Hans Wijers – författare

Assault guns (Sturmgeschütz in German) were armored fighting vehicles similar to tanks, with the chassis and tracks of a panzer but without the rotating turret, which allowed the mounting of a larger gun. They were usually used to support infantry assaults, but they also proved effective as tank destroyers, especially late in the war when German tank inventory diminished. Among the most famous variants are the Sturmtiger and Brummbär (“Grouch”). Hans Wijers has assembled hundreds of photos—most of them never seen anywhere before—of these vehicles at war on the Eastern Front of World War II.

In these firsthand accounts--never before published in English--German soldiers describe the horrors of combat on the Eastern Front during World War II. A panzer crewman holds out to the bitter end at Stalingrad, fighting the Soviets as well as cold and hunger. An assault gun commander seeks out and destroys enemy tanks in Poland. Along the Oder River, a ragtag antiaircraft battery turns its guns against Russian infantry. And in Berlin a paratrooper makes a last, desperate stand in the war’s closing days.

During the first week of the Battle of the Bulge, the Germans’ 6th SS Panzer Army rolled down the road to Bütgenbach, where the 26th Infantry Regiment of the U.S. 1st Infantry Division held out against constant attacks at the southern end of Elsenborn Ridge. Meanwhile, Jochen Peiper’s SS battle group raced toward the critical river bridges at Stavelot and Trois Ponts, massacring American prisoners along the way near Malmedy. The U.S. 30th Infantry Division and other units put up stiff resistance, destroyed the bridges, and forced Peiper’s men to withdraw.