On 16 December we marked a festive occasion. At the command post of the 54th Regiment, which was situated in the Kamyshly gully by the village of the same name, the divisional commander, Major-General Kolomiyets, was to present government awards to ten of my regimental comrades who had distinguished themselves in the defence of Odessa. I had returned from sniper duty in the forest quite late that day and immediately gone to bed. But Lieutenant Dromov ordered me to go to congratulate the recipients on behalf of the 2nd Company. Also in attendance, apart from me, were representatives of our other detachments, probably about forty people in all.
First to speak was Kolomiyets. He said that our great homeland always marked the feats of Red Army soldiers and officers and he called on them to fight as bravely by the walls of Sevastopol as they had at Odessa. The next speaker was regimental commander Major Matusyevich. He assured the general that the Razins would live up to the honour conferred upon them. Third to take the floor was, appropriately, the military commissar for our regiment, Battalion Commissar Maltsev. He talked about the Communist Party and Young Communist League members who were setting an example of courage and staunchness in combat. Then came the presentation of awards. I witnessed in person the official award to the gallant machine-gun company sergeant, Nina Onilova, who received the Order of the Red Banner and, when my turn came, I addressed her with a speech befitting the occasion, albeit a very short one.
It had been a clear, sunny day with a slight frost. The winter daylight was quickly coming to an end. Returning to the 2nd Company lines, I sat down on a fallen tree and lit up my pipe.1 It had been given to me by Anastas Vartanov after our successful attack on the village of Mekenzia and was the only item of value he had left after the Germans destroyed his house. The old Turkish pipe made from the root of a pear tree, with an amber mouthpiece, had a most unusual appearance. It was also an award, but from an ordinary man.
I easily learned how to use it: to pack it with tobacco correctly, smoke it unhurriedly and maintain a slow glow of dry tobacco fibres in the gleaming polished bowl made of dark brown wood. It was pleasant to feel the warmth of the bowl in your hand. The mouthpiece seemed to moderate the strength of the smoke and prolong the pleasure for the smoker, which was unwittingly conducive to reflection.
Since my officer comrades had been commemorating the battles for Odessa that day, my thoughts also returned to those recent events. We had come through our first lessons in the arduous and dangerous school of war and benefited much from the experience; we had matured, become smarter, hardened our characters, grown accustomed to looking death calmly in the eyes and skilfully deceiving her. Without such habits you are not a real soldier.
Could Nina Onilova and I be measured against each other in terms of enemies annihilated? At the staff headquarters of the 25th Rifle Division she was credited with having sent 500 Fascists to the next world. By the middle of December 1941 I had just over 200. The most important thing was that they were no longer fighting, trampling our land, killing our compatriots. Perhaps the suddenness of their demise drove some sense into other invaders who had come here in the hope of a swift and easy conquest.
‘This is the first time I’ve seen a girl with a pipe,’ said a pleasant baritone voice behind me.
I looked around. A junior lieutenant was approaching the fallen tree. I had seen him somewhere before. Not in the 54th Regiment, but quite probably in the 287th or 31st, which were also part of our division and had fought at Odessa. He was a big, statuesque and broad-shouldered man with blue eyes and dark brown hair, about thirty-five years of age. He sat down beside me, took a cigarette case out of his overcoat pocket and opened it. It contained Kazbek brand cigarettes from the officers’ rations. The junior lieutenant offered them to me. After hesitating, I took one. He also took one, then clicked his lighter, and we started smoking.
‘What do you use in your pipe?’ the officer asked.
‘Shag tobacco.’
‘Isn’t it a bit strong?’
‘It is, but I’ve got used to it.’
‘It’s funny,’ he continued. ‘Good-looking women don’t usually smoke pipes.’
‘In other words, I must be ugly and unusual.’
‘The fact that you’re unusual is well known to the entire 54th Regiment, Lyudmila Mikhailovna,’ he said respectfully, looking at me. ‘But the question of female looks is quite a complex one. Our ideal is dictated by time, fashion and custom. For example, I consider you good-looking . . .’
