32nd tank brigade

The team was formed from October 5 to October 25, 1941 in Vladimir according to the state No. 010/78 of August 23, 1941 ^[1] :

• Office of the brigade (state number 010/75)
• Company management (state number 010/76)
• Reconnaissance company (state No. 010/77)
• 32nd Tank Regiment
  • 1st tank battalion
  • 2nd tank battalion
  • 3rd tank battalion
• Motorized Rifle Machine Gun Battalion
• Anti-tank division
• Anti-aircraft division
• Motor transport company
• Repair company
• Sanitary platoon

Colonel I.I. Yushchuk (former commander of the 48th Panzer Division ) was appointed brigade commander.

In the Tula direction

On October 28, 1941, the 32nd Panzer Brigade was transferred by rail to the city of Tula and transferred to the Western Front ^[1] . On the evening of October 30, 5 KV-1 , 7 T-34 , 22 T-60 and a motorized infantry battalion of 960 people ^[2] arrived in Tula and took an active part in the defense of Tula , and then in the defeat of German troops near Tula , in the liberation of Yasnaya Polyana .

From October 30 to November 10, 1941, in the battles for Tula, the brigade lost half of its personnel ^[1] . According to the report of the Military Council of the 50th Army to the commander of the troops of the Western Front on the military operations of the army in the region of Tula from October 20 to November 10, 1941 (November 10, 1941) ^[3] :

On November 1 and 2, the enemy several times tried to attack Tula from the south, but all his attacks were repelled with heavy losses of enemy tanks and infantry. 1.11 32 TBR took part in repelling enemy attacks, which significantly raised the morale of our infantry.

Prisoners of the 3 TD taken in the Tula region showed that from 29.10 to 2.11 the Germans suffered very large losses in the tanks and, in connection with this, stopped the general attacks on Tula ...

... 9.11 the enemy went on the counterattack and forced 413 SD with 32 TBR to retreat to the Mal line . Fir , Cool, Borykovo , where there are fights ...

... 32 TBR in the battles for Tula lost up to 50% of the personnel. From the mat. the part has KV - 2, T-34 - 4, BT-7 - 6, T-60 - 8 ...

In mid-November, taking into account the superiority of the enemy in forces, and especially in tanks, the tanks of the 32nd Panzer Brigade were distributed among rifle units: 9 tanks were in combat formation of the 413rd Rifle Division (8 of them made up the reserve commander of the 413rd Rifle Division , were in the second echelon), 5 tanks in combat formation of the 299th Infantry Division , 7 tanks in the Tula combat area ^[4] .

On November 18, the German units, having superior power, broke through the defense of the 50th Army in the sections of the 413rd and 299th Rifle Divisions and by the end of the day captured Dedilovo . On the section of the 413rd Infantry Division, the counterattacks of the tanks of the 32nd Panzer Brigade, the enemy offensive was stopped, but the position of the rifle units was not restored ^[5] . The tanks of the 32nd Panzer Brigade mainly operated from ambushes in close cooperation with the infantry. Particularly successful were the actions of Captain M. A. Zaporozhets’s detachment (5 tanks), which repelled several attacks on the working village of Bolokhovo ( Kireevsky District of the Tula Region ) on November 19, knocking out 11 tanks and destroying up to 300 enemy soldiers and officers ^[6] . And in just three days of fighting on November 18-20, his group knocked out 19 German tanks. The captain of the medium tank company of the 32nd Panzer Battalion died on November 20 during a breakthrough from the encirclement, when Bolokhovo was already blocked by German troops from all sides. He was posthumously represented by the brigade command to the title of Hero of the Soviet Union , but was posthumously awarded the Order of Lenin (January 22, 1942) ^[7] .

By the evening of November 20, units of the 32nd Panzer Brigade and the 108th Panzer Division, without a continuous front , retreated to the frontier along the Shat River ^[6] . On November 21, after breaking through the defense on the Shat River and capturing Uzlovaya and Stalinogorsk , the remnants of the 32nd, 11th Panzer Brigades and 108th Panzer Division were sent to the Venevsky combat area, created to eliminate the German breakthrough and cover the Venevsky direction ^[6] . Venevsky combat site with varying success defended until the end of the day on November 24. On November 24, the German 17th Panzer Division (Colonel Rudolph-Eduard Licht) went around the city from the east, forcing its defenders to move north. The city of Venev fell, and the Venevsky battle site ceased to exist as a combat unit. The 32nd Panzer Brigade, the remnants of the 124th Panzer Regiment, and the motorized rifle battalion of the 11th Panzer Brigade moved to the Tula region ^[8] .

Russian historian M.V. Kolomiyets notes that the defense of the Venevsky combat site was weakened due to the lack of communication between ambushes and the strike group, as well as due to the small number of infantry (30 tanks and 500 infantry, including tank brigade infantry). However, these lessons were taken into account when organizing the defense of combat sites on the entire left flank of the Western Front, where there was no solid front line. In addition, the actions of tanks from ambush thwarted the plans of the German command on the move to break through to the crossings on the Oka River near Kashira, Serpukhov and Kolomna, and also made it possible to better prepare the defenses of Kashirsky, Laptevsky, Zaraysky and Ryazan combat sites ^[9] .

