Finally some current images.
To the right a piece of the wall
Already visible the Bolshaya Sovetskaya street (the Hauptstrasse of the Germans) one of the oldest and most important of Smolensk, which descends from the hill in the city center to the central bridge over the Dnieper and passes by the symbol of the city, the Cathedral of the Assumption, which rises on its own hill ......
The gates of hell were opened and we accepted the invitation to enter" 26/880 Lance Sgt, Edward Dyke. 26th Bn Northumberland Fusiliers , ( 3rd Tyneside Irish )
1st July 1916
Thought shall be the harder , heart the keener,
Courage the greater as our strength faileth.
Here lies our leader ,in the dust of his greatness.
Who leaves him now , be damned forever.
We who are old now shall not leave this Battle,
But lie at his feet , in the dust with our leader
House Carles at the Battle of Hastings
But a city is not only its streets and buildings. Also, the people who live there every moment.
The truth is that the Russians who had to live in Smolensk under German occupation were unlucky.
Surviving each day was a terrible task that, during those two long years, many thousands of inhabitants failed to do so.
The German authorities, convinced of their racial superiority and of the subhuman condition of the Russians, governed the population under draconian laws that punished countless infractions and disobediences with death.
The most serious initial problem was that of housing, since the city suffered severe and extensive damage during the bombings, which devastated entire neighborhoods of the city.
Looking anywhere, the same panorama: images of a devastated city showing the brick chimneys of houses burned to the ground.
The problem was terrible, because the winter from 1941 to 1942 was very hard and as the Germans occupied the best buildings and houses, the inhabitants of the city had to survive in basements and ruined buildings in really harsh conditions.
Citizens capable por work had to sign up at city government offices, where they were assigned to the multiple tasks required for a city to function. This entitled them to their short food rations.
Throughout the summer of 1941 there was a lot of work to clear debris and keep the streets free of rubble.
The queues of women with children to receive certain provisions were another common image in the occupied city.
One of the new rules of the occupying authorities to win hearts & minds was the reopening of the cathedral for worship, which the Soviet authorities had closed.
There is a series of images taken on July 16, 1943, on the occasion of the acts of celebration of the 2nd anniversary of the "liberation of the city" by the Germans.
The city maintained a series of civil services such as the fire department and there are more images of that day, at the Bürgermeisterei square, in the Noble assembly building. There is a military marching band and pictures of the city fire trucks.
Last edited by TabsTabs1964; 04-16-2022 at 08:22 AM.
There were also concerts on the street for the German soldiers.
Concert on Ilyinskaya Street
And Nazi propaganda posters in public places...
There is a group of photos also about the celebration of Labor Day, May 1 in Lapatinsky park
But let's not lose sight of the harshness of the occupiers towards Russian civilians.
Here we have two images of a resident detention point. It is the entrance to the Pioneer Park (formerly Sosnovsky Boulevard).
The sign says: those detained here did not obey the orders of the German military forces.
Finally, on the harshness of that winter, two photos "on the outskirts of Smolensk" with a snowfall of one and a half meters, perhaps.
And three photos from my collection of German soldiers with snow plows, which I did not imagine existed in the 40s, also says one on the back "near Smolensk"
tabstabs collection
tabstabs collection
tabstabs collection
I finish by putting together two photos: the one of the truck that is heading in convoy towards the city, and the one of the snowplow truck on the outskirts of the city.
Both trucks have almost the same lettering on their boxes. Would they be trucks brought from some German city? I don't know, I don't know its meaning.
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