In this first conversation of ours he behaved in a restrained, courteous and sensitive way. He introduced himself at once: Kitzenko, Alexei Arkadyevich, from the city of Donyetsk: called up in 1941, he fought in the ranks of the 287th Regiment, had a technical education (as an electrician), had been a sergeant, then a senior sergeant, and recently become an officer, on 30 November of this year, on completion of an accelerated course for the middle-rank officer corps under the coastal army general staff. His reason for making my acquaintance was quite simple. Kitsenko had been appointed commander of our 2nd Company, and now he was going around the battle formations to get to know people and study the fortifications he was tasked with defending.
Alexei Arkadyevich’s speech was coherent, grammatically correct and even quite witty. He concluded his narrative with a funny story about the final examinations on his officers’ course. While assembling a TT pistol, his friend got so nervous that he lost one of the components. He put the gun together, but it could not be dismantled any more and would not fire. After lengthy consultations, the commission came up with the verdict that he had passed the exam: his knowledge of his weapon was obvious, and the rest was beyond the commission’s competence.
In a word, Alexei made a good impression. I hoped that this would not evaporate in the course of further service together. I can add that men like him – big, well-proportioned, blue-eyed and blond-haired – generally appealed to me. Privately I called them ‘Vikings’, the bold warriors of the far-off northern seas.
How were we to know that on this quiet evening the invaders were completing preparations for a second assault on Sevastopol, moving up the last of 645 pieces of field ordnance and 252 items of anti-tank artillery? As well as that, they had already set out 378 mortar-guns of various calibres behind no man’s land, and now had twenty-seven weapons per kilometre of front, while we had only nine. Over 200 bombers and fighters were about to attack the Soviet positions, while we had only ninety aircraft.
Beyond the crests of the Mekenzi hills, covered in bushy forest, three German infantry divisions, the 22nd, 24th and 132nd, were lining up in battle formation. They were preparing to strike at the junction between the third and fourth sectors of the Sevastopol defences, that is, on the narrow stretch from Mekenzia village to Aziz-Oba hill, in order to break through to the north side of the biggest bay in the Black Sea Fleet’s principal naval base. If the Nazis reached its shores, then the city, being completely surrounded on the landward side, could not stand. Sea transport – and this remained the only way – of draft reinforcements, military supplies, weapons and provisions would then cease.
The Fritzes unleashed a hail of artillery and mortar fire on the city’s defence positions at 6.10 on the morning of 17 December 1941. The earth shook. The crashing, wailing and whistling of shells and mortars were deafening and seemed impossible to bear. Hidden in our deep earth refuges, we waited for the end of the cacophony. The ammunition of the enemy, even one as calculating as the Germans, could not be infinite. The artillery attack continued for about twenty minutes. Then the enemy infantry advanced across the entire front. Twin-engine Junkers and Heinkels appeared in the sky. They bombed not just the city, but the front line of the Soviet forces.
I wrote about this after the war.
The enemy now counted on inflicting its main blow in a different sector, from the Duvankoi district across the Belbek river valley and the village of Kamyshly to the north-east extremity of Northern Bay. The invaders intended to split the defensive front, to encircle the units of the fourth sector, and come out at Sevastopol. The Nazis switched the main forces of their 11th Army to the district of Aziz-Oba hill, to the north of the Mekenzi hills. As well as that, auxiliary reserves were gathering there to ensure the success of the military action . . . The enemy planned to conclude this operation in four days, by 21 December.
By using the natural features of the locality, Nazi submachine-gunners managed to penetrate through to the rear of our defences on some sectors of the front. They counted on encircling the Soviet units. The Nazi manoeuvre did not come off. Our destruction squads, consisting mainly of Communist Party and Young Communist League members, isolated the enemy movements. The enemy submachine-gunners were surrounded and annihilated.
The first day of the second assault was not a successful one for the Nazis. They lost nine aircraft in aerial battles and from anti-aircraft fire. There were great losses of tanks and manpower, too. The enemy came up against increasing resistance from rifle units and naval infantry detachments, which engaged them in heavy, prolonged fighting.
Of the coastal army units, the soldiers of the artillery regiment, led by Lieutenant Colonel Bogdanov, fought with special distinction. They had earlier battled heroically for Odessa. The Bogdanov gunners always took up positions close to the forward line and there were times when they had to beat off the attacks of the enemy infantry. At critical moments in major advances Bogdanov himself would go out into no man’s land and serve as a spotter for his own regiment. Fearlessness and courage were the gunners’ main watchwords.
