Brest battle. Brest Fortress: the history of the building, a feat during the Second World War and a modern memorial

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  The assault on the fortress, the city of Brest and the capture of bridges across the Western Bug and Mukhavets was entrusted to the 45th Infantry Division (45th Infantry Division) of Major General Fritz Schlieper (about 17 thousand people) with reinforcement units and in cooperation with units of neighboring formations (including including mortar divisions attached 31st and 34th infantry divisions 12th Army Corps of the 4th German Army and used by the 45th Infantry Division during the first five minutes of an artillery raid), a total of up to 20 thousand people.

  Assault on the fortress

  In addition to the divisional artillery of the 45th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht, nine light and three heavy batteries, a high-power artillery battery (two super-heavy 600 mm self-propelled mortars "Karl") and a division of mortars. In addition, the commander of the 12th Army Corps concentrated the fire of two mortar divisions of the 34th and 31st Infantry Divisions on the fortress. The order to withdraw units of the 42nd Rifle Division from the fortress, given personally by the commander of the 4th Army, Major General A.A. managed to complete.

  From the combat report on the actions of the 6th Infantry Division:

  At 4 am on June 22, heavy fire was opened on the barracks, on the exits from the barracks in the central part of the fortress, on bridges and entrance gates and on the houses of the commanding staff. This raid brought confusion and caused panic among the Red Army personnel. The command staff, which was attacked in their apartments, was partially destroyed. The surviving commanders could not penetrate the barracks because of the strong barrage fire placed on the bridge in the central part of the fortress and at the entrance gate. As a result, the Red Army soldiers and junior commanders, without control from the middle commanders, dressed and undressed, in groups and singly, left the fortress, overcoming the bypass channel, the Mukhavets River and the rampart of the fortress under artillery, mortar and machine-gun fire. It was not possible to take into account the losses, since the scattered units of the 6th division mixed with the scattered units of the 42nd division, and many could not get to the assembly place because at about 6 o’clock artillery fire was already concentrated on it.

  By 9 o'clock in the morning the fortress was surrounded. During the day, the Germans were forced to bring into battle the reserve of the 45th Infantry Division (135pp / 2), as well as the 130th Infantry Regiment, which was originally the reserve of the corps, thus bringing the group of attackers to two regiments.

  According to the story of the Austrian SS private Heinz Henrik Harry Walter:

  The Russians did not put up strong resistance, in the first days of the war we took control of the fortress, but the Russians did not give up and continued to defend. Our task was to capture the entire USSR by January-February 1942. But still, the fortress was held in place for no reason at all. I was wounded in a skirmish on the night of 28/29 June 1941. We won the shootout, but I don't remember what it was. Having captured the fortress, we arranged a feast in the city. [ ]

  Defense

  About 3,000 Soviet servicemen were taken prisoner by German troops in the fortress (according to the report of the commander of the 45th division, Lieutenant-General Shliper, on June 30, 25 officers, 2877 junior commanders and soldiers were taken prisoner), 1877 Soviet servicemen died in the fortress .

  The total losses of the Germans in the Brest Fortress amounted to 947 people, of which 63 were Wehrmacht officers on the Eastern Front during the first week of the war.

  Experience learned:

  1. Short strong artillery fire on the old brick walls, fastened with concrete, deep cellars and unobserved shelters does not give an effective result. Prolonged aimed fire is needed to destroy and fire of great strength is needed to thoroughly destroy fortified centers.

  The commissioning of assault guns, tanks, etc. is very difficult due to the unobservability of many shelters, fortresses and a large number possible targets and does not give the expected results due to the thickness of the walls of structures. In particular, a heavy mortar is not suitable for such purposes. An excellent means of moral shock to those in hiding is the dropping of large-caliber bombs.

  2. An attack on a fortress in which a brave defender sits costs a lot of blood. it simple truth once again proved during the capture of Brest-Litovsk. Heavy artillery also belongs to the strong stunning means of moral influence.
  3. The Russians in Brest-Litovsk fought extremely stubbornly and persistently. They showed excellent infantry training and showed a remarkable will to fight.

  The memory of the defenders of the fortress

  On May 8, 1965, the Brest Fortress was awarded the title of Hero Fortress with the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal. Since 1971, the fortress has been a memorial complex. On its territory, a number of monuments were built in memory of the heroes, and there is a museum of the defense of the Brest Fortress.

