T34 turret found in Rostock/germany

[corporalSteiner]

interesting... a police cordon may be necessary due to explosives. but it must be a downer for folk keen to have a closer look. judging by how scant reference is made to interesting wartime facts and exhibits of military hardware in some german museums, the best we may hope for is some museum apparachik to make a poetic model out of the mud from the site and display it as a silent prayer against the war.

[Roman Alymov]

Andrey Karpov from http://niemirow41.narod.ru/ managed to find what seems to be archive reference to this tank and its crew:
In this report of officer losses from 3rd Guards Tank Brigade (http://shot.photo.qip.ru/101qAuo.jpg ) under #7 on this page (http://shot.photo.qip.ru/301qAup.jpg) is listed Guards Lieutenant Vasily Kriventsev, tank platoon commander from 2nd Tank battalion - killed on May 1, 1945 by the explosion of naval mine on highway bridge over Varnov river, 400 meters east from Rostok.
Posthumous award document (http://shot.photo.qip.ru/101qAxe.jpg ) provide more details of the event: After managing to capture military supply train arriving on station Cassedom (?) 1500 m west from Rostok, and taking village Cassedom, Kriventsov’s tank was first to break into Rostok suburbs, destroying enemy personell and vehicles on the way, and was exploded by naval mine on the bridge. Kriventsov was killed by the blast (as, probably, whole crew of the tank – there is nothing about it in the document). Place of explosion is pointed as burial place in the documents.
This story is matching newspaper story of first tank that entered by city and was destroyed by local policemen – probably policemen was responsible for operating IED control, and Soviets listed explosion too powerful to be resulted by regular landmine to be caused by hidden naval mine.

[MarioL]

Hello Roman,

very interesting to read the story behind the tank.

And some news, the hull of the T34 is also there, on the other side of the street.

[Roman Alymov]

And some news, the hull of the T34 is also there, on the other side of the street.

Thank you! What is the source for information about the hull?
Meanwhile Andrey continued the study and found award document for tank MG/radio operator
http://shot.photo.qip.ru/101qCoh.jpg
http://shot.photo.qip.ru/201qCoi.jpg

And then all other crew members, for some reason they were all in private\NCO losses report of 9th Rifle division, marked red:
http://shot.photo.qip.ru/201qCoB.jpg

http://shot.photo.qip.ru/301qCoA.jpg

http://shot.photo.qip.ru/101qCoz.jpg

So now we know all five crew members:

Vasily Kriventsev, 31, platoon commander
Vasily Kleshov,21, driver
Panteley Lipeev, 21, radio operator
Nikolai Martynenko, 20, gunner
Andrey Gusev, 23, loader

[MarioL]

Here the source
http://nachrichten.t-online.de/sowje...086/index?news

"Die zweite Hälfte des Panzers liegt auf der anderen Straßenseite, die muss auch noch untersucht werden"

[Roman Alymov]

Story on Russian TV: http://www.tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/c...80919-9a5n.htm They managed to find relatives of tank driver of this tank, Vasily Kleshov.

[jotuntroll]

Thanks Roman

Very interesting work you have provided to this tread.

[MarioL]

Thank you very much Roman.
Can you make a short explain what they are saying in the interviews?
Why have they interviewed german civilians?

The hull will be recovered next year and then it will go to the Militärhistorische Museum in Dresden.

[Roman Alymov]

Thank you very much, but the only thing I did is bringing the story to the attention of Russian “Nemirov-41” team (http://niemirow41.narod.ru/ ) who did all archive search and brought the story to officials and Russian media.

Persons interviewed in this report are:

1. German road worker who initially found the turret -describing how it was found

2. German museum workers saying that “armor is good” and if the hull will be recovered in good shape – they will try to put together turret and tank . By the way piece of newspaper shown is part of Izvestia from April 21, 1945 telling the story about somebody ( unreadable) transporting major part of Italian gold reserve out of the country.

3. Old lady with white hair is tank driver’s daughter speaking about her father. Strange thing is that she say he was reported MIA – but in documents he was clearly listed as MIA. His family received his posthumous award (order).

4. Old Russian man is tank driver’s cousin showing wooden house Vasily Kleshov left going to war.

5. German civilian and old lady in red are son and wife of German soldier who witnessed the tank on the bridge and explosion when being on leave in his hometown Rostok recovering after frost burns suffered on Eastern Front. Son says his father told him the story many times, and wife say it was his (soldier) nightmare for the rest of his life (running from the tank over the bridge and waking up when explosion behind him). Strange that experienced soldier went out to see his relatives in other part of the city when Soviet troops fighting their way in.

6. Russian MoD representative on memorial affairs in Germany saying that the fate of crew remains will be decided mutually by Russian and German officials.