The fighting proceeded not only on land, but also at sea. The sailors of the cruiser Krasniy Krim fought courageously during these days under the command of Captain (2nd Class) Zubkov. His crew – gunners, engineers, electricians, torpedo personnel – self-sacrificingly repelled the furious attacks of the Nazi bombers. This floating fortress covered the Soviet ships heading into Sevastopol Bay and trained destructive fire at the enemy infantry and vehicles. The ship’s gunners did not know the meaning of the word fatigue. They inflicted lethal blows and shocked the foe with the suddenness of their attacks.
Once in the very heat of battle an enemy shell exploded by the gun of Starshina (Warrant Officer) (2nd Class) Mikhailenko. The commander of the weapon and some of the gun crew were wounded. But the firing continued. The sergeant major was replaced by a sailor. Despite the losses, the ship’s artillery operated without a hitch.
Many heroes of the Sevastopol defence were known in the city by name. One popular name was that of minesweeper captain Dmitry Andreyevich Glukhov. His boat was the first to go out to deal with acoustic mines. They were very difficult to counter. These mines were called acoustic precisely because they would explode as a result of insignificant sound oscillations . . . With no fear of danger Glukhov’s minesweeper would set about disarming them. This bold-spirited crew needed only a few hours to completely clear the approach routes for ships into the bay.
I recall another feat of this team. A convoy of heavily loaded Soviet transport ships was heading for Sevastopol. Protection was provided by a chain of boats under Glukhov’s command. Nazi air reconnaissance discovered the ships and directed their bombers against them. Bombs whistled down, raising huge fountains of water. They tried many times to attack the transport ships, but the fire from our boats drove the planes away. The Soviet transports got to their destination unharmed.
The glorious defenders of Sevastopol were inspired by the initial victories of the Soviet armies near Moscow.
Striving to downplay the significance of our victories and somehow restore the myth of their army’s ‘invincibility’, the Nazi high command set an objective for their forces at Sevastopol: to capture the city, regardless of the losses.
The date laid down by the Nazis for entry into the city was 21 December. They wanted the capture of the city to coincide with the six-month anniversary of war with the Soviet Union. The enemy were advancing. Sevastopol was placed in an extraordinarily difficult situation. The fate of its future defence was being decided. On 20 December a message concerning the seriousness of the situation was sent to the supreme command headquarters. In the reply that followed four hours later the commander of the Black Sea Fleet was ordered to send to Sevastopol part of the naval infantry, some draft reinforcements and shells . . .2
Within the military formations of the 25th Chapayev Division, the first day of the assault, 17 December, was particularly difficult for the soldiers and officers of the 287th Rifle Regiment, who were occupying positions by the Yaila-Bash hill and the southern extremity of the Kamyshly gully. Advancing against them was an infantry force of several battalions, supported by ten tanks. Soon there was hand-to-hand combat in the trenches of the 5th Company of this regiment’s 2nd Battalion. Junior political instructor Golubnichy distinguished himself here. He bayonetted six Nazis and continued in action, despite being wounded.
However, by the middle of the day the troops of the 287th Regiment were forced to retreat towards the village of Kamyshly. At five o’clock in the evening they were already 800 metres east of the village, while the 9th Company was completely encircled and heroically fighting off the attacks of the Nazi submachine-gunners. By the end of the day the regiment had withdrawn still further – towards the northeast slopes of the Kamyshly gully.
The soldiers of the 2nd, Perekop, Regiment of naval infantry, which was part of our division, also withstood a significant blow. Launching themselves in a bayonet attack, they stemmed the Fritzes’ advance, but were gradually forced to withdraw and managed to establish themselves only on the western slopes of Height 264.1. They were assisted in getting away from the enemy by the gunners of the 69th Regiment, who wiped out ten enemy tanks by direct fire from their 76mm-calibre ordnance.
These ferocious clashes occurred approximately 1 kilometre to the left of the 54th Regiment’s dispositions. The Razins also engaged in crossfire with the Nazis, but did not experience such desperate enemy pressure. True, a number of times the German infantry ranks ventured into no man’s land, which had been cleared of bushes and trees. However, on encountering solid machine-gun and rifle fire, backed up by mortars, they went to ground and then drew back.
For two days the cannons roared on the Mekenzi hills. The Nazis were unable to overrun our front, or to achieve a definitive advantage over the defenders of Sevastopol. The Russians charged in counter-attacks and won back their firing lines that had been occupied by the Germans.
