Made during WWII for the home market in Germany, this silent newsreel shows the battle for Sevastopol. The film begins with a map showing Soviet defenses on the peninsula including fortifications. At :43 German columns of tanks occupy the high ground and mortars and artillery begin lobbing shells into the city.
After the barrage the infantry begins to move forward at 2:00, supported by tanks. At 2:30 Stukas join the fight, bombing Soviet positions. At 3:14 troops break into enemy lines. At 3:30 Junkers Ju 88 bombers fly through a rainstorm and into combat. At 4:53 a flamethrower is use against the enemy, and the artillery moves in closer.
A huge shell is moved at 5:15 and loaded into a artillery piece called the “Thor”. Thor was a 600mm-caliber heavy mortar used by the German Army during World War II. This self-propelled artillery piece was one of a series of seven 60 cm mortars known as Karl Gerät (040). Designed and developed by Rheinmetall between 1937 and 1940, six of these seven powerful mortars were used during Operation Barbarossa, on the Eastern Front, taking part in the siege of Brest Fortress, the siege of Sevastopol, and the siege of Warsaw during the Polish uprising. They were called “Thor”, “Loki”, “Odin”, “Ziu”, “Adam”, and “Eva”.
Thor had a 5.07m-long barrel, a hydro-pneumatic recoil, and a horizontal sliding-wedge breech. It moved on tracks and was powered by a Daimler-Benz MB 507 C diesel engine, delivering 580 horsