The German troops entering Factory No. 4 were officers and soldiers of the First Battalion of the 578th Regiment. The regiment was ordered by Steinmetz to move to the right wing of the 577th Regiment and occupy Factory No. 4 and the surrounding defensive positions.
The battalion commander, Captain Rettenmeier, was sitting in an armored vehicle at the front. As soon as he entered the factory, he loudly asked the soldiers in the ruins not far away: "Soldiers, where is your commander?"
The German troops stationed in the factory were part of the 100th Chasseur Division. They had just repelled a sneak attack by the second company of the downsized regiment, and were in a state of high nervousness. Suddenly they saw a troop entering the factory. Although they were wearing uniforms and
Wearing the same uniforms and holding the same weapons, they still occupied a favorable defensive position and pointed their guns at the convoy that had just arrived, ready to shoot as soon as they discovered something was wrong.
After Rettenmaier shouted, seeing that the other party did not agree, he jumped out of the armored vehicle and prepared to take a few steps forward to see if he could find the commander of the friendly forces. Unexpectedly, he had just left the armored vehicle, and a
The German sergeant jumped out of the rubble next to him. He was not affected by Rettenmaier's higher rank than him at all. Instead, he pointed his gun at the opponent and shouted sternly: "Captain, stop! Which part are you in?"
"
Facing the gun pointed at him, Rettenmaier stopped and replied loudly: "I am Rettenmaier, commander of the second battalion of the 578th Regiment of the 305th Infantry Division, and I have been ordered to take over your defense. Yours.
Where is the commander? Ask him to come out and hand over the defense to me."
"I'm sorry, Captain!" Although Rettenmaier had already identified himself, the sergeant who pointed the gun at him did not lower his gun. Instead, he shouted to the side: "Private Zesina, you
Go and invite Mr. Lieutenant over, and tell him that people from the 305th Infantry Division will take over our defense." The soldier whose name was called by the sergeant agreed and ran away quickly.
Looking at the soldier's retreating figure, Rettenmeier, in order to ease the atmosphere, deliberately spoke to the sergeant: "Sergeant, how long have you been here?"
"I'm sorry, Mr. Captain." The sergeant replied coldly: "I won't tell you anything until my commander confirms your identity."
Fortunately, the waiting time was not long. After only two or three minutes, a stern voice came from not far away: "Sergeant, what happened here? Also, where did this damn convoy come from?
Coming?"
Rettenmeier looked in the direction of the sound and saw five or six figures walking towards his location. He guessed that the person coming might be the garrison commander in the factory, so he greeted the sergeant.
The muzzle took a few steps forward and said loudly: "I am Captain Rettenmeier, commander of the second battalion of the 578th Regiment. Are you the supreme commander here?"
When the visitor heard Rettenmaier announcing his identity, he trotted over quickly, straightened his body and reported to him: "Hello, Mr. Captain. I am Lieutenant Herold, the company commander of the 100th Jäger Division, from here.
Supreme Commander."
"Lieutenant Herod," Rettenmaier said, looking at the other party: "Our battalion has been ordered to take over the defense of your company. Please hand over the defense to me now."
"I'm sorry, Mr. Captain." When Rettenmaier asked him to hand over the defense to him, Herold said in an official tone: "Do you have an order to take over the defense? If not, please forgive me, I can't defend this place.
Handed over to you."
"I have already prepared the order to take over the defense." Rettenmeier took out a folded order from his pocket, handed it to Herod, and said: "Please take a look, Lieutenant Herod.
"
Herod took the order from Rettenmaier, and as soon as he unfolded it, the subordinates next to him immediately illuminated him with flashlights so that he could see the contents of the order clearly.
"Have you read it, Lieutenant Herod?" After seeing Herod carefully read the order, Rettenmeier asked: "Now, can you hand over the defense to us?"
"Yes, Mr. Captain, we can hand over the defense to you now." After Herod finished speaking, he tilted his head and whispered a few instructions to a second lieutenant beside him, then looked at Rettenmaier and said: "This
You are my deputy company commander, let him hand over the defense to your subordinates."
Taking advantage of the handover of defense between the two sides, Rettenmaier curiously asked Herold: "Lieutenant, on the way here, we heard gunshots and explosions coming from your direction. What's going on?"