On the morning of 19 December silence reigned along the 1st Battalion’s sector. But suddenly the enemy began intensive firing from cannons and large-calibre mortars. This was a normal occurrence, and we hid in our dugouts under three layers of beams. Our military outposts then informed us of the approach of German vehicles. With clanking caterpillar tracks a Stu.G.III self-propelled vehicle with a short, seemingly sawn-off, cannon had crawled into the clearing along with an Sd.Kfz. 250/1 armoured transport, which was maintaining continuous fire from a machine gun situated behind the armoured shield on the cab roof. Following immediately behind these vehicles were about two battalions of riflemen and submachine-gunners. Our anti-tank battery set their sights on the self-propelled vehicle. It was up to the infantry to deal with the caterpillar armoured transport.
According to Battalion Commander Dromin’s plan, in the event of a German advance on the positions of the 1st Battalion, the soldiers in the sniper platoon were to stand alongside the machine-gunners and, together, repel the enemy attacks, under directions from the officers. I was allowed to occupy an earlier prepared concealed trench, in order to direct fire at the flank of the advancing force and to neutralize machine-gun nests and mortar crews.
At that moment the machine-gun nest was moving towards me at a speed of around 25km per hour. Low-built and not very big in size, the beige-coloured armoured Sd.Kfz. 250/1, weighing almost 6 tonnes and painted with brown and green patches, was turning on its left track and directing a continuous spray of bullets at the area in front of the 1st Battalion’s trenches. Clearly visible on its side was a black and white cross and vehicle number 323, which stood for armoured transporter No. 3, 2nd Platoon, 3rd Company. The distance was growing shorter. The vehicle was approaching a familiar marker, the long trunk of a young elm tree which had been broken off low down. I looked through the eyepiece of the PE telescope sight on my Three Line.
I had a minute to solve the ballistics problem.
First, the armoured transport had quite high sides and, consequently, the heads of the machine-gunners operating their MG. 34 so fearlessly were over 2 metres above ground level. My trench, which was firmly dug into the ground, had a parapet about 20cm high, where the rifle rested. Between the aiming line and the weapon horizon was an angle of 35 degrees – the so-called ‘target angle’ – and, at that moment, it was positive. Consequently, the sights had to be set at a reduced level.
Second, the armoured transport was moving. This required deflection shooting, that is, the barrel of the weapon had to follow the target and stay ahead of it at a corresponding speed. It was easy to calculate the deflection at a distance of 200 metres. A bullet from a Three Line would reach it in 0.25 seconds. In this time the German vehicle would have travelled 4 metres. Using the concept of milliradians in my calculations, I turned the windage drum on the metal tube of the sight several units, then softly pressed the trigger with my index finger. The butt of the rifle kicked against my shoulder as usual and a momentary flash appeared from the muzzle.
With that the machine-gun fire from the roof of the Sd.KFz. 250/1 ceased. The soldiers fell into the bottom of the armoured transport. Their helmets did not save them. The Russian bullets had flown from below and struck them through their eye slots. The junior officer in charge of the transport’s crew acted very stupidly. In his surprise he climbed out of the cab onto the body of the vehicle to see why the machine gun had fallen silent. After all, the enemy were firing only from the front, where the vehicle was protected by armoured sheets about 1.5cm thick. He did not have time to consider the possibility of a sniper; my bullet shot him through the temple.
But those who were watching the attack from the command post of the German reconnaissance battalion guessed, of course. Literally within a minute, salvoes of 8cm-calibre GrW (Granatwerfer, mortar) descended on the clump of trees where I was located. I had a deeper, well-equipped, reserve lair adjacent. Rolling over three times on my left side, I almost reached it. However, it was not a mortar but a heavy shell which suddenly rent the air and threw up clumps of earth, twigs, fragments of trees and fallen leaves. It felt as if the burning paw of a huge beast had prodded me in the shoulder, a sharp pain penetrated my right shoulder blade, and then everything went black.
I came to, woken by the cold. My overcoat and camouflage smock had been reduced to rags on my right shoulder and my back. My helmet was lying alongside with its strap torn. The wooden stock of the rifle was broken, the barrel was bent and the telescope sight was completely missing. The worst thing was that the crown of an acacia tree, shattered by the shell, had fallen down and pinned me to the ground, making it impossible for me to get up. The pain was concentrated between my spine and right shoulder blade. But I could not reach the wound and bind it by myself. I could just feel that I was losing blood. The back of my undershirt and tunic were soaked with it.
