Over Fields of Fire

but I’ve never seen anything like that. Not only were you flying a wreck not a plane, but what’s more you’ve landed it brilliantly! Honour and praises to you!” And straightaway Koudelin addressed this subordinates. “Shall we try it, guys? Shall we fix it up?”

This appeal by the Chief Engineer played a positive role. The impossible was done — in a week the pilot Bougrov took off in that plane to strike at the enemy. Everyone knew that every repaired plane, its every sortie, meant death for dozens of Fascists!

But in the tension of combat work my regimental comrades nevertheless knew how to find time for relaxation and rest. The aerial gunner Zhenya Berdnikov was an indefatigable and constant organizer of regimental amateur performances. A merry fellow and a live wire, he could tell all sort of cock-and-bull stories and jokes for hours. And when, goggling his eyes and turning his toes out sideways, Zhenya began to dance imitating Chaplin and singing songs from his movies, it was simply impossible to keep from laughing!

Once, Berdnikov suggested putting on stage in the Stanitsa Timashevskaya’s club a sketch of Leonid Lench’s135 called ‘The Dream Comes True’. Most of the roles were taken willingly by the amateur performers, but no one wanted to act as the demoniacal Fuhrer. Finally the Comsomol organizer Rimskiy had to accept it. The staging went off successfully, and then it was decided to show it to the locals. The concert in the club went well. The mechanic Vanya Koulikov danced the ‘Yablochko’136, then, together with the female armourers Nina Piyuk and Dousya Nazarkina, ‘The Russian Folkdance’. Masha Zhitnyak and Vasya Nazarov read aloud humorous stories, and Berdnikov and Panina sang the ‘Ogonyok’ song to the accompaniment of the flyer Pavel Evteev. Everybody liked how Vadim Morozov recited the poem ‘Wait for Me’137. Then the sketch ‘The Dream Comes True’ began, but at the moment of conversation between Napoleon and Hitler loud cursing resounded through the complete silence, and some object flew across onto the stage and accurately hit ‘Hitler’. The club audience burst out laughing but the actor didn’t feel like laughing: he’d got a good smack from a gumboot. Apart from that, his wig with its renowned forelock on his narrow forehead flew off his head.

After that incident the sketch was not performed anymore: no one wanted to play the despicable person! And when after the concert a very old man came up to Rimskiy and began to apologize: “My boy! Forgive me, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I’d strangle Hitler with my own hands! The Fascists shot my two brothers, burned my house down…” How could we not sympathize with this human grief…

29. A heroic place

On 16 September 1943 our troops liberated Novorossiysk, on 9 October the Choushka Spit was cleared of Fascists and troops were landed North of Kerch on the Enikale Peninsula. Troops also landed near Eltigen. On the maps there is no such a place as Eltigen now, but there is a place named Geroiskoye (‘Heroic’). And back then, when on the night of 1 November 1943 huge waves were violently smashing the rocky cliffs, the fearless landing party went ashore there. They were to sail thirty-odd kilometres across the tempestuous Kerch Straits in unseaworthy tubs. Thirty-odd kilometres under endless artillery barrage, under the beams of searchlights…

We airmen knew nothing about the Eltigen landing. The weather prevented flying and all our field aerodromes had become slushy. There were several attempts to take off but nobody had any success: the Ils’ undercarriage went into the mud up to the wheel hubs. We managed to join the combat only on November 7.

The group was led then by the regimental navigator Major Karev. During the briefing before take off he instructed us: not to brake during the run-up — otherwise the six-ton Sturmovik would bog down, bury itself in the mud, and might turn over. The undercarriage might not retract for it would be jammed with mud and, even if retracted, might not extend before landing — the mud would suck it back. In that case one would have to lower the undercarriage with the emergency winch, making 32 turns with the right hand, while controlling the plane with the left. Karev warned that we would all would have to take off with the oil cooler’s shield shut, and open it immediately after take-off, or the mud would block the cooler’s cells, the engine would cook and break down.