"What else can happen?" Herod said with a wry smile: "The Russians took advantage of the night to sneak attack on us, but we discovered and repelled them. I guess they won't attack again tonight after suffering a loss."
Already."
"Lieutenant Herold, I want to ask you a question." Rettenmaier thought about a task assigned to him by the regiment leader Colonel Wenzel before he came, which was to find out as soon as possible the whereabouts of the Russian troops who were reinforcing the barricade factory during the day.
Number, and Herod's troops had been stationed here for a long time. I was afraid that he knew something, so he asked humbly: "Do you know the number of the Russian troops who reinforced the factory during the day? If you know, please tell the truth.
I."
When he asked this question, he didn't have much hope. As soon as he asked the question, he saw Herod on the opposite side shaking his head and replied: "Mr. Captain, to be honest, I also saw this reinforcement of the Russian troops during the day."
, but I don’t know what their numbers are.”
Seeing that he could not get any useful information from Herod, Rettenmaier felt a little disappointed. He thought to himself that if he wanted to find out the number of the Russian unit, he could only send people to conduct reconnaissance.
Herod saw Rettenmaier's thoughts and reminded him: "Captain, if you want to send someone to conduct reconnaissance, I advise you to give up this idea as soon as possible."
"Why?" Rettenmeier asked curiously.
"We have just repelled a Russian sneak attack. Based on my experience, they will definitely strengthen their defenses." Herold explained to Rettenmaier: "Sending scouts at this time will not be able to penetrate the Russians.
defense zone, let alone detect any useful intelligence."
Herold's words made Rettenmeier a little disappointed. He smiled bitterly and said: "Lieutenant Herold, if I don't send someone to conduct reconnaissance, how will I know which army the Russians who are about to fight us belong to?"
"Mr. Captain, it's actually not difficult to figure out the other party's serial number." When Herod said this, he saw a puzzled expression on Rettenmaier's face, so he explained to him: "In the near future,
In the battle explained before, we killed several Russians who made a sneak attack. We only need to send people to search for their bodies, and we can figure out which army they belong to based on the documents they carried with them."
Rettenmaier felt that what Herold said was a good idea, and quickly called an officer and ordered him: "Lieutenant Bullock, take two smart soldiers and search for the bodies of Russians outside the factory.
, see if they have documents on them."
After accepting the order, Bullock asked Herold about the location of the body, then left the factory with two soldiers and went outside to search for the remains of the dead Soviet soldiers to see if they could find documents that could prove their identities.
Although the body was twenty or thirty meters away from the factory, and the entire area was under the control of friendly forces, for the sake of safety, as soon as Lieutenant Bullock left the factory, he immediately lay down and ran towards the location of the body on his hands and knees.
past.
Bullock quickly crawled to a corpse. This was a soldier of medium build. He might have been killed by a machine gun when he stood up and charged towards the factory. His chest was beaten to pieces. The uniform was mixed with flesh and blood. Even if there was
All the documents were badly damaged. Bullock stuck his hand with warm blood, but found nothing, so he gave up decisively and went to search for another target.
Lying next to him was the body of a thin soldier who died after being shot in the head and abdomen. From his body, Bullock touched a document. He opened it and read it, although he could not understand what was written on it.
He couldn't get the content, but he could confirm that it was a military ID card. He quickly stuffed it into his coat pocket as if he had found a treasure.
The two German soldiers who came out with Bullock were not idle either. They carefully searched the remains of the fallen soldiers and took out their military ID cards, cigarettes and some slices of bread from their pockets. The two Germans were a little confused about these things.
None of them were discarded, and they were all stuffed into their pockets. After all, there was a problem with the supplies now, so it never hurts to bring more food with you.
After the three of them climbed into the factory building again, Bullock collected several military ID cards from them and handed them all to Rettenmaier. Rettenmaier didn't know anything about Russian, so he quickly handed the military ID cards to the Russian in the camp.
The translator said: "Look quickly, which part are they?"
The Russian translator quickly flipped through several books of military ID cards, then raised his head and said to Rettenmaier: "Mr. Captain, judging from the military ID cards, these Russians are not from the same army."
"This is normal." When Herod heard this, he couldn't help but interjected: "The Russians deployed four divisions in front of and behind the factory. After a long battle, except for the 138th Division, the rest of the divisions were
After being crippled by us, it is entirely possible for them to merge the remaining soldiers into the troops that are still fully organized."