Twilight was descending. It was very quiet in the forest. The sound of distant cannon fire was echoing somewhere. But here the fighting was probably over. How had it finished? Where were my regimental mates now? How far had the Fritzes managed to get? Would they come looking for me?
In my brain, which was now clouded by pain, major blood loss and intensifying cold, words dissolved into syllables, lost their sense, vanished . . . They were replaced by visions – at first unclear and dim. These were followed by others which had outlines, figures and faces. I was now preparing for death and imagining that I ought to see all those I had lost over months of war. However, it was my mother Yelena Trofimovna, tenderly known in our family as Lenusya, who was addressing me, my good friend and adviser, now living in far-off Udmurtia. The stern face of my father also appeared. ‘Belovs simply don’t retreat’ – his phrase did not so much resound as imprint itself in my brain. And then there was my son Rostislav, my dear beloved Morzhik, who had grown up over the half-year we had been apart, and was now a gawky adolescent rather than a child. He stretched out a hand to me: ‘Mum!’ The hand was warm. I felt its touch and struggled to open my eyes.
The bare branches of trees crippled by the artillery attack looked black against the grey winter sky. The last ray of the setting sun shone through their sad tangle and fell on the gleaming armour of a Viking. The bright specks sparkled on his helmet with its raised visor. But this was the last manifestation of a clouded consciousness. Leaning over me in actual fact was Junior Lieutenant Alexei Kitsenko, clad in an overcoat, with his helmet tilted slightly towards the back and his submachine gun over his shoulder.
He was saying something, and I caught his words: ‘Lucy, don’t die! . . . Lucy, I beg you! Lucy, please! . . .’
How the commander of the 2nd Company had managed to find me in this forest, I simply cannot imagine. Some soldiers appeared behind him. They disentangled the splinters of acacia. Alexei picked me up in his arms and carried me out of the thicket into the trenches. There our medical orderly, Yelena Paliy, cut open my overcoat and tunic and bandaged the wound tightly, to stop the bleeding. Kitsenko asked the regimental commander for his car. In twenty minutes I was driven from the slope of Kamyshly gully to Inkerman, where divisional Medical Battalion 47 was located in tunnels, along with Field Hospitals 316, 76 and 356.
Over the three days of the second assault approximately 3,000 soldiers and officers from the coastal army had ended up there. But this huge underground medical centre was designed to cope with such numbers. There were two superbly equipped operating theatres, bandaging rooms, isolation wards, various clinics (physiotherapy, dentistry, etc.), and wards for treating the sick.
The wounded were quickly triaged in reception, and I ended up in an operating theatre, where operations were being carried out on four tables simultaneously for those wounded in the stomach and chest. I was lucky. The splinter was removed from my back and three stitches put in my wound by the surgeon of our divisional medical battalion, Vladimir Fyodorovich Pishel-Gayek, an excellent doctor and a remarkable man. Because I had had major blood loss and my general state was quite serious, he intended to dispatch me to unoccupied territory. Late in the evening of 19 December, the transport ship Chekhov was due to depart from the Kamennaya wharf in Southern Bay, and loaded on it were over 400 seriously wounded soldiers and officers who had been operated on.
If that had happened, Alexei Kitsenko and I would never have seen each other again. It is quite possible that my wartime career would have taken a different turn. But the commander of the 2nd Company waited until the end of the operation, escorted me into the ward and then spoke to the surgeon. He asked him not to evacuate Senior Sergeant Pavlichenko from Sevastopol, promising that the troops not only of the 2nd Company, but of the whole of the 54th Rifle Regiment’s 1st Battalion, would donate blood for me – and not just for me. For a start, the junior lieutenant suggested that his very own blood should be taken by the surgeon.
The offer regarding the troops of the company and battalion was hardly credible. Nobody would release soldiers from the front line to the rear while the Nazis were advancing. However, Alexei Kitsenko apparently possessed the gift of persuasion, and Pishel-Gayek believed him. I do not know what special words Alexei came up with during his conversation with the doctor. Perhaps they were prompted by love. The doctor realized this and changed his decision. I stayed in hospital for two and a half weeks, during which the junior lieutenant visited me several times.