  In art

  Art films

  • " Immortal garrison" ();
  • "Battle for Moscow", the first film "Aggression" ( one of the storylines) (USSR, 1985);
  • “State Border”, fifth film “Year forty-first” (USSR, 1986);
  • "I am a Russian soldier" - based on the book by Boris Vasiliev “I didn’t appear on the lists”(Russia, 1995);
  • "Brest Fortress" (Belarus-Russia, 2010).

  Documentaries

  • "Heroes Brest" - documentary about the heroic defense of the Brest Fortress at the very beginning of the Great Patriotic War(Studio TSSDF, 1957);
  • "Dear fathers-heroes" - amateur documentary film about the 1st All-Union rally of the winners of the youth campaign to the places of military glory in the Brest Fortress(1965);
  • "Brest Fortress" - documentary trilogy about the defense of the fortress in 1941(VoenTV, 2006);
  • "Brest Fortress" (Russia, 2007).
  • "Brest. Fortress heroes. (NTV, 2010).
  • “Berascey crepe: Dzve abarons” (Belsat, 2009)

  Fiction

  • Vasiliev B. L. Didn't appear in the lists. - M.: Children's literature, 1986. - 224 p.
  • Oshaev H. D. Brest is a fiery nut. - M.: Book, 1990. - 141 p.
  • Smirnov S. S. Brest Fortress. - M. : Young Guard, 1965. - 496 p.

  Songs

  • "There is no death for the heroes of Brest"- song by Eduard Khil.
  • "Brest trumpeter"- music by Vladimir Rubin, lyrics by Boris Dubrovin.
  • "Dedicated to the Heroes of Brest" - words and music by Alexander Krivonosov.
  • According to Boris Vasiliev's book “He was not on the lists”, the last known defender of the fortress surrendered on April 12, 1942. S. Smirnov in the book "Brest Fortress" also, referring to the stories of eyewitnesses, calls April 1942.

  Notes

  1. Christian Ganzer. German and Soviet losses as an indicator of the duration and intensity of the battles for the Brest Fortress // Belarus and Germany: history and modernity. Issue 12. Minsk 2014, p. 44-52, p. 48-50.
  2. Christian Ganzer. German and Soviet losses as an indicator of the duration and intensity of the battles for the Brest Fortress // Belarus and Germany: history and current events. Issue 12. Minsk 2014, p. 44-52, p. 48-50, p. 45-47.
  3. Soviet citadel of brest litovsk is captured jun 1941 - YouTube
  4. Sandalov L. M.
  5. Sandalov L. M. Combat actions of the troops of the 4th Army in the initial period of the Great Patriotic War
  6. Eve and beginning of the war
  7. Mortar CARL
  8. Brest Fortress/// Transmission of the radio station "Echo of Moscow"
  9. Last centers of resistance
  10. "I'm dying, but I'm not giving up." When the last defender of the Brest fortress perished
  11. Albert Axell. Russia's Heroes, 1941-45, Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2002, ISBN 0-7867-1011-X , Google Print, p. 39-40
  12. Combat report of the commander of the 45th division, lieutenant general Shliper, about the occupation of the fortress Brest-Litovsk, July 8, 1941.
  13. Jason Pipes. 45. Infanterie-Division, Feldgrau.com - research on the German armed forces 1918-1945
  14. The defense of the Brest Fortress became the first feat of Soviet soldiers in the Great Patriotic War.

  Literature

  Historical research

  • Aliev R.V. Storming of the Brest Fortress. - M. : Eksmo, 2010. - 800 p. - ISBN 978-5-699-41287-7. Review on book Aliyev (in Belarusian language)
  • Aliev R., Ryzhov I. Brest. June. Fortress, 2012 - video presentation of the book
  • Christian Ganzer (head of the group of authors-compilers), Irina Yelenskaya, Elena Pashkovich and others. Brest. Summer 1941. Documents, materials, photographs. Smolensk: Inbelkult, 2016. ISBN 978-5-00076-030-7
  • Krystyyan Gantser, Alena Pashkovich. "Heraism, tragedy, courage." Museum of abarons Berastseyskaya krepastsi.// ARCHE pachatak № 2/2013 (Cherven 2013), p. 43-59.
  • Christian Ganzer. The translator is at fault. The impact of translation on perception historical events(on the example of Major General Fritz Schlieper's report on the military operations to capture Brest-Litovsk) // Belarus and Germany: history and current events. Issue 13. Minsk 2015, p. 39-45.
  • Christian Ganzer. German and Soviet losses as an indicator of the duration and intensity of the battles for the Brest Fortress. // Belarus and Germany: history and modernity. Issue 12. Minsk 2014, p. 44-52.