In the December offensive battles, having scouted a weak spot in the enemy’s defense, Colonel Yushchuk, together with the 124th Tank Regiment of the 112th Panzer Division, raided the enemy’s rear to a depth of 25 km, defeating three large enemy convoys and capturing a number of settlements, including Yasnaya Polyana . Under his leadership, the 32nd Panzer Brigade participated in the liberation of Kaluga and in the pursuit of the enemy to the city of Yukhnov ^[10]

Until the end of October 1942, the brigade fought in the band of the 50th Army ( Bolshaya Yarovaya , Ovsyannikovo , Tikhvinsky ), the 10th Army (the area of ​​the city of Kirov ), and the 16th Army (defense on the Zhizdra River). At the end of October 1942, the brigade was withdrawn to the reserve of the Supreme Command Headquarters ( Kubinka ) ^[1] .

Further fighting

By March 12, 1943, the brigade concentrated in the area of ​​the Nizhne-Mityakino farm ( Voronezh region ) and became part of the 29th tank corps of the Steppe Military District . In May 1943, the brigade was reorganized into a two-battalion state, having received 65 T-34s ^[1] .

She took part in the Battle of Kursk . On October 19, 1943, together with the troops of the Steppe Front, during the offensive in the Kryvyi Rih direction, the 32nd Panzer Brigade liberated the city of Pyatikhatki . On December 9, 1943, during the operation to expand the bridgehead on the right bank of the Dnieper, she took part in the liberation of the city of Znamenka . By order of the Supreme High Commission, the honorary name Znamenskaya was awarded ^[11] .

On January 8, 1944, during the Kirovograd operation, the brigade liberated the city of Kirovograd ^[11] .

July 1, 1944 during the Minsk operation took part in the liberation of the city of Borisov . On July 13, 1944, during the Vilnius operation, together with other units and formations of the 3rd Belorussian Front, Vilnius was liberated. October 10, 1944 during the Memel operation - the city of Palanga ^[11] .

32nd Tank Znamenskaya Order of Lenin, Red Banner, Order of the Suvorov Brigade

• Colonel Yushchuk, Ivan Ivanovich (from 05.10.1941 to 04/02/1942);
• lieutenant colonel, from 11/11/1942 Colonel Sakhno, Mikhail Gordeevich (from 03/03/1943 to 10/13/1943);
• Lt. Col. Chepaykin, Pyotr Iosifovich (from 10/14/1942 to 01/07/1943);
• Colonel Linev, Alexei Alekseevich (from 08/08/1943 to 08/25/1943);
• Colonel Vorobyov, Konstantin Konstantinovich (from 08/26/1943 to 10/28/1943), 10/19/1943 - seriously wounded;
• Lieutenant Colonel Vitebsky, Grigory Ivanovich (from 10.29.1943 to 12.13.1943);
• Lieutenant Colonel Bzyrin, Vasily Alekseevich (from 12/15/1943 to 01/08/1944);
• Lieutenant Colonel Yachnik, Sergey Fedorovich (from 09/09/1944 to 04/27/1944);
• Lieutenant Colonel Kurnosov, Nikolai Andreyevich (from 04/28/1944 to 07/06/1944);
• Colonel Zlenko, Mikhail Kuzmich (from July 19, 1944 to September 12, 1944);
• Lieutenant Colonel Kolesnikov, Semyon Gavrilovich (from September 13, 1944 to February 1, 1945), died on February 1, 1945;
• Lieutenant Colonel Morozov, Sergey Ivanovich (from 02/02/1945 to 05/09/1945) ^[1] .

On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the defense of Tula in November 1966, by a decision of the executive committee of the Tula City Council of Workers' Deputies on a concrete pedestal in the square in front of building No. 2 of TSPU The tank T-34 was installed by L. N. Tolstoy : “In November – December 1941, the 32nd Panzer Brigade showed heroism in the defeat of Nazi troops. Established in November 1966. " ^[13]

• The leading political composition of the departments of the fronts, fleets, armies, flotillas, corps, divisions, formations of the navy, tank brigades of the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945. M. , 1968.
• Feskov V.I., Kalashnikov K.A., Golikov V.I. The Red Army in victories and defeats. Tomsk: Tomsk University Press, 2003.
• Kochetkov D.I. With closed hatches. Moscow, 1962
• Maxim Kolomiets. 1941. Tanks in the battle for Moscow. - M .: Eksmo, 2009 .-- 170 p. - (Great tank battles). - ISBN 978-5-699-34612-7 .

• 32nd Tank Brigade on the Tank Front website.
• Report 32 TBR for the period from August 14 to 25, 1942 in the Sukhinichi region (Neopr.) . Website "Tank Front". - TsAMO. F. 3116, op. 1, d. 1, l. 131. (document provided by Igor Chernyaev). Date of treatment October 22, 2012. Archived December 18, 2012.