62nd Army - operationally created formation of the Red Army, which took part in the Great Patriotic War. It existed for a very short time - from July 1942 to April 1943, but in this short period it managed to go down in national history, distinguished by the heroic defense of Stalingrad.
Building an army
62nd Army was formed in Tula. This happened on July 10, 1942. This military unit was created on the basis of the Seventh Reserve Army. It is important that the 62nd Army was directly subordinate to the Headquarters of the Supreme Commander.
Structure
Initially, it consisted of six rifle divisions, one of which was guards, as well as a tank brigade, artillery and other military formations.
The location of the 62nd Army is Volgograd (at that time it was called Stalingrad). Already on July 12, she was included in the newly created Stalingrad Front.
The composition of the 62nd army was very peculiar. It stood out thanks to powerful tank battalions, which were armed with 42 tanks each (half of them were medium,the rest are easy). Such battalions were part of every formation, with the exception of the 196th Infantry Division.
It is worth emphasizing that no other army at that time had such separate tank battalions in such proportions. In addition, each rifle division was reinforced with an anti-tank and fighter regiment, armed with 20 guns each.
In total, the 62nd Army had 81,000 men. The number of individual formations ranged from 11.5 to 13 thousand soldiers and officers.
Dislocation
On the eve of the Battle of Stalingrad, a military unit took up defense at the turn in the area of several settlements: Evstratovsky, Malokletsky, Slepikhin, Kalmykov, Surovikino. The total length was over a hundred kilometers, while the 184th Rifle Division was withdrawn to the second echelon.
The commander of the 62nd Army decided to concentrate efforts on the left flank, covering the direction along which it would be possible to reach Stalingrad along the shortest route. It was possible to achieve the concentration of the main forces on the left flank by moving the 192nd Infantry Division.
Battle of Stalingrad
This is one of the main battles of the Great Patriotic War. Many historians believe that it was a turning point that changed the entire course of the future confrontation.
For the 62nd Army, the battle began at the end of July 1942, when it collided on the Chir River with the 6th Wehrmacht Army. On July 23, the main forces repelled an enemy attack at the Surovikino-Kletskaya defensive line. As a result, we had to retreat to the left bank of the Don.
Already by the middle of the next month, the army entrenched itself on the outer defensive contour of Stalingrad, continuing to wage stubborn battles. On August 30, it became subordinate to the South-Eastern Front after breaking through the outer bypass and the exit of Nazi troops to the north of the city.
From mid-September, troops fought fierce defensive battles on the territory of Stalingrad itself for about two months. By the end of this operation, Lyudnikov Island, an area north of the tractor factory, several workshops of the Krasny Oktyabr plant, and a number of neighborhoods in the central part of the city were under the control of the 62nd Army.
On October 19, units of the Don Front came to the rescue. General Rokossovsky had important tasks at that time. He was ordered to break through the enemy defenses in order to connect with the units of the Stalingrad Front.
In his memoirs, Marshal Zhukov writes that in October it was decided to send six more divisions across the Volga, because there was practically nothing left of the original composition of the army, except for the headquarters and rear.
At the same time, the remnants of the army continued to fight even after the start of the offensive operation. The 62nd Army managed to effectively tie down the enemy forces, preparing to go on the offensive.
January 1, 1943, the army finally became part of the Don Front. Then she participated in the operation to eliminate the grouping of Nazi troops, which were surroundednear Stalingrad.
When the battle officially ended, the army was transferred to the Headquarters reserve. In the spring, she participated in the construction of a defensive line on the Oskol River. On April 16, it was transformed into the 8th Guards Army, which existed until 1992.
Commanders
During the short history of the 62nd Army, it was commanded by four generals. The first was Vladimir Kolpakchi. He led the unit for less than a month on the distant approaches to Stalingrad. Later he led the 30th Army of the Western Front, which took part in Operation Mars.
Another month the army was headed by Lieutenant-General Anton Lopatin. He failed to hold back the distant defensive lines on the outskirts of Stalingrad. When the German troops made a breakthrough, he was removed from his post.
He was replaced by Major General Nikolai Krylov. For this, he was urgently summoned to Stalingrad. At that time, the 62nd Army was fighting street battles on the territory of the city itself. Krylov was in command for only a week. After that, leadership formally passed to Lieutenant General Vasily Chuikov, who remained in command until the end of the Battle of Stalingrad.
Chuikov began to use melee tactics. Often the German and Soviet trenches were located at the distance of a grenade throw. This forced the Nazi troops to abandon the use of artillery and aviation, as they were afraid to hit their own.
In manpower, the superiority was on the side of Paulus, but the Soviet troops acted on counterattacks, mainly at night. This made it possible to take positionslost in the afternoon.
Chuikov is associated with the emergence of assault groups that used underground utilities to move.
Memory
In honor of the 62nd Army, a monument was erected, a plate on a mass grave on Mamayev Kurgan. After the Great Patriotic War, the central embankment of Stalingrad was named in her honor. She bears the same name today.
The embankment of the 62nd army in Volgograd consists of a couple of terraces. The upper one is adjacent to residential buildings, public buildings and parks, while the lower one is designed for direct contact with water.
In 1952 it was rebuilt. It was believed that its restoration is an important part of the reconstruction of the entire Stalingrad. Today, the embankment of the 62nd Army is one of the main attractions of the city.
