by George Bruce
Churchill took action. The highly unrealistic Polish requests for the dropping of the Polish Parachute Brigade and the landing of the four Polish bomber squadrons in Poland were rightly rejected at once. But to Air Marshal Sir John Slessor, Air C-in-C for the Mediterranean and the Middle East, Churchill sent an emergency signal early on 3 August revealing the Uprising. He ordered that ammunition and weapon drops, if technically possible, be started at once from RAF bases in southern Italy, nearly a thousand miles away from Warsaw.
RAF 148 Squadron of 334 Wing was detailed for this impossible task, a formation which specialized in sorties over enemy-occupied territory. All the seven Polish crews in 1586 Flight attached to 148 Squadron and seven British crews experienced in night flights over Poland took off.
Bad weather stopped flying on the night of 3 August, but fourteen Halifaxes and Liberators set out on the night of 4 August on this long and hazardous journey over German-occupied territory. Having survived the concentrated attacks of German night-fighters en route their task was to fly at roof-top height through the thick blanket of smoke and the curtain of anti-aircraft fire over the flaming city and drop their containers in places signalled by the Poles.
On the evening of 4 August however the BBC played melodies signalling a supply drop outside Warsaw. Someone, it seemed, had a bad ear for music, but observer teams were on the alert throughout the capital and in the early hours an engine note unlike any German one was heard in the starry skies. Two Halifax bombers had succeeded in getting through and had dropped 24 containers of weapons and ammunition, of which 12 only fell into insurgent hands. It was, of course, chicken feed in relation to the dire needs of the Home Army’s 42,000 men, yet the gallant flight cheered the city’s lonely fighters with the thought that perhaps after all they were not alone. Five aircraft were lost.[189]
To Air Marshal Slessor the risk that three or four such flights would wipe out his specialist crews and long-range aircraft in return for small returns was too great. He was also convinced that the lives of his airmen should not be exposed in pursuit of impossible objectives. He imposed a ban on further flights to Warsaw.
The order caused something of an uproar among members of the Polish Government in London. And in Warsaw, having received no more drops, Komorowski signalled London on 6 August:
I have to state that in her present struggle Warsaw is getting no aid from the Allies, just as Poland got no aid in 1939. We demand that you should clearly state this fact to the British in an official declaration and leave it on record. We are not asking for material help; we claim that it should be immediately forthcoming. Failure to drop ammunition may soon put us in a difficult situation, especially if the enemy, applying the barbarous method of burning down houses, uses heavy arms in larger quantities in support.[190]
Strong pressure forced Slessor to countermand his order in favour of the Polish crews of 1586 Flight, who had volunteered to fly in the teeth of the high odds against survival. Three aircraft carrying arms and ammunition flew off on 8 August, reached Warsaw and dropped their containers. Some of these fell into the hands of the Home Army and some of them became German booty. On the night of 9 August another four Polish-crewed aircraft took off, but could not reach the city and dropped their loads in the near-by Kampinos Forest, which they knew to be the hideout of many hundred insurgents. There were no losses on these two flights, though the aircraft were badly damaged.
The nature of the struggle for Warsaw now began to change. Komorowski’s order to conserve ammunition had precisely limited operations to attacks on objectives needed for consolidating present positions and attacks necessary for preparing future offensives. So inevitably Home Army impetus was checked.
The Germans however were now attacking more and more with heavy tanks. Polish arsenals undertook mass-manufacture of incendiary bottles with which to counter them, but the increase of German armour presented a difficult challenge. These Panzers, the spearhead of the counter-attack which Himmler had organized, were now about to assault the working-class suburb of Wola, western bastion of the Uprising.
Chapter Eleven: The Germans counter-attack
During 4 August 1944 advance detachments of the German relief force under the overall command of Lieutenant-General Heinz Reinefarth detrained near Wola, on the western outskirts of Warsaw. Reinefarth reported to General Niklaus von Vormann’s headquarters at Skiemiewicz, forty-five miles south-west of the city, where the 9th Army Commander informed him that the Uprising was more dangerous than had at first been believed; and that he doubted whether the relief force would be strong enough to crush it completely.[191]
At this time the Home Army still blocked the German lines of communication across the city to the Vistula bridges and so effectively that the Germans had been forced to erect two pontoon replacements, one north at Bielany and the other south, at Siekierki. All German military traffic was forced to take these roundabout routes.