  The defense of the Brest Fortress (defense of Brest) is one of the very first battles between the Soviet and by the German army during the period Great Patriotic War.

  Brest was one of the border garrisons on the territory of the USSR, it even covered the central highway leading to Minsk, which is why Brest turned out to be one of the first cities to be attacked after the German attack. The Soviet army held back the onslaught of the enemy for a week, despite the numerical superiority of the Germans, as well as support from artillery and aviation. As a result of a long siege, the Germans were still able to capture the main fortifications of the Brest Fortress and destroy them, but in other areas the struggle continued for quite a long time - small groups that remained after the raid resisted the enemy with their last strength. The defense of the Brest Fortress became a very important battle in which the Soviet troops were able to show their readiness to defend themselves to the last drop of blood, despite the advantages of the enemy. The defense of Brest went down in history as one of the bloodiest sieges, and at the same time, as one of the greatest battles that showed all the courage of the Soviet army.

  Brest Fortress on the eve of the war

  The city of Brest became part of the Soviet Union shortly before the start of the war - in 1939. By that time, the fortress had already lost its military significance due to the destruction that had begun, and remained as one of the reminders of past battles. The Brest Fortress was built in the 19th century and was part of the defensive fortifications Russian Empire on its western borders, but in the 20th century it ceased to have military significance. By the time the war began, the Brest Fortress was mainly used to accommodate military garrisons, as well as a number of families of the military command, a hospital and utility rooms. By the time of the perfidious German attack on the USSR, about 8,000 military personnel and about 300 command families lived in the fortress. There were weapons and supplies in the fortress, but their number was not designed for military operations.

  Assault on the Brest Fortress

  The assault on the Brest Fortress began on the morning of June 22, 1941, simultaneously with the start of the Great Patriotic War. The barracks and residential buildings of the command were the first to be subjected to powerful artillery fire and air strikes, since the Germans wanted, first of all, to completely destroy the entire command staff in the fortress and thereby confuse the army, disorient it. Despite the fact that almost all the officers died, the surviving soldiers were able to quickly orient themselves and create a powerful defense. The surprise factor did not work as expected Hitler and the assault, which, according to the plans, was supposed to end by 12 noon, dragged on for several days.

  Even before the start of the war, the Soviet command issued a decree according to which, in the event of an attack, the military must immediately leave the fortress itself and take up positions along its perimeter, but only a few managed to do this - most of the soldiers remained in the fortress. The defenders of the fortress were in a deliberately losing position, but even this fact did not allow them to give up their positions and allow the Germans to quickly and unconditionally take over Brest.

  The garrison of the fortress under the command of Captain I.N. Zubachev and regimental commissar E.M. Fomin (3.5 thousand people) for a week heroically held back the onslaught of the 45th German Infantry Division, which was supported by artillery and aviation. Pockets of resistance remained in the fortress for another three weeks (Major P. M. Gavrilov was captured on July 23). According to some reports, some defenders of the fortress held out in August. The defense of the fortress was the first, but eloquent lesson that showed the Germans what awaits them in the future.

  THE LEGEND BECOME A REALITY
  In February 1942, on one of the sectors of the front in the Orel region, our troops defeated the enemy's 45th infantry division. At the same time, the archive of the division headquarters was captured. While sorting through the documents captured in the German archives, our officers drew attention to one very curious paper. This document was called "Combat report on the occupation of Brest-Litovsk", and in it, day after day, the Nazis talked about the course of the battles for the Brest Fortress.

  Against the will of the German staff officers, who, naturally, tried in every possible way to exalt the actions of their troops, all the facts cited in this document spoke of exceptional courage, amazing heroism, and the extraordinary stamina and stubbornness of the defenders of the Brest Fortress. As a forced involuntary recognition of the enemy, the last final words this report.

