The hot shell came to rest on what used to be Houlihan’s lap, sizzling like a chop on a barbecue.
The loader vomited.
Cream fired again.
Prentiss shook his head to clear his vision, which responded sufficiently to observe the Soviet tank part company with its turret in dramatically spectacular fashion.
“Fire in the tank!”
Higgins, the loader, shouted, in between clearing the vomit from his mouth and adding to it.
Retaining enough presence of mind, he started to extinguish the small fire that had started around the mess that had been Houlihan.
“Load me up! Another tank coming in!”
Prentiss dropped inside and grabbed a shell.
“FIRE!”
The shell hit dead on.
The T-34 kept coming.
“What did you load, Sir?”
‘Oh bugger it!’
Higgins, fire extinguished, virtually barged his Colonel aside, grabbing an AP shell.
The previous HE shell had wiped a grape of infantry off the T-34, scattering them far and wide, and given the Red Army tank crew the fright of their lives.
Their reply missed the stationary ‘Kinloss’ by the width of a fly’s genitalia.
Cream put the AP shell straight through the turret ring.
The T-34 halted and backed up, its gun slightly canted where the shell had bounced back into the mounting, wrecking it.
Prentiss stuck his head out again, his binoculars in hand.
Bullets twanged off the metal, as infantry in the woods saw an easy target.
They, in turn, were silenced by the armoured cars, who dashed forward, keeping on the move, using their speed as defence.
Again Prentiss tried for a view of the battlefield.
What he saw was staggering in its intensity.
The Soviet armour lay shattered, pillars of smoke and flame indicating where British shells had met Soviet metal.
However, his own tanks also contributed to the scene of desolation. One Black Prince, probably from ‘B’ Squadron’s 3rd Troop, glowed like a brazier, an incandescent red tank standing out in a sea of red blood and red fire.
And still it went on.
Another British tank erupted in fire, the flames dying as quickly as they started.
Aircraft swept overhead, Fleet Air Arm, and rockets flashed, descending somewhere to the north of Bad Brahmstedt-land, where the escaping 7th Guards Rifle Corps flowed around the central core of Cheshires and Hussars.
Soviet artillery stopped almost instantly.
“Right, prepare to move out. Higgins, you’ll have to drive.”
“Sir, she won’t start. Briggsy said, Sir. That close one did something and knocked the engine out. We’re on battery power, Sir.”
Prentiss had no recollection of the report.
He stuck his head out and surveyed the rear of the tank.
Two engine covers were open, testament to the force of the blast.
“Right. Nip out and see what’s to be done, there’s a good chap. Let me know what’s up on the squawk box. Watch out for enemy in the woods.”
Higgins pushed himself up through his hatch and disappeared from view, although the sounds of his efforts, couched in colourful language, could still be heard inside.
“Tank target, three hundred.”
Prentiss looked and saw the T-34s turret emerge from behind a rise in the land.
“FIRE!”
The shell cut through the earth and grass, emerging in perfect position to strike the gun mantlet.
“Fuck”.
Cream watched as the white blob went skywards, the rounded mantlet winning over penetrative power.
Prentiss was conscious of the gunner’s eyes on him as he loaded a replacement shell.
The 17pdr fired and the shell arrived as the T-34 lurched into a deeper part of the stream.
The commander in the turret disappeared in sparks as the AP shell struck the base of his cupola and carved its way through his body before deflecting back inside the tank.
A small curl of smoke betrayed the success of the shell, and the tank came gently to a halt, clearly out of the fight.
“Bloody hell!”
Prentiss slotted another shell home, surprised at the fear in Cream’s voice.
“Didn’t you get him?”
“Sir, you’d better have a gander at this lot… I mean… Jesus…”
Before he could raise his head out of the hatch, Higgins dropped back in, accompanied by the patter of bullets striking the heavy armour.
“Why didn’t you use the squawk box, man?”
“It’s knackered, just like the engine, Oil everywhere… musta burst all sorts of couplings. In any case, Sir, nearside track’s off.”
Prentiss continued on up through the hatch and saw that which had frightened Cream.
At least another forty T-34s were committing to the battle, turning off the autobahn and heading towards HQ and B Squadron… or what was left of them.
Another Fleet Air Arm flight went over, again dropping their ordnance north of Bad Brahmstedt-land.
‘Can’t they see they’re needed here!’
Lieutenant Colonel Kreyer had no idea that the Hussars were in such dire straits, the radio links shot to pieces, literally as well as proverbially.
He was controlling his part of the battle with flair, directing the Fleet Air Arm against the forces escaping to his west, where there were fewer assets to interdict them. To his eastern side, the escaping 7th Guards was running across the front of his forces, and his infantrymen and the Hussar tanks were enjoying a turkey shoot, just as Prentiss planned.
Matters were hotter on the northern edge of his position, where cannier Soviet officers were trying to get their men closer to the British positions and move on through the woods, rather than the two exposed flanks.
The Cheshires’ ‘A’ Company had needed stiffening, and Kreyer had sent his last formal reserve, the remainder of ‘D’ Company, to help ‘A’ hold.
None of this was known to Prentiss. His overriding priority was now the distinct possibility that his command was going to be overrun by a superior enemy tank force…
“What the deuce…”
Behind the tanks came half-tracks and lorries, of all shapes and sizes, but many familiar to an Allied officer.
Prentiss Force was about to receive the full attention of 9th Guards Mechanised Brigade, as its commander threw in everything to ensure the evacuation of the trapped guardsmen.
There were more tanks to kill than shells in the magazine, a thought that occurred to Prentiss and Cream simultaneously.
“Engage at will, Cream, engage at will. Just keep it up and keep the bastards under pressure.”
Prentiss fiddled with his radio, trying to raise someone… anyone…
“Blackberry-six, any station, come in, over…”
Static.
“Electric traverse gone. Using hand traverse.”
Cream’s report indicated a worsening electrical situation, hardly encouraging for a Colonel desperately in need of a working radio.
Prentiss Force was living on borrowed time.
Major Thomas Fanshaw had, despite his and his mechanics’ best efforts, still not managed to bring his entire Squadron along for the ride.
Six vehicles had fallen out on the forced march, victims still of the dodgy fuel issue, which looked more like a case of sabotage the more the MPs looked at it.
That meant that D Squadron, 23rd Hussars, arrived with eight fully functioning Black Prince tanks, a platoon of infantry seconded from the 4th KSLI, and a Forward Air Support section, whose jeep bounced along behind the lumbering tank of the ‘D’ Squadron commander.