Our brief meetings were very cordial. The company commander turned up with various gifts: a trophy bar of Belgian chocolate found in the bag of a dead German officer, or a small flacon of ‘Red Moscow’ perfume (some shops were still open during the siege), or half a dozen cambric handkerchiefs, edged with lace (a present from the wonderful women of Sevastopol). He talked about life at the front for our own 54th Stepan Razin Rifle Battalion in a detailed and fascinating way.
For example, on 20 December a large group of enemy submachine-gunners under tank cover had broken through to the Soviet rear at the boundary between the 54th Regiment and the 3rd and 2nd, Perekop, Regiments of naval infantry, but they were wiped out with the aid of the naval infantry from the 7th Brigade, which arrived just in time. The Germans did not rest and, on the night of 22 December, a battalion of Fritzes again broke through at the boundary between the Razins and the 3rd Naval Infantry Regiment. The breakthrough was covered with the help of the divisional reserve sent up by Major-General Kolomiyets. This was a company of sailors in peakless caps (although the temperature was sub-zero) from the Perekop Regiment. On top of that, they had brought mattresses with them, but they left those in the trenches and went into the attack. The Germans opened a frenzied burst of fire, but the sailors still kept advancing and they routed the Germans in the end.
Some 300 dead Nazis were left on the field, along with their weapons: eleven medium machine guns, seven light machine guns, two mortars and 300 rifles. The Razins also took part in this glorious action and launched bayonet charges. To back them up, the commander of the coastal army also sent three small tanks. However, they were of no benefit; they got stuck in the forest among the fallen trees and had to be towed out later.
The soldiers and officers of the corps battalion of the 265th Artillery Regiment gave a brilliant account of themselves on 22 December. Left without infantry cover, from a distance of 300–400 metres they fired their cannon and howitzers directly at the mass of Nazis rushing straight at them and held the enemy back.
On 24 December the Nazis renewed their advance on the positions of the 54th Regiment; the situation became very difficult, but our troops held out. At the same time an order came from the army staff headquarters to gather up the weapons left on the battlefield, both our own and the enemy’s. In the evening of 29 December two battalions of Germans suddenly attacked our positions north-east of the village of Mekenzia. This assault was also repelled with the aid of regimental artillery.
The plans of the Wehrmacht’s 11th Army commander, Colonel General Erich von Manstein, who wanted to greet the new year of 1942 in Sevastopol, were not fulfilled. It was a pity that I did not manage to make my contribution to the deeds of the city’s defenders and lay a dozen or two champions of ‘European civilization’ in Crimean soil for eternity.
I was unable to tell Alexei Kitsenko anything interesting. He knew about my accurate shooting at the armoured transport and the artillery attack that followed, or else he would not have come to look for me in the forest. The weird visions of a seriously wounded sniper would scarcely be of any value to him. I would never have admitted my fantasies to him, and they still amaze me to this day by their coincidence with reality. His words ‘Lucy, don’t die!’ still rang in my ears, and tears welled up in my eyes, although I am a far from sentimental person.
Everything seemed to happen of its own accord. After I was discharged from hospital, Alexei took me back to the 1st Battalion’s lines and straight to his commander’s dugout. He had decorated it: on a table knocked together from freshly planed planks and covered with a canvas tablecloth he had placed a 45mm shell-case holding a winter bouquet of green juniper shoots and maple twigs with red and yellow leaves which had miraculously been preserved. In the cellar-like premises illuminated by the dim light of a battery-powered lamp they glowed like two torch beams. There was even a dinner service: tin plates with thinly sliced black bread and salami, an open can of meat stew, boiled potatoes in a mess tin, and a flask of vodka.
‘Today is a special day, Lucy,’ he said very solemnly, and, leaning over towards the vase, he tore off one palm-shaped leaf and handed it to me. ‘A small souvenir for you, my one and only. Now I am offering you my hand and my heart.’
I replied by accepting. I will not deny that events were unfolding too quickly, but in wartime there was no point in pondering too long. Today we were alive, but tomorrow . . . What would happen tomorrow, nobody knew. I had one request and at first it surprised Kitsenko. I said that my first husband was also called Alexei. I did not wish to remember this man and I would call the junior lieutenant by something different, ‘Lyonya’. He laughed, hugged me and gave his permission: ‘Call me what you like, my dear!’