  “A stunning attack on a fortress in which a brave defender sits costs a lot of blood,” wrote enemy staff officers. - This simple truth was once again proved during the capture of the Brest Fortress. The Russians in Brest-Litovsk fought extremely persistently and stubbornly, they showed excellent infantry training and proved a remarkable will to resist.

  Such was the recognition of the enemy.

  This “Combat report on the occupation of Brest-Litovsk” was translated into Russian, and excerpts from it were published in 1942 in the Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper. So, actually from the mouth of our enemy, Soviet people For the first time, we learned some details of the remarkable feat of the heroes of the Brest Fortress. The legend has become a reality.

  Two more years have passed. In the summer of 1944, during the powerful offensive of our troops in Belarus, Brest was liberated. July 28, 1944 soviet soldiers for the first time after three years of fascist occupation, they entered the Brest Fortress.

  Almost the entire fortress lay in ruins. By the mere sight of these terrible ruins, one could judge the strength and cruelty of the battles that took place here. These piles of ruins were full of severe grandeur, as if the unbroken spirit of the fallen fighters of 1941 still lived in them. The gloomy stones, in some places already overgrown with grass and bushes, beaten and chipped by bullets and shrapnel, seemed to have absorbed the fire and blood of the past battle, and the people wandering among the ruins of the fortress involuntarily came to mind how much these stones had seen and how much they would be able to tell if a miracle happened and they could speak.

  And a miracle happened! The stones suddenly spoke! On the surviving walls of fortifications, in the openings of windows and doors, on the vaults of cellars, on the abutments of the bridge, inscriptions left by the defenders of the fortress began to be found. In these inscriptions, sometimes nameless, sometimes signed, sometimes scribbled in pencil, sometimes simply scrawled on the plaster with a bayonet or a bullet, the fighters declared their determination to fight to the death, sent farewell greetings to the Motherland and comrades, spoke of devotion to the people and the party. It was as if the living voices of the unknown heroes of 1941 sounded in the ruins of the fortress, and the soldiers of 1944, with excitement and heartache, listened to these voices, in which there was a proud consciousness of a duty fulfilled, and the bitterness of parting with life, and calm courage in the face of death, and a covenant about revenge.

  “There were five of us: Sedov, Grutov I., Bogolyubov, Mikhailov, Selivanov V. We took the first battle on June 22, 1941. We'll die, but we won't leave!" - was written on the bricks of the outer wall near the Terespol Gate.

  In the western part of the barracks, in one of the rooms, the following inscription was found: “There were three of us, it was difficult for us, but we did not lose heart and we will die like heroes. July. 1941".

  In the center of the fortress courtyard stands a dilapidated church-type building. There really was once a church here, and later, before the war, it was converted into a club of one of the regiments stationed in the fortress. In this club, on the site where the projectionist's booth was located, an inscription was scratched on the plaster: “We were three Muscovites - Ivanov, Stepanchikov, Zhuntyaev, who defended this church, and we swore an oath: we will die, but we will not leave here. July. 1941".

  This inscription, along with the plaster, was removed from the wall and transferred to the Central Museum of the Soviet Army in Moscow, where it is now kept. Below, on the same wall, there was another inscription, which, unfortunately, has not been preserved, and we know it only from the stories of soldiers who served in the fortress in the first years after the war and read it many times. This inscription was, as it were, a continuation of the first one: “I was left alone, Stepanchikov and Zhuntyaev died. Germans in the church itself. The last grenade remained, but I will not give myself up alive. Comrades, avenge us!" These words were apparently scratched out by the last of the three Muscovites - Ivanov.

  Not only stones spoke. As it turned out, the wives and children of the commanders who died in the battles for the fortress in 1941 lived in Brest and its environs. During the days of the fighting, these women and children, caught in the war in the fortress, were in the cellars of the barracks, sharing all the hardships of defense with their husbands and fathers. Now they shared memories, told a lot interesting details memorial defense.

  And then a surprising and strange contradiction emerged. The German document I was talking about stated that the fortress resisted for nine days and fell by July 1, 1941. Meanwhile, many women recalled that they were captured only on July 10, or even on July 15, and when the Nazis took them outside the fortress, fighting was still going on in certain areas of the defense, there was an intense firefight. The inhabitants of Brest said that until the end of July or even until the first days of August, shooting was heard from the fortress, and the Nazis brought their wounded officers and soldiers from there to the city where their army hospital was located.

