It’s in the morning of June 24th, 1941.
Hunkered down at a crossroads outside the central Lithuanian town of Raseiniai,
is what is thought to be a KV-1 from the 3rd Company of the 2nd Tank Division,
and it's about to make history.
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Meanwhile, inside the KV-1 the crew waits patiently
as the commander looks through his observation slit
at the German trucks approaching 800 yards away.
Laden with wounded soldiers, POWs, fuel and ammunition,
the hapless convoy lumbers toward its grim fate.
The Russian loader shoves a high-explosive shell into the breach
as the gunner lines up the crosshairs on the lead vehicle.
Seconds later the propellant ignites with a thundering crack
sending the projectile screaming down the barrel and slamming headlong into the first truck
causing it to erupt in a fire-ball.
As shot after shot is fired,
nearly a dozen more are destroyed in quick succession,
while those in the rear make a hasty retreat.
But now the KV-1 and its crew are faced with a group of German tanks,
anti tank guns, and indignant Wehrmacht troopers
desperate to even the score and to take their revenge.
Fresh from a series of swift victories in the early days of Operation Barbarossa –
the battle hardened troops of the 6th Panzer Division are brimming with confidence…
but they’ve never faced anything quite like the KV-1.
At just 10 tons, sporting 37 mm guns and somewhat thin skin,
the aging Panzer 35 Ts are hopelessly outclassed by the 45-ton Russian beast
with its potent 76 mm cannon and 90 mm frontal armor.
Then, cutting through the still morning air, German commanders bark –
“Fire!”
High-velocity shells from nearly every direction hurtle just meters over the ground
and smack into the Russian leviathan with a cacophony of bangs, blasts and crashes.
Inside the KV-1 the beleaguered crew cover their ears to drown out the deafening clamor
as the rounds pound mercilessly against the stronk Soviet armor.
The German gunners report that “We didn’t penetrate their armor!” and
“That one didn’t go through!”
Instead, the shells deflect off in sparky arcs,
disintegrating on impact,
or drop to the ground like bags of wet sand.
Inside it feels like time has ground to a screeching halt,
but the bombardment lasts just a few minutes
as the Soviets wait for the perfect opportunity to respond in kind.
Then, waking the mechanical beast,
the KV-1’s hulking turret heaves toward the 50 mm anti tank guns
under the drone of its 600 horsepower diesel engine.
They shoot.
The first round slams into a German gun,
then another explodes, and another,
until the guns have all been reduced to mangled hunks of smoldering wreckage.
With their smaller guns permanently out of action,
the Germans call in a heavy hitting 105 mm field gun.
Its crew try to get it into a suitable firing position.
The commander of the KV-1 spots the threat.
Without hesitation they get a shot off.
It’s a hit!
And the 105mm is also taken out of action.
Next the Germans attempt to outflank the enemy
and take the KV-1 by surprise.
More than 700 yards to its rear,
an 88 mm Flak gun threatens to put a kill shot through its back end
where its armor is thinnest.
Capable of propelling 3.5 inch anti tank rounds at nearly 2,700 feet per second,
88s are among the war’s most lethal tank killers,
and they pack enough punch to penetrate even the KV-1’s thick armor.
But the vigilant crew spots the ruse,
and they wheel the turret nearly 180 degrees
and destroys the 88 before it can even get a shot off.
Now with even the biggest guns out of commission,
the KV-1 advances to pick off the remaining Panzers.
As the driver shoves the transmission into gear
the 90,000-pound tank's tracks lurch over the uneven ground.
Again the Panzers open fire, and there’s nothing the Germans can do to halt the advance.
The KV-1 proceeds in destroying the impotent Panzers one by one,
ultimately getting to within 70 yards of the German lines
and causing the remaining tanks to flee.
Victory!
Now fresh out of targets the KV-1 jerks to a halt
as the blistering midday sun beats down on the weary crew.
Together the heat and the weight of the inevitable counterattack are unbearable,
and as the afternoon sky gives way to twilight
they wonder if they’ve been forgotten, or more likely, the enemy are busy formulating a new plan.
Darkness falls and the German infantrymen clutching grenades and satchel charges
creep toward the slumbering hulk.
If they can’t destroy the KV outright,
they’ll settle for disabling a track or damaging its gun,
but the vigilant crew greets them with a hail of machine gun fire.
The Germans manage to get an explosive charge onto the tracks.
It works and with the track on one side slipping off
the Germans head back to cover.
The KV-1 is going nowhere.
Daybreak the following morning the Germans decide to throw everything they have at the KV-1,
and with a little luck and misdirection they’ll overwhelm it and finally put an end to the monster tank.
Shortly after daybreak the Panzers 35ts open up from a nearby treeline,
and they’re accompanied by 88s
that’d moved into place the previous night.
The Panzers 35 Ts still aren’t inflicting any real damage,
but the distraction allows the 88 gunners to put two rounds through the KV-1’s armor.
Then through the haze and smoke the Russian giant goes eerily silent.
Waiting for a fire, an explosion, or a white flag to unfurl from an open hatch,
German soldiers cautiously make their way to the crippled KV-1,
but despite the gaping holes in its armor
the turret begins to move yet again!
Battered and bruised, the stubborn Russians are still in the fight.
As the German soldiers flee, one throws a grenade through a hole in the KV-1’s armor –
it explodes with a mighty clang.
This vehicle's had it.
and the KV-1s gun falls silent…
This time for good.
For more than 24 hours the KV-1 held off a numerically superior Panzer force
in a monumental stands against the Nazi juggernaut.
According to the German General Erhard Raus,
the dead crewmen were later recovered by the Germans
and buried with full military honors.
The tanker’s identities have never been definitively determined,
but decades after the battle the remains of Russian soldiers buried near the crossroads were exhumed
and reburied at the Soviet military cemetery in Raseiniai,
and it’s widely believed that they belonged to the KV-1 crew.
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