And off we went. A solid morass of mud lay under the wings. Not all of us managed to break out of its clutches. Seven machines out of nine took off for the combat sortie — two of them nosed over during the run-up…

Our course lay towards Eltigen. This fishing village was situated between the Chourbashskoye and the Tobechikskoye Lakes — where the spurs of the coastal hills come up against the sea. The port of Kamysh-Bouroun was situated next to Eltigen, a little bit to the north of it. The Fascist naval ships were based in the port. But this time we carried not bombs but containers of ammo, food, medicine. Stormy weather was preventing the timely supply of reinforcements to the bridgehead, and this was weakening the Eltigen landing contingent. Our task was to drop the load precisely on the bridgehead. So as not to miss we would have to take everything into account: wind speed and direction, and the speed of our own planes. And meanwhile the Fascists were shooting at us from the ground with all kinds of weapons — so we would have to return fire as well. But that time we dropped the containers of ammo, food and medicine to the landing troops at Eltigen right on target!

Now we would fly from the Taman Peninsula, cleared of the Hitlerites, to the Kerch Peninsula. One day I was ordered to lead a group of six Sturmoviks to the area of Baksy, north to the Mitridat Hill. But we hadn’t been assigned an actual target and had been set the task of flying along the frontline, finding a target of opportunity for ourselves and giving it a whole-group ‘workout’.

And now we were flying. I stubbornly repeated through the radio the same word for my wingmen: “Manoeuvre, manoeuvre, manoeuvre!” I wasn’t snoozing either — I threw the Sturmovik from side to side, slowed down and sped up from time to time. I knew if the ack-ack guns struck, I as the leader would get the largest share. And now they opened up. It flashed through my mind automatically: that means something is concealed down there. I looked closely — down there, in the gardens there were disguised tanks! I went into a dive: there was a tank in my gun-sight and I launched rockets. “Attack, with a manoeuvre!” I yelled to my wingmen via the radio.

Now I see a loaded truck in the gun-sight. I pressed the triggers and the fire of my automatic cannons poured onto the target. The earth quickly came closer: it seemed to be rushing towards me. Again my fingers touched the buttons triggering the launch of rockets, and at the very same moment the lethal missiles dashed towards the ground from under my plane’s wings. I pulled the control column and the Sturmovik obediently pulled out of the dive. Having dropped a batch of bombs, I switched the machine to climbing, and my aerial gunner Starshina Makosov began to strafe the Fascists rushing about below with his large-calibre machine-gun. Now that was an attack!

Having finished working over the target we turned back but at the very same moment the Messers pounced on us. One of their groups engaged our escort fighters, and another struck at the Ils. We formed a defensive circle stretched towards our lines. But there were only six of us against ten German fighters — the odds were clearly unequal. I saw two fighter-planes fall into the sea a bit aside from us: one with red stars, another with a black- and-white cross on its fuselage. Before my eyes an Il-2 hit the water and went to the bottom…

We had to hold out, hold out all costs! And we shot at those who were heedless, who slid forward and exposed their bellies to our cannons. One Fritz emitted smoke and pulled aside. One more was struck so badly that he went straight to the ground like a stone…

The Messers retired, but the German flak guns opened up at us again. A scorching splinter of flak passed in front of my face, having pierced the Plexiglas cheek of the cockpit. Glancing back I saw blood on the reinforced glass panel separating me from the gunner’s cockpit. Was Makosov wounded? And at the same time I felt the plane drifting to the right — the rudder control rods had been smashed. From bad to worse! My wingmen were on their way to the East, home, and my plane was no longer obeying me, it was turning west, towards the enemy. I felt shivers treacherously running down my spine… I was on my own.

I strained all my strength and skills to straighten out my Il. And on top of that the ‘skinnies’, sensing easy prey, smothered me from all sides and kept peppering my badly damaged machine with the bursts of fire! Nevertheless, I managed to turn the Sturmovik towards our lines. The engine missed time