The Old Town, entirely in Polish hands, and Mokotow partly so, cut the German routes to the north, west and south. Home Army troops had also seized the Post Office Station, built astride the main Warsaw railway from east to west, which they thus controlled. In the tunnel beneath they had derailed a train and near by had blown up lengths of rail. Before the Uprising an average of fifty military supply trains went through the station every twenty-four hours, but owing to this accurate demolition not one got through to the east during the entire battle.
The German 9th Army War Diary[192] reported on 4 August that while all the efforts of the 9th Army were directed at blocking the Soviet forces in the Magnuszew area (some forty-five miles south-east of Warsaw) operations against the Soviet 8th Tank Corps in the Praga sector had had to be abandoned to a large extent. Referring to the Uprising it said: ‘The situation in Warsaw is basically the same. The centre of the city is completely in the hands of the insurgents. The attack from the east to re-open communications could not proceed because a regiment of the Kaminski brigade, only partly in uniform, was to attack from the west towards Ochota, and it was considered desirable to avoid any mistaken fighting between the two groups.’
Reinefarth’s formations, according to von Vormann’s orders, were to strike east from Wola along the line of Chlodna Street — the Saxon Gardens — the Brühl Palace, in order to drive off the Polish force pinning down General Stahel there, and relieve him. The relief force was promised Luftwaffe fighter and bomber support, a company of heavy tanks from the SS ‘Hermann Goering’ Regiment and artillery bombardment from the heavy guns of No 75 armoured train.
General Rohr’s group was also to fight east and parallel along Jerusalem Avenue towards the river. Altogether about 7,300 men, it consisted of Kaminski’s Ukrainians, a Panzer assault company, a company from the SS ‘Viking’ Division, a battalion of pioneers, about 3,000 men from Geibel’s militarized police and 500 from Okecie airport garrison supported by nine tanks and a field gun.
Meanwhile on the evening of 4 August the 9th Army issued a report that the insurgents still fought fiercely, even though they had suffered heavy losses. Despite air attacks they were holding on to all the main crossroads, so that any German sortie or movement caused them heavy losses. German positions in the Ghetto ruins were under attack by insurgents with a field-gun mounted on a lorry.
Less-organized insurgent groups were more or less quiet, while Praga was subdued. In the southern part of the city a large force of insurgents had been annihilated by the Luftwaffe, while in the south-west there was silence. ‘It is becoming more and more apparent,’ the report mistakenly observed, ‘that the majority of the people are taking no part in the Uprising.’[193]
The night passed quietly in Wola. The Home Army and the population spent it digging anti-tank ditches and strengthening barricades. Fortunately some of the containers dropped by the RAF — with valuable Piat anti-tank weapons and light machine-guns — fell in Wola. Home Army Intelligence reported the arrival of German reinforcements and of the armoured train in the sector. The defenders
were about four thousand strong. They were expecting a heavy attack by some twelve thousand seasoned troops supported by tanks and artillery.
What sort of troops were these with which the Germans were to counter-attack? Von dem Bach, the anti-partisan expert, on his way to command in Warsaw, testified later[194] of Dirlewanger’s criminal brigade:
Although their moral qualities left much to be desired, their fighting ability was extremely high. This brigade was composed exclusively of released criminals who were offered a pardon if they showed valour in battle. They had nothing to lose and everything to win. They exposed their lives without hesitation for this reason. They knew that they were respected neither by their own officers nor the enemy. They gave no mercy in battle and did not expect any. As a result they suffered losses three times as great as those of any other German unit… They had enormous experience of anti-partisan fighting, which they had been carrying out for years. All in all, Dirlewanger’s brigade possessed the highest fighting qualities. To remove it from the battle would have been nothing less than to give up any idea of an offensive.
