28
5 The Headquarters of the XIth SS Panzer Corps (see ‘The Siege of Klessin’) had been located here.
29
1 This would have been already in existence as part of the ‘Stein-Stellung’, the second defensive belt, unmanned and relying on survivors from the first defensive belt to man it in due course.
30
2 Hitler’s birthday.
31
1 This was the beginning of Marshal Zhukov’s two-day ‘Reconnaissance in Force’ in preparation for the launching of ‘Operation Berlin’ on the 16th. An essential factor was to gain enough ground to establish routes through the minefields for the main attack.
32
2 The 245th SPG Brigade and some tanks of the 8th Panzer Battalion were operating in this area.
33
3 A kind of parachute flare that scattered smaller elements to produce an illuminated Christmas tree effect.
34
4 Elements of the 3rd Guards Tank Army of the rival 1st Ukrainian Front.
35
5 Soviet Po-2 biplanes.
36
6 The surrender signed by Colonel General Jodl at Rheims.
37
7 The way that the remains of the 20th Panzergrenadier Division were kept intact and isolated by the British before allowing the division to disband itself, lends colour to the Soviet allegation that the British were contemplating using German troops against the Red Army should the need arise.
38
1 The second highest decoration after the Order of Lenin.
39
2 Exactly fifty years later on this battlefield, sixty-nine year-old Harry would meet his former enemies, the ‘Halbe Gruppe,’ and among them the eighty-four year-old Panzer leader Hans von Luck, commander of the 125th Panzer Regiment of the 21st Panzer Division.
40
1 This would have been the Sten Gun, a cheaply manufactured weapon produced in vast quantities.
41
2 The MG 42 was commonly known as the ‘Spandau’ from its original place of manufacture.
42
3 The major tank battle of the Second World War fought at Kursk-Orel in July and August 1943.
