Tank Corps advance, knocking out twenty of the 186th Tank Brigade’s T-34’s in as many minutes.
Despite this success, the 45th had to give ground.
10th Tank Corps flooded through, pushing hard and quickly, overrunning the artillery and support units behind the lines.
River crossings over the Amper at Schongeising and Grafrath were captured intact and without a fight, as the 10th raced on to its target of Buchloe, some forty five kilometres beyond the front line, intent on outflanking Augsberg.
A desperate attack by USAAF Thunderbolts ravaged the lead Soviet formations, leaving hundreds of men from the 11th Motorised Rifle Brigade dead and wounded in their wake, although not without unaffordable cost to the ground-attack unit, which left five of its precious aircraft behind on the field.
The 11th thundered on and bounced the River Lech at Landsberg am Lech, a town made famous by the prison in which Hitler had written ‘Mein Kampf’.
A handful of men from 2e French Armoured’s 97e Quartier General, a motor transport unit, were cut down as the motorised infantry pushed hard.
Soviet recon troops entering Kaufering found the bridges still down, having been destroyed by the Germans during the previous war.
Meanwhile, Lieutenant Mercier was still asking for instructions, desperate for information, not even beginning to imagine how close he was to destruction.
A French officer from the 2e’s Fusiliers Marins Tank-destroyer unit had decided to dig his heels on the Lech, just east of Klosterlechfeld, and bloodily halted the unsupported Soviet infantry before they crossed the river.
The Soviet commander made a swift appreciation of the situation, and ordered units from Landsberg to move north, in order to drive into the flank of the French tank-destroyers.
Lacking good intelligence, he decided to order the Katyushas of 76th Guards Mortar Regiment to drop their rockets on likely defensive points on the road heading north, paying particular attention to Hurlach and Obermeitingen, both on the road to Klosterlechfeld.
3rd Battalion, 11th Motorised Rifles, was tasked for the attack, directly supported by a tank company from the 44th [Motorised] Engineer Brigade, with most of the 186th Tank Brigade to follow as soon as it caught up.
The 76th’s twenty-seven surviving Katyushas punched out their rockets, and, as was expected from such a veteran unit, they arrived on target.
In truth, few men were killed outright, and casualties were relatively light considering the amount of high-explosive that arrived in a short period of time.
However, the shock value was immense, especially to troops that had sustained a constant moderate barrage for some hours, and many a former FFI warrior messed his pants and cried for his ‘mère.’
The 11th Motorised, although a unit that was tried and tested, also contained men who had seen little by way of proper combat.
Such a man was Major Vsevolod Skotolsky.
A French machine-gunner opened up as the lead units of the 3rd Battalion drove out of the cover of the trees and into full view. The sole casualty was the Battalion Commander, a popular officer who believed in leading from the front. Blood and brain matter splattered all over the panicky Skotolsky, and he turned his formation to the west, exposing the flank to further fire, as he desperately tried to regain the cover of the tree line to the west of the road.