  Thus, it became clear that the German report about the occupation of Brest-Litovsk contained a deliberate lie and that the headquarters of the 45th enemy division hastened in advance to inform its high command about the fall of the fortress. In fact, the fighting continued for a long time ... In 1950 Researcher Moscow museum, exploring the premises of the western barracks, found another inscription scratched on the wall. This inscription was: “I am dying, but I do not give up. Farewell, Motherland! There was no signature under these words, but at the bottom there was a completely clearly distinguishable date - "July 20, 1941." So it was possible to find direct evidence that the fortress continued to resist even on the 29th day of the war, although eyewitnesses stood their ground and assured that the battles had been going on for more than a month. After the war, a partial dismantling of the ruins was carried out in the fortress, and at the same time, the remains of heroes were often found under the stones, their personal documents and weapons were found.

  Smirnov S.S. Brest Fortress. M., 1964

  BREST FORTRESS
  Built almost a century before the start of the Great Patriotic War (the construction of the main fortifications was completed by 1842), the fortress has long lost its strategic importance in the eyes of the military, since it was not considered capable of withstanding the onslaught of modern artillery. As a result, the objects of the complex served, first of all, to accommodate personnel, which in case of war had to keep the defense outside the fortress. At the same time, a plan to create a fortified area, taking into account latest achievements in the field of fortification, as of June 22, 1941 was not fully implemented.

  At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the garrison of the fortress consisted mainly of units of the 6th and 42nd rifle divisions of the 28th rifle corps of the Red Army. But it has been significantly reduced due to the participation of many military personnel in planned training events.

  The German operation to capture the fortress was launched by a powerful artillery preparation, which destroyed a significant part of the buildings, destroyed a large number of garrison soldiers and at first noticeably demoralized the survivors. The enemy quickly gained a foothold on the South and West Islands, and assault troops appeared on the Central Island, but failed to occupy the barracks in the Citadel. In the Terespol Gate area, the Germans met a desperate counterattack Soviet soldiers under the general command of the regimental commissar E.M. Fomin. The vanguard units of the 45th division of the Wehrmacht suffered serious losses.

  The time gained allowed the Soviet side to organize an orderly defense of the barracks. The Nazis were forced to remain in their positions in the building of the army club, from which they could not get out for some time. Fire also stopped attempts to break through enemy reinforcements across the bridge over the Mukhavets in the area of ​​the Kholmsky Gates on the Central Island.

  In addition to the central part of the fortress, resistance gradually grew in other parts of the complex of buildings (in particular, under the command of Major P.M. Gavrilov on the northern Kobrin fortification), and dense buildings favored the soldiers of the garrison. Because of it, the enemy could not conduct aimed artillery fire from close range without being in danger of being destroyed. With only small arms and a few artillery pieces and armored vehicles, the defenders of the fortress stopped the advance of the enemy, and later, when the Germans carried out a tactical retreat, they took up the positions left by the enemy.

  At the same time, despite the failure of a quick assault, on June 22, the Wehrmacht forces managed to take the entire fortress into a blockade ring. Prior to its establishment, according to some estimates, up to half of the payroll of the units stationed in the complex managed to leave the fortress and occupy the lines prescribed by defensive plans. Taking into account the losses for the first day of defense, as a result, the fortress was defended by about 3.5 thousand people, blocked in its different parts. As a result, each of the major pockets of resistance could only count on material resources in close proximity to you. The command of the joint forces of the defenders was entrusted to Captain I.N. Zubachev, whose deputy was the regimental commissar Fomin.

  In the following days of the defense of the fortress, the enemy stubbornly sought to occupy the Central Island, but met with an organized rebuff from the Citadel garrison. Only on June 24 did the Germans manage to finally occupy the Terespol and Volyn fortifications on the Western and Southern Islands. Artillery bombardments of the Citadel alternated with air raids, during one of which a German fighter was shot down by rifle fire. The defenders of the fortress also knocked out at least four enemy tanks. Several deaths are known German tanks on impromptu minefields established by the Red Army.

