Medal for Bravery, summer 1942 retreat

[Bjorn S]

Medal for Bravery #108225.
Awarded in September 1942 to Sr. Lieutenant Vasili Petrovich Shevtsov, for bravery displayed during the German offensive Fall Blau and 4th Panzer Armee's drive to Voronezh, June - July 1942.

Shevtsov was born in December 1910 in Ukraine, and joined the Red Army in February 1933.
He served as the commander of the wire line telephone-telegraph company (horse driven) of the 49th Separate Signals Regiment (21st Army).
Other awards he received were the Medal for Combat Merits and OPW2 in 1944 and the OPW1 in 1945.
He joined the communist party in 1944 and got promoted to Major. His unit ended the war with the 6th Guards Army in the Courland Peninsula. Shevtsov had the luck to service all this time with his same unit.

Thanks to Pamyat Naroda I was now able to add a face to this medal...and discovered that I already had a photo of him, which came with the research in 2019 (group of officers from the 49th Separate Signals Regiment, 1944). The person next to Shevtsov is identified as Sr. Technical Lieutenant Ivan Ivanovich Cherdak, born 1921.

Award citation
Shevtsov was initially recommended for an OPW2, but this was downgraded to a Medal for Bravery.


In of the combat operations of the 21 army during the period 25/06-12/07
of 1942, comrade SHEVTSOV provided for signalling links from the army HQ to
the 297 rifle division, 8 motorised rifle division, and 1 motorised rifle brigade. In
the vicinity of the settlement Skorodnoe, he provided excellent signalling
capabilities between the aforementioned division and the army headquarters.

When the enemy tanks entered Skorodnoe, comrade SHEVTSOV was
receiving the order of the army commander Major-General GORDOV to the rifle
division commanders. Only after the call between the commander GORDOV and
the division commanders was over, he gathered the equipment and retreated in
the Eastern direction following the retreating rifle divisions.

Later on, comrade SHEVTSOV together with his company retreated in
organised manner and provided communication links near the town Novy-Oskol
and Verkhnesosensk in the very difficult combat circumstances.
Despite the fact, that comrade SHEVTSOV’s company was dispersed along
the singling links across a large area, he exhibited cunning initiative gathered his
company with only small losses in personnel.

For exhibited courage and bravery, for skilful command of the unit for
maintaining signalling in very difficult circumstances, I recommend to the military
council of the 21 army to award comrade SHEVTSOV with order “Patriotic war II
class”.

What I like about this award is that the ribbon is not Soviet, but is actually made from a folded German Iron Cross ribbon, and that it was awarded for brave defensive (retreating) actions.

[Marcel Banziger]

Very nice one

[Gerry C]

Bjorn,

Being a collector of Soviet Orders & Medals myself it's always nice to have a photo of the recipient. Adds history and an actual individual to the award. Nice historical piece!

GerryC
From the High Plains of Middle America

[Woolgar]

Nice and very unusual and interesting ribbon

Nick

[Bjorn S]

Interestingly, I found the story Shevstov's comrade Ivan Ivanoch Cherdak online! Very interesting to read what these men went through. History really comes to life.

On July 5, the day when the Battle of Kursk began, we talked with its participant Ivan Ivanovich Cherdak. At the front, he was a signalman. His task was to establish communication between divisions, regiments, etc. He went through the Stalingrad and Kursk battles.

Ivan Ivanovich Attic in the photo is the second in the first row. Photo taken in 1944. These are the soldiers of the 49th Polotsk telephone and telegraph separate communications regiment of the 6th Guards Army.

A lot depended on the signalmen at the front. After all, the troops were commanded precisely by means of communications, and the situation was also reported by communications. Communication was cut off and the troops found themselves, as it were, an information blockade. Often, under the bullets, signalmen had to establish a connection cut off by the bombing - to fasten the wires. Therefore, it was a responsible business to communicate between the headquarters, divisions and corps. As Ivan Ivanovich says, it was necessary to establish communication constantly - the wires were torn due to the bombing.

Ivan Ivanovich was drafted into the ranks of the Red Army in 1939. He served as a machine gunner. Even then, there was talk that the Soviet Union was preparing for war, but all this was at the level of rumors ...

And Ivan Ivanovich got into the signalmen at the end of the winter of 1940, when officers from the communications battalion of the 5th Army of the Kiev Special Military District arrived (later it was renamed the 43rd communications regiment). They recruited soldiers to train signalmen from them. “They looked whether our fingers were working well, asked which of us can play musical instruments, took into account the level of education, etc. They took me to the signalmen. This is how my fate was decided, ”says Ivan Ivanovich.

