In the frozen wastelands of the Eastern Front,
the Battle of Stalingrad stands as a monument to human endurance, despair, and the dark
extremes of war. It was here, among the ruins of a city bearing
Stalin's name, that one of World War II's most brutal confrontations unfolded, a battle
that would turn the tide against Nazi Germany. In six months of fighting, the combined Axis
and Allied forces at Stalingrad suffered over one million dead and countless more wounded
or suffering from disease. Men
fought in subzero temperatures, without
proper clothing or supplies, where frostbite claimed fingers and toes before bullets could
claim lives. The city became a gruesome tableau of war's
savagery, with soldiers suffering injuries that defied medical understanding and pushed
the boundaries of human pain and resilience. The Battle of Stalingrad is believed to be
the single-bloodiest battle ever fought. The battle for Stalingrad began on the 23rd
of August, 1942. Operation Barbarossa – the Axis in
vasion
of the Soviet Union - had started over a year prior, in June of 1941. The Red Army had been pushed deeper and deeper
into Russia by the Nazi's infamous Blitzkrieg. The lack of experienced officers, armored
vehicles, aircraft, and basic provisions such as boots and rations meant the Soviets suffered
a year of defeat after defeat. Stalingrad would prove to be a significant
turning point in the war. At Stalingrad, the German army would be devastated,
marking the beginning of the long westwar
d retreat back towards Germany. The battle raged between the 23rd of August
1942 and the 2nd of February 1943. It pitted the combined forces of the Germans,
Italians, Romanians, Hungarians, and Croatians against the Soviet Red Army. In order to encourage the Soviets to fight,
and to never surrender the city, Stalin ordered the civilians not to evacuate. The presence of civilians meant that collateral
damage was high during the initial siege, but especially during the intense urban warfare
and st
reet-to-street combat. No one was safe from danger. Many of the casualties of Stalingrad were
not from direct combat but from other factors, such as disease or starvation. Those who weren't wounded in combat could
still find themselves dead or injured in many other ways. Illness and Disease Temperatures at the Battle of Stalingrad were
routinely 20 or 30 degrees below freezing, even reaching -40 degrees in November. These conditions meant frostbite was common. Even those soldiers lucky enough to
have winter
clothing were not safe from the cold. The lack of adequate medical supplies and
the sheer number of soldiers suffering meant men were often not treated in time, resulting
in many cases of Gangrene. The German forces were running low on ether,
antiseptics, and chloroform, meaning amputations and other serious surgeries were often carried
out without anesthetic. The lack of antiseptics for sterilizing tools
and wounds meant fresh wounds had to be cauterized. This was usually done with
a bayonet, heated
over a fire until red-hot, then used to burn the wound closed. This method was not perfect, and could still
result in infection. Infectious disease was also commonplace. Large populations living in dense formations
is always a catalyst for disease, but the specific conditions of Stalingrad made this
problem even worse. Both Axis and Soviet forces were running low
on even basic medical equipment, such as antibiotics to cure the infection or antiseptics to sterilize
tools and wo
unds. Even fresh, sterile bandages were in short
supply. A wound that would otherwise be easily treated
with antibiotics or antiseptics was left to fester, causing many cases of sepsis and Gangrene. During the initial retreat to Stalingrad,
the Soviet army was doing battle with another enemy – Cholera. An epidemic of Cholera threatened to disable
the entire army. The first cases were discovered on the 18th
of July, just a month before the battle for the city began. Many soldiers fell to Cholera.