  The enemy used against the garrison incendiary ammunition and tear gas (the besiegers had a regiment of heavy chemical mortars at their disposal).

  less dangerous for Soviet soldiers and the civilians who were with them (primarily the wives and children of officers), there was a catastrophic lack of food and drink. If the consumption of ammunition could be compensated for by the surviving arsenals of the fortress and captured weapons, then the needs for water, food, medicine and dressings were met at a minimum level. The water supply of the fortress was destroyed, and the manual intake of water from Mukhavets and Bug was practically paralyzed by enemy fire. The situation was further complicated by the incessant intense heat.

  On the initial stage defense, the idea to break through the fortress and connect with the main forces was abandoned, since the command of the defenders was counting on an early counterattack Soviet troops. When these calculations did not materialize, attempts began to break through the blockade, but they all ended in failure due to the overwhelming superiority of the Wehrmacht in manpower and weapons.

  By the beginning of July, after a particularly large-scale bombardment and artillery shelling, the enemy managed to capture the fortifications on the Central Island, thereby destroying the main center of resistance. From that moment on, the defense of the fortress lost its integral and coordinated character, and the fight against the Nazis was continued by already scattered groups in different parts of the complex. The actions of these groups and single fighters acquired everything more damn sabotage activity and continued in a number of cases until the end of July and even until the beginning of August 1941. Already after the war, in the casemates of the Brest Fortress, the inscription “I am dying, but I do not surrender” was found scratched by one of the Soviet defenders. Farewell Motherland. July 20, 1941"

  Most of the surviving defenders of the garrison were captured by the Germans, where even before the end of organized defense, women and children were sent. Commissar Fomin was shot by the Germans, Captain Zubachev died in captivity, Major Gavrilov survived captivity and was transferred to the reserve during the post-war reduction of the army. The defense of the Brest Fortress (after the war it received the title of "fortress-hero") became a symbol of the courage and self-sacrifice of Soviet soldiers in the first, most tragic period of the war.

  Astashin N.A. Brest Fortress // Great Patriotic War. Encyclopedia. /Answer. ed. Ak. A.O. Chubaryan. M., 2010.

  In February 1942, Soviet troops during the Yelets offensive operation defeated the four-infantry division of the Wehrmacht. At the same time, the archive of the division headquarters was captured, in the documents of which very important papers were found - “Combat report on the occupation of Brest-Litovsk”. “The Russians in Brest-Litovsk fought extremely stubbornly and persistently. They showed excellent infantry training and proved a remarkable will to fight, ”said the report of the commander of the 45th division, Lieutenant General Shliper. It was then that the Soviet troops learned the truth about the battles for the Brest Fortress.

  Defeat in no time

  In the early morning of June 22, 1941, after aviation and artillery preparation, German troops crossed the border of the USSR. On the same day, Italy and Romania declared war on the USSR, and a little later, Slovakia, Hungary and other allies of Germany. Most of of the Soviet troops was taken by surprise, and therefore on the first day a significant part of the ammunition and military equipment. The Germans also gained complete air supremacy, putting out of action more than 1.2 thousand aircraft of the Soviet army. Thus began the Great Patriotic War.

  According to the plan of attack on the USSR "Barbarossa", the German command counted in as soon as possible crush Soviet army, not allowing her to come to her senses and organize a coordinated resistance.

  Photo report:"I'm dying, but I don't give up!"

  Is_photorep_included9701423: 1

  One of the first to fight for the Motherland was the defenders of the Brest Fortress. On the eve of the war, about half of the number of personnel was withdrawn from the fortress to the camps for exercises. Thus, in the morning of June 22, there were about 9 thousand soldiers and commanders in the Brest Fortress, not counting the staff and patients of the hospital. The assault on the fortress and the city of Brest was entrusted to the 45th Infantry Division of Major General Fritz Schlieper in cooperation with units of neighboring combat formations. In total, about 20 thousand people participated in the assault. In addition, the Germans had an advantage in artillery. In addition to the divisional artillery regiment, whose guns could not penetrate the one and a half meter walls of the fortifications, two 600-mm Karl self-propelled mortars, nine mortars of 211 mm caliber and a regiment of 158.5 mm caliber multi-barreled mortars took part in the attack. At the beginning of the war, Soviet troops simply did not have such weapons. According to the plan of the German command, the Brest Fortress was supposed to surrender in a maximum of eight hours, and no more.