In contrast, the Poznan police group were, in von dem Bach’s view, useless for attack, because they lacked the necessary impetus. They were used for attack only when the enemy position was destroyed by flame-throwers or artillery. Yet they excelled at defending a position once this had been taken. Discipline was very much better than in Dirlewanger’s brigade.
Von dem Bach said that Colonel Schmidt’s reserve regiment were well-trained troops dependable for any infantry job, but matter-of-fact, lacking any sort of joy in their trade (‘Freude am Handwerk!’) or any real enthusiasm for fighting like the Dirlewanger criminals he praised so much. This was counterbalanced by their experience in frontal attack, their good equipment and the fact that they were led by thoroughly experienced officers and non-commissioned officers.
The commanding officer, Colonel Schmidt, was the real source of the worth of this regiment. His experience of warfare, his tactical talent and his readiness to engage himself personally in the battle were outstanding among the officers in Warsaw. ‘He was both the soul and the father of his regiment.’
The Ukrainian collaborationists, or Cossacks, led by SS-Brigadeführer Kaminski, a deserter from the Red Army, were in von dem Bach’s view, the lowest of the low. ‘The fighting value of these Cossacks was, as usual in such a collection of people without fatherland, very poor. They had a great liking for alcohol and other excesses and had no understanding of military discipline.’
Shortly after dawn on 5 August Luftwaffe bombers flying without fighter cover zoomed low over the roofs of Wola to drop high-explosive and incendiary bombs. The whole of this working-class district of mostly wooden houses was soon a mass of flames. Civilians — women, children and old people — poured out of their homes with what belongings they could carry and trudged towards the City Centre, where all looked quiet.
The German counter-attack had begun.
At 6 o’clock units of Dirlewanger’s and Schmidt’s infantry in tight columns behind tanks attacked along Wolska and Gorczewska Streets towards Kercely Square and down Chlodna and Ogrodowa Streets. After the tanks had shot up the Polish barricades the infantry, some using flame-throwers, rushed up to them and attacked at close quarters with hand-grenades, retiring only after many had fallen. A heavy German tank was blown up by a mine at half past eight at the corner of Mlynarska and Gorczewska Streets.
Kaminski’s Cossacks had attacked along Grojecka Street towards Narutowicz Square to try to seize the districts south of Wola on the insurgents’ left flank. At the same time the Germans launched an attack on the cemeteries in this district which, held by the Home Army troops, were stopping access through Wola towards the City Centre.
Bombs and mortar shells burst among the tombstones, bullets from machine-gun crossfire whined and ricocheted among the marble statuary. Strafed from the air and heavily attacked on the ground the Poles, suffering heavy casualties, fell back from the Calvinist cemetery to Okopowa Street.
Profiting by this advance, the German troops attacked Polish positions in the near-by Evangelist cemetery and by about 4 o’clock took it by storm, going on to sweep Okopowa Street with machine-gun fire. Colonel Radosław, in charge of the Polish group defending Wola, reinforced the Jewish cemetery and Okopowa Street along the western boundaries of the Ghetto ruins with two battalions of shock troops. Two German tanks captured by Home Army troops opened fire on the advancing German troops and checked their advance, but the near-by hospital of Saint Mary and Saint Charles was overrun by Dirlewanger’s criminal regiment and everyone there shot.
The captured tanks then attacked German positions in the Ghetto, which included a concentration camp of Jews from all over Europe. Nazi camp guards cheered wildly at the tanks’ approach. In retribution for their inhuman treatment of the Jewish prisoners they were shot out of hand and some three hundred and fifty Jews set free.
A little later in the summer evening, darkened by smoke and reddened by flames leaping from whole streets of burning buildings, the two captured tanks again strafed the German infantry in the cemeteries, after which they were driven out by a Polish counter-attack, leaving behind a large number of dead and many weapons.