At the beginning of the war, our troops, where Ivan Ivanovich also fought, held the Germans near Kiev for three months and did not allow Hitler to carry out his plan: to quickly take Moscow. But the forces were not enough and our army was surrounded. “Hitler realized that the movement to Moscow was being held back by the 5th Army, he transferred tanks here from other fronts and gave the command to destroy them. Our car with telegraph equipment was bombed. - says Ivan Ivanovich. - Then a lot of signalmen died. I was not injured, I was lucky - I lay in a ravine and got off with scratches. We were given the command to get out of the encirclement on our own - in small groups to make our way east to the rear of the Soviet army. We got out of the environment in just 10 days. The compass helped. The first two days they circled in one place. We moved around at night. We will cover ourselves with greatcoats, we will shine matches on the compass so that the Germans do not notice the light,let's see which direction is east and go there. They went strictly to the east, through ravines, swamps, rivers. Twice they entered into skirmishes with the Germans. They ate fodder beets that were not removed from the fields. They cleaned and nibbled it. They came to their own in tattered clothes, their boots were wet, all dirty and lousy. We were fed lard with bread and into the trenches. We sat in ambush on the defense line and fired at German motorcyclists with machine guns. Then we were taken to the telephone and telegraph battalion of the 49th Polotsk separate communications communications regiment of the 6th Guards Army, where I served until the end of the war. At first, it was very difficult to work because of the lice - we were not given new clothes. And there was no bathhouse in which one could wash and remove the lice. The body was constantly itching and it was necessary to be distracted at the moment of transmission of information. So we suffered for about two months. It just seems: “Yes,what are these lice there! " Then, thank God, we were sent to the Belgorod region, where they finally changed our clothes, cut them, washed and removed the lice. In the winter at the end of 1941, we were ordered to conduct active operations at the front. At that time, there were very strong battles near Moscow. The Germans were defeated, they did not have enough strength, ammunition and equipment, and they removed people from other fronts. The snow was above the knee and even the tanks got stuck in it and did not pass. When we were establishing communication, we were pulling wires, we were usually covered from the air by an airplane. And somehow we witnessed an air battle, when in the sky two planes clashed for life and death - ours and the enemy. In the end, the fascist managed to damage our plane. He began to fall, and the pilot ejected. The German shot both the parachute and the pilot and flew away. We cried a lot that day over the body of the pilot,it turned into a cake from hitting the icy snow. Here is such a small feat of a man in the name of victory. But the army then fulfilled the task - the Germans from this front did not transfer troops to Moscow. "

For his participation in the heroic defense of Kiev, Ivan Ivanovich was given a medal. Then there was the Battle of Stalingrad. After her, the 49th telephone and telegraph communications regiment was transferred to the Oryol region, and then to Belgorod, which was occupied by the Germans. The Germans occupied Belgorod and Orel, and Kursk was liberated by our troops. If you look at the map, the troops were positioned in an arc. Until July 5, every soldier and the entire civilian population was thrown into the construction of several defense zones - they dug trenches, trenches, built a railway and waited for the German offensive. Our high command decided to wait for the offensive from the Germans, since there are fewer losses in defense than in attack. We had to wear down the Germans, defending ourselves, and then when they were already exhausted, go on the attack. They hoped that the Germans would try to encircle our troops - closing their fronts, then to march on Moscow.

As Ivan Ivanovich Cherdak says, everyone dug trenches: “We were preparing equipment. At the front, there was a relative calm - from time to time planes flew in, but they did not particularly bomb. The fighting began on 5 July. I was then in Kochetovka, where we organized a communications center. The Germans went on the offensive - shooting began and in many places damage to communications. During the battles, a lot of wires were torn. We repaired the damage under the bullets, then a lot of signalmen were killed. The connection had to be restored quickly. In the first few days, they were able to advance several kilometers. After July 10, in some areas, some German tanks managed to break through in the direction of Oboyan. We were sent to the trenches for defense. They were given anti-tank grenades and Molotov cocktails. These tanks were destroyed. But the Germans decided to go to Kursk, without stopping the offensive on Oboyan,having rounded the line of defense. And by July 11, the Germans took up their starting positions for the capture of Prokhorovka. By this time, the Soviet 5th Guards Tank Army was concentrated in positions northeast of the station. The tanks were moving towards each other. I was there after July 12 - I removed the wires. This is a terrible picture - piles of metal all over the place, twisted tanks, machine parts and dead people. I have not seen this in all the years of the war. Our tankers went to their death. Few living tankers remained there. The Soviet troops won this battle thanks to their heroism.

“They say that there were no competent officers in the USSR ... Probably, if it were not for Joseph Stalin, Dmitry Ustinov, People's Commissar for Armament of the USSR and the generals, we could have lost the war,” says Ivan Ivanovich.

On the Kursk Bulge, Ivan Ivanovich's combat path does not end. He reached Germany. In 1944, at the front, he met his future wife. She worked as a cook in the dining room. began to look after her. Of course, during the war it was difficult with this, but he tried: when he called to an amateur concert, when he gave a bouquet of wild flowers. So we waited for the Victory together. And in 1946 they got married. And they lived together until old age.


Source:05 | Июль | 2010 | Уроки памяти в Железногорске и Железногорском районе

[Bjorn S]

Ivan Ivanovich Cherdak

In 1945 and later in life...

He must have known Chevtsov, as they served in the same unit for some years, and were pictured next to each other.

[Gerry C]

Bjorn,

Thanks for the added write up. Absolutely fascinating. Many of us here in the states have no comprehension of what the average Soviet Frontovik went through in the Patriotic War.

Gerry C