  “Soldiers and officers arrived one by one in half-dressed clothes”

  The attack began on June 22, 1941 at 4:15 am Soviet Decree Time with artillery and rocket launchers. Every four minutes the artillery fire was shifted 100 meters to the east. Hurricane fire caught the garrison of the fortress by surprise. As a result of the shelling, warehouses were destroyed, communications were interrupted and significant damage was inflicted on the garrison. A little later, the assault on the fortifications began.

  At first, due to the unexpected attack, the fortress garrison was unable to put up a coordinated resistance.

  “Due to the continuous artillery shelling, suddenly launched by the enemy at 4.00 on 22.6.41, parts of the division could not be compactly withdrawn to the areas of concentration on alert. Soldiers and officers arrived singly, half-dressed. From those concentrated, it was possible to create a maximum of two battalions. The first battles were carried out under the leadership of the commanders of the regiments of comrades Dorodny (84 joint ventures).), Matveeva (333 joint ventures), Kovtunenko (125 joint ventures)."

  (Report of the deputy commander for the political part of the same 6th rifle division, regimental commissar M.N. Butin.)

  By 0400, the assault detachment, having lost two-thirds of its personnel, captured two bridges connecting the Western and South Islands with the Citadel. However, trying to take the fortress as quickly as possible, the German troops were drawn into close combat using small arms which resulted in heavy losses on both sides.

  The battles were of an opposite nature. During one of the successful counterattacks at the Terespol Gate, the German assault group. By 7:00 a.m., a group of Soviet troops managed to break out of the fortress, but many servicemen failed to break through. It was they who continued the further defense.

  The fortress was finally surrounded by nine o'clock in the morning. In battles during the first day of the assault, the 45th infantry division, having carried out at least eight large-scale attacks, suffered unprecedented losses - only 21 officers and 290 soldiers and non-commissioned officers were killed.

  Having withdrawn the troops to the outer ramparts of the fortress, the whole next day German artillery bombarded the positions of the defenders. During breaks, German cars with loudspeakers called for the garrison to surrender. About 1.9 thousand people surrendered. Nevertheless, the remaining defenders of the fortress managed, by knocking out the Germans from the section of the ring barracks adjacent to the Brest Gate, to unite the two most powerful centers of resistance remaining in the Citadel. And the besieged managed to knock out three tanks. These were trophy French tanks Somua S-35, armed with a 47 mm cannon and having good armor for the start of the war.

  Under the cover of night, the besieged tried to break out of the encirclement, but this attempt failed. Almost all members of the detachments were captured or destroyed. On June 24, the headquarters of the 45th division reported that the Citadel had been taken and that separate pockets of resistance were being cleared. At 21.40, the headquarters of the corps was informed about the capture of the Brest Fortress. On this day, German troops really captured most of it. However, there were still several areas of resistance, including the so-called "Eastern Fort", which was defended by 600 fighters under the command of Major Pyotr Mikhailovich Gavrilov. He was the only senior officer among the defenders. Most of the command was put out of action in the first minutes of shelling.

  "The prisoner could not even make a swallowing movement"

  Despite the fact that by July 1 the main core of the Citadel's defenders had been defeated and scattered, resistance continued. The fighting took on an almost partisan character. The Germans blocked areas of resistance and tried to destroy the defenders of the fortress. Soviet fighters, in turn, using surprise and knowledge of the fortifications, carried out sorties and destroyed the invaders. Attempts to break out of the encirclement to the partisans also continued, but the defenders had almost no strength left to break through.

  The resistance of such single disparate groups continued for almost the entire July. Major Gavrilov is considered the last defender of the Brest Fortress, who, already seriously wounded, was captured only on July 23, 1941. According to the doctor who examined him, the major was in an extreme state of exhaustion:

  “... the captured major was in full command uniform, but all his clothes turned into tatters, his face was covered with powder soot and dust and overgrown with a beard. He was injured, unconscious and looked emaciated to the extreme. It was in the full sense of the word a skeleton covered in leather.

  To what extent exhaustion had reached, it could be judged by the fact that the prisoner could not even make a swallowing movement: he did not have enough strength for this, and the doctors had to apply artificial nutrition to save his life.