Although Rettenmaier felt that what Herod said was reasonable, he did not agree with the other party's opinion. Instead, he looked at the Russian translator and asked: "Which troops do they come from?"
The Russian translator looked down at the captured military IDs and said casually: "What about the Istria Company, the 73rd Infantry Brigade, the 41st Guards Division, etc."
The Russian translator may not be clear about the numbers of these troops, but before Rettenmaier came to the barricade factory, the regiment leader Colonel Wenzel specially summoned him to the headquarters and assigned him to find out the numbers of the troops reinforcing the barricade factory.
He was specifically told to confirm whether the reinforcements came from Mamayev Heights. In addition, he also told Rettenmaier the numbers of the troops commanded by Sokov.
The numbers mentioned in the Russian translation today are all the troops commanded by Sokov. The military IDs found on more than a dozen corpses all prove that these people are Sokov's subordinates. In this way, it is
Whoever comes to reinforce the barricade factory will have the answer.
After Rettenmaier confirmed that the troops reinforcing the barricade factory were Sokov's troops, he couldn't help but take a breath. After taking a few deep breaths, he called the communications soldier sitting on the armored vehicle over and ordered him:
"Immediately send a telegram to the regiment headquarters saying that based on the captured military IDs, we have been able to confirm that the troops who reinforced the barricade factory during the day came from Mamayev Hill."
After Wenzel received the telegram from Rettenmaier, he did not dare to neglect and quickly reported to Steinmetz by phone. Steinmetz learned that the troops reinforcing the barricade factory were indeed Sokov's.
When the troops arrived, he smiled bitterly and said to his Chief of Staff: "Chief of Staff, the moment the 577th Regiment was driven out of the factory by Russian artillery fire, I should have known that the troops reinforcing the barricade factory were composed of Sokov's troops.
force."
"Then what should we do now?" When the division chief of staff learned that the troops reinforcing the barricade factory were indeed Sokov's troops, he couldn't help but panic. He quickly asked Steinmetz: "Should we let the troops
Evacuate the barricade factory first?"
"No need." Steinmetz shook his head and replied: "We should follow the original plan and have the 576th and 578th regiments stationed at the barricade factory overnight to protect the left and right wings of the 577th regiment."
Lieutenant Herold, who was staying in Factory No. 4, after completing the defense handover, planned to gather the troops and move, but was stopped by Rettenmaier: "Lieutenant Herold, wait a minute, you can't leave now.
"
Lieutenant Herold thought that after the defense handover was completed, he could leave naturally, but when he heard Rettenmaier preventing him from leaving, he asked dissatisfiedly: "Mr. Captain, we have handed over the defense to you, why can't we leave?"
?”
"Lieutenant Herold, you misunderstood. It's not that I deliberately prevented you from leaving, but because you can't leave now." Rettenmeier saw that Herold had misunderstood and quickly explained to him: "According to the order of the division headquarters,
The two regiments of our division will be stationed on the left and right flanks of the 577th Regiment tonight. It is so dark now. If you withdraw rashly and happen to meet the troops stationed in the factory area, there may be a misunderstanding. I think
You should wait until dawn tomorrow before leaving the factory."
After listening to Rettenmaier's explanation, Herold knew that he had misunderstood the other party. He grinned and said sheepishly: "Mr. Captain, that's what happened. I understand, and I will let the soldiers continue."
Stay in the factory and wait until daybreak before leaving to avoid misunderstandings and unnecessary conflicts with your own people during the transfer."
Seeing that Herod agreed to stay, Rettenmeier felt much more at ease. He smiled and asked Herod: "Lieutenant Herod, your company must have been stationed in the factory for a long time, right? Can you give it to me?"
Can you tell me about the situation here?"
"Mr. Captain," Herold remembered that he had received an order from his superiors to blow up all the sewers leading to the factory, so that the Soviet army could not use the sewers to sneak into the factory. He said to Rettenmaier: "According to what we have learned,
According to the information we have, the Russians like to use sewers to mobilize troops and penetrate into our positions. Therefore, in the past two days, we have been ordered to blow up the sewers leading to the factory buildings so that the Russians cannot use these sewers. However,
I'm worried that there are still sewers that have not been found. If you want to defend Factory No. 4, you must destroy those remaining sewers to prevent the Russians from entering your defense zone."