During the night the weary troops on both sides rested, but the Luftwaffe again heralded the next morning, 6 August, with low-level fighter and bomber attacks, sometimes no more than a hundred feet high, on barricades in Kercely Square and the Chlodna-Towarowa crossroads. The 10th and the 11th Home Army assault groups manning the barricades were decimated. Units of Dirlewanger’s brigade then advanced along Chlodna and Elektoralna Streets towards the Brühl Palace in Theatre Square without meeting serious opposition. Thus in a daring raid the Germans had driven a thin wedge through the Polish lines in Wola to the City Centre, while a further attack by Dirlewanger’s troops in the cemetery area had pinned down Colonel Radosław’s group.
Captain Sosna held Wronia Street, leading to Radosław’s position and Komorowski requested Chrusciel, commander of the Warsaw troops, to order a counter-attack along this street, or along the Mirowski Market, to relieve Radosław’s men. Chrusciel replied that he had only enough arms and ammunition for defensive action, and declared that he would sit tight and wait for the arrival of the Red Army.[195] It appears that this commander, whose belief that the Soviets were about to enter Warsaw had started the insurrection, was making it the yardstick of all his subsequent action.
Headquarters of Captain Sosna’s group was in the Haberbusch Brewery, Krochmalna Street, also a ‘cage’ for German prisoners. At 7 AM on 6 August, German bombs hit the brewery, killing fifty-seven prisoners and setting a hospital next door on fire. Nurses and attendants in the hospital carried patients and wounded out from the burning building under fire from tanks.
Half an hour later Dirlewanger’s criminal regiment and Reinefarth’s flame-thrower unit, followed by Schmidt’s regiment, attacked behind tanks along Ogrodowa, Krochmalna and Chlodna Streets in an effort to extend their wedge in the Polish positions. The main weight of the attack hit the barricade at the Chlodna-Wronia crossroads. Both Polish commanders were badly wounded here.
Captain Sosna’s headquarters informed him that all ammunition had been used. He ordered a retreat and gave permission to quit the fighting area to all unarmed troops — they had been awaiting the arms of the fallen, or those of German prisoners. On receiving the order to retreat Lieutenant Berbostawki led his company in a counter-attack. He was never seen again; his troops were driven off with heavy losses.
The main Polish forces and the walking wounded in this vital area of the western City Centre fell back several hundred yards through Mirowski Square to the Palace of Justice in Leszno, leaving weak rearguards on what remained of the barricades. Aircraft first, then tanks and infantry attacked in strength the positions on Chlodna and Ogrodowa Streets and overwhelmed them, the severely weakened Home Army troops being forced back still further towards the City Centre.
At a
bout midday on 6 August a formation of Dirlewanger’s hard-fighting criminal regiment backed by heavy tanks finally broke through to the Mirowski Market and thence to the Saxon Gardens and Theatre Square. After the tanks in the open spaces had dispersed the Poles pinning down General Stahel in the Brühl Palace contact was made with the SS units defending it. The defenders were drinking heavily and ready to surrender.[196] An hour or two later and the Poles would have been able to seize the German general commanding the garrison and his entire staff. Such is the fortune of war.
The German commanders now held a conference in the Brühl Palace and decided that General Stahel would stay there to direct operations, with a battalion of SS-Oberführer Dirlewanger’s regiment at his disposition while SS-Gruppenführer Reinefarth’s troops would reinforce and extend the wedge he had driven through the Polish positions in Wola and the City Centre. Utterly ruthless destruction of entire streets by burning and by artillery fire had made this advance possible, including bombardment by shells of the heaviest calibre from the armoured train on the railway which ran from north to south across Wola.
Neither the Poles nor the Germans kept their troops that night in fiercely burning Chlodna Street between the Zelazna crossroads and Saxon Gardens. Next morning, 7 August, the Luftwaffe were again out early, smashing the Polish barricades in the district with low-level bombing attacks. Then through the swirling smoke came two heavy Tiger tanks leading Dirlewanger’s 2nd Battalion, who drove in front of them a screen of Polish women and children. They were followed by a Poznan Police battalion. No aid could arrive from Colonel Radosław’s group in the cemetery area to the immediate north because it was held down by enemy tanks, armoured cars, mortar and machine-gun fire.