  But German soldiers, who took him prisoner and brought him to the camp, told the doctors that this man, in whose body life was barely glimmering, only an hour ago, when they caught him in one of the casemates of the fortress, single-handedly accepted a battle with them, threw grenades, fired a pistol and killed and wounded several Nazis.

  (Smirnov S.S. Brest Fortress)

  As of June 30, 1941, the losses of the 45th German Infantry Division amounted to 482 killed, including 48 officers, and more than 1,000 wounded. Considering that the same division in 1939 during the attack on Poland lost 158 ​​killed and 360 wounded, the losses were very significant. According to the commander of the 45th division, German troops 25 officers, 2877 junior commanders and fighters were taken prisoner. 1877 Soviet soldiers died in the fortress. By the end of the war, about 400 people remained living defenders of the Brest Fortress.

  Major Gavrilov was released from German captivity in May 1945. However, until the mid-1950s, he was excluded from Communist Party for the loss of a membership card while in concentration camps. Orders and medals were awarded to about 200 defenders of the Brest Fortress, but only two received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union - Major Gavrilov and Lieutenant Kizhevatov (posthumously).

  Unexpectedly attacked Soviet Union, the fascist command expected to reach Moscow in a few months. However, the German generals met resistance as soon as they crossed the border of the USSR. The Germans took several hours to capture the first outpost, but the defenders of the Brest Fortress held back the power of the huge fascist army for six days.

  The siege of 1941 became

  for the historical Brest Fortress, however, it was subjected to attacks even before that. The fortress was built by the architect Opperman in 1833 as a military structure. The war reached it only by 1915 - then it was blown up during the retreat of the Nikolaev troops. In 1918, after the signing, which took place in the Citadel of the fortress, it remained under German control for some time, and by the end of 1918 it was in the hands of the Poles, who owned it until 1939.

  The real hostilities overtook the Brest Fortress in 1939. The second day of the Second World War began for the garrison of the fortress with the bombing. German aircraft dropped ten bombs on the citadel, damaging the main building of the fortress - the Citadel, or the White Palace. Then in the fortress there were several random military and reserve units. The first defense of the Brest Fortress was organized by General Plisovsky, who from the scattered troops he had managed to assemble a combat-ready detachment of 2,500 people and evacuate officer families in time. Against the armored corps of General Heinz, Plisovsky could only oppose an old armored train, several of the same tanks and a couple of batteries. Then the defense of the Brest Fortress lasted three full days

  

  From September 14 to 17, while the enemy was almost six times stronger than the defenders. On the night of September 17, the wounded Plisovsky led the remnants of his detachment south, towards Terespol. After that, on September 22, the Germans handed over Brest and the Brest Fortress to the Soviet Union.

  The defense of the Brest Fortress of 1941 fell on the shoulders of nine Soviet battalions, two artillery battalions and several individual divisions. In total, this amounted to about eleven thousand people, excluding three hundred officer families. The fortress was stormed by the infantry division of Major General Shliper, which was reinforced additional parts. In general, about twenty thousand soldiers were subordinate to General Schliper.

  The attack began early in the morning. Due to the suddenness of the attack, the commanders did not have time to coordinate the actions of the fortress garrison, so the defenders were immediately divided into several detachments. The Germans immediately succeeded in capturing the Citadel, but they were not able to gain a foothold in it - the invaders were attacked by the Soviet units left behind, and the Citadel was partially liberated. On the second day of defense, the Germans offered

  

  surrender, to which 1900 people agreed. The remaining defenders united under the command of Captain Zubachev. The enemy forces, however, were immeasurably higher, and the defense of the Brest Fortress was short-lived. On June 24, the Nazis managed to capture 1250 fighters, another 450 people were captured on June 26. The last stronghold of the defenders, the Eastern Fort, was crushed on June 29 when the Germans dropped a 1800-kilogram bomb on it. This day is considered the end of the defense, but the Germans cleared the Brest Fortress until June 30, and the last defenders were destroyed only by the end of August. Only a few managed to escape to Belovezhskaya Pushcha to the partisans.

  The fortress was liberated in 1944, and in 1971 it was mothballed and turned into a museum. At the same time, a memorial was erected, thanks to which the defense of the Brest Fortress and the courage of its defenders will be remembered forever.