Infection was spread through consuming water
or food contaminated by the feces of an infected individual, and the high concentration of
men meant many sources of water were contaminated. The disease can kill within hours, as the
person loses large amounts of fluid to diarrhea, leading to deadly dehydration. Large numbers of men living in such close
proximity meant lice were ubiquitous, and these lice often spread Typhus. Those infected would suffer from vomiting,
muscle and joint pain, extreme
fevers, chills, confusion, and more. Dysentery, Diphtheria, Tuberculosis, and Jaundice
were also present at the Battle of Stalingrad due to the highly unhygienic conditions within
the city and the extreme malnutrition. With the city in ruins, there was no working
sewage system or water supply, and the people of Stalingrad were living amongst their own
waste and frozen dead bodies, while flies and vermin helped spread illness and disease
between the dead and the living. Disease was present in eve
ry corner of Stalingrad,
on both sides. Wounds could not be cleaned, bandages were
rinsed with water and reused, and even medical implements could not be sterilized. 1. Starvation and Malnutrition As the German army steamrolled towards Stalingrad,
Soviet forces shipped large amounts of grain and livestock out of the city and across the
Volga river, to prevent the Germans from capturing it. Grain that could not be transported was contaminated
with diesel or oil, rendering it unfit for human consu
mption. This meant a lack of adequate food, amongst
other things. Rations were cut as the months rolled on,
and men on both sides were barely surviving on starvation rations. The freezing cold and extreme physical and
mental exertion exacerbated the issue, as men burnt calories in combat that could not
be replaced. Both armies were isolated from their supply
lines, unable to stock up on food and medicine. As the Soviet army tightened its grip on the
faltering Axis forces, the rations for the fig
hting men were reduced. The standard ratio for a German soldier engaged
in combat was 300 grams of meat and 150 grams of bread. During Stalingrad, at the worst points of
the battle, this daily ration was reduced to 75g of bread, about one slice, and two
portions of watery soup. Men would sometimes have a small portion of
canned meat, if available. This meager ration was not enough to survive
on, especially in such cold weather and with so much physical exertion. During the battle, many German so
ldiers dropped
dead despite no physical injuries or apparent disease. After thawing out the bodies, an autopsy was
conducted, and the discoveries shocked German medics. All the internal organs had shrunk to half
their original size, making them unable to perform their functions. Their bodies were totally void of any body
fat. They had starved to death. Many within Stalingrad resorted to eating
livestock, pet cats and dogs, or even vermin, and the city's animal population was decimated. As a Chri
stmas treat, the army slaughtered
4000 workhorses to feed the men. When the meat was consumed, the bones were
used for soups. Motorized divisions, equipped with cars and
trucks, did not have any horses of their own to slaughter, and so received only small amounts
from other regiments. The malnutrition was so extreme that many
men stopped growing facial hair because their bodies were so devoid of energy. Some soldiers were so underfed that they resorted
to consuming anything that might fill them
up: wallpaper, window sealant, cloth; many
men even made soup from boiled leather straps or old shoes. Some civilians resorted to eating the blood-soaked
clay that lined the banks of the Volga River, which was supposedly sweet. Those unable to cope with the starvation often
resorted to the extreme of cannibalism. Soviet and German forces would execute anyone
found to have consumed human meat, but it is estimated that there were between 1000
and 2000 cases of cannibalism during the 6-month battle
. 2. Combat Wounds Intense fighting meant that combat wounds
were common at Stalingrad. The city was under siege. Over a million bombs were dropped by Axis
aircraft, and hundreds of thousands of artillery shells were fired. The bombing and shelling resulted in the destruction
of 41-thousand houses, or 90% of all residential housing in the city. No one at Stalingrad was safe from the fighting. On the first day of the battle, the 23rd of
August, the Luftwaffe flew 1,600 bombing runs, dropping over
1000 tonnes of explosives. Buildings – many still occupied by soldiers
and civilians – were destroyed, and incendiary bombs set the city ablaze. The city was engulfed in a thick black smog,
rising thousands of feet into the sky. Those families that survived fled to nearby
ravines and rivers in an attempt to escape the raging fire. When Axis forces entered the city, intense
street-to-street fighting began. The Soviet soldiers created fortified positions
amongst the rubble and remaining buildings
. They waited in ambush or used guerrilla tactics
against the invading army, resulting in some of the most intense urban warfare in history. The nature of the battle meant groups of soldiers
could fight for days or weeks, battling to take control of a single building or even
a single floor, and an entire section or company of men might be wiped out in a battle for
control of an old bakery or shop. Many soldiers have told their stories of Stalingrad. One young Soviet soldier described the brutal
scene along the Volga River: "The bank of the river was covered in dead fish mixed with
human heads, arms, and legs, all lying on the beach. They were the remains of people who were being
evacuated across the Volga when they were bombed." 3. 4. After The Battle – The Death Continues On the 2nd of February, 1943, after almost
six months of brutal fighting, the German 6th army was surrounded and forced to surrender. They were out of ammunition, out of food,
and out of energy. The end of the battle
, however, did not mean
an end to the suffering. The German surrender resulted in almost 100,000
men being taken as Prisoners of War. These POWs were sent to Soviet work camps
and used as forced labor. These men faced backbreaking work in extreme
weather conditions. Prisoners were deprived of food and medical
care and would receive routine beatings from camp guards. Most would not last until the end of the war,
with those who did not starve to death being killed by disease or an angry Soviet gua
rd. Of the 100,000 German prisoners taken at Stalingrad,
only 5,000 would ever return home. Some POWs would not leave the Soviet labor
camps until 1955, ten years after the war had ended. The Battle of Stalingrad would result in an
estimated 1.2 million dead and hundreds of thousands more injured and wounded, many of
whom would become disabled for life. The battle would sink to the deepest depths
of depravity, driving otherwise ordinary men to incredible feats of cruelty and inhumanity. Blindnes
s, missing limbs, disease, deafness,
no one who served at Stalingrad would come away unharmed. Having seen so much death and corruption,
those who had managed to avoid physical wounds would still come away from the battlefield,
mentally scarred. Anyone who survived the war would never forget
the sights, sounds, and smells of Stalingrad. This is History on Fleek and we’ll see you
next time.
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