We actually sent in a request to our superiors to formalize out relations in the established way. It was also signed by the battalion commander, Lieutenant Dromin, and the regimental commander, Major Matusyevich. The document was given the regimental stamp of approval and accepted for implementation at the staff headquarters of the 25th Chapayev Division. Our regimental mates made some hints about wedding festivities, but more as a joke than in earnest. The people of Sevastopol had repelled a second assault, but borne heavy losses – 23,000 killed, wounded or missing. In some companies in our regiment there were only sixty or seventy soldiers left. It was tough, for instance, for the 8th Naval Infantry Brigade, which had been fighting not too far from us in the fourth defence sector, by the Aziz-Oba hill and the village of Aranchi. At the beginning of the second assault it comprised about 3,500 men, but by 31 December there were just over 500. It would have been more appropriate to stage a wake than a merry marriage feast.
My husband Alexei Arkadyevich Kitsenko was eleven years older than me. His family life, like mine, had not worked out particularly successfully. At the insistence of his domineering mother he had married early and to a woman she chose for him. Then followed a scandalous divorce, accompanied by various unpleasant details. Nevertheless, by the age of thirty-six his character, kind and mild by nature, had stood firm and nothing could move the junior lieutenant from his chosen path. As an officer, he enjoyed unquestioned authority with his subordinates. As a husband, he was always concerned for me and protected me from various adversities as far as that that was possible on the front line. With him I felt for the first time the meaning of love, requited and all-consuming love, and I was completely happy during those days.
No doubt a dugout with earth walls and a low ceiling made of three layers of logs bore little resemblance to a cosy family nest, but we lived there as happy as can be, in whatever comfort a front-line officer and his wife could afford. From here I would go off into the forest hunting for enemies and come back knowing that at any time of the night or day there would always be a pot of hot water for me on the pot-belly stove, a mug of sweet tea, a fresh undershirt, a bunk with a flannelette blanket, that the orderly of the 2nd Company’s commander would pick up dinner or supper in the kitchen and bring it to us.
The honeymoon had a profoundly positive effect on my shooting. The bullets fired well – only along the set trajectory – and seemed to find the target of their own accord. Sometimes it seemed to me that the enchanted forest approved of our marriage and was helping me, prodding the self-confident Fritzes either into snowy clearings (to check on mine-laying), or onto roads (to connect broken telephone cables), or up into the tallest trees (to be spotters for artillery fire). Love drew me back again from woods that were chilled from the January wind. The enemy often accompanied my crossings of no man’s land with his usual ‘concert of German classical music’ performed by mortar bombs. I would request assistance from our machine-gunners, calling out to them or raising a small sapper’s spade above the bushes. They would initiate an exchange of fire and I would get out of the forest alive.
The troops of the sniper platoon had the right attitude towards my personal success: they strove to follow my example, to adopt various camouflage skills more speedily, to improve their mastery of their weapon. A significant part of the initial training of soldiers joining us from draft companies delivered from Novorossiysk was now undertaken by Fyodor Sedykh. He had been promoted to the rank of sergeant for the courage and distinction he had shown during the second assault. He was assisted by Anastas Vartanov, who had long studied the sniper’s rifle and inventively employed his hunting skills against the invader. Those beginners who showed an aptitude for sharpshooting were sometimes taken by me into the forest as lookouts for real-life tuition. The finer points are easier to understand if you are operating alongside a master.
I know what the soldiers said about me. First, they considered me somehow enchanted, as if some witch in the village near Odessa which I had saved from the Romanians had placed on me a magic spell protecting me from death. Second, they maintained that nobody was able to find me in the forest, because there I was followed by the lord of the forest himself – the wood sprite, who had not the slightest fear. It was he who protected me from enemies with his huge, tree-like body and, with his gnarled snags of hands, deflecting onto himself the bullets and shrapnel aimed in my direction. The third legend (and in my view the old ranger had made them all up) related to my abilities. I had, the claim ran, learned from the wood sprite’s keen hearing to know what was happening a kilometre around me, to see at night as well as I could in daytime, to move along forest trails with absolute silence and to hide where nobody else could. Hence my strange nickname within the regiment – the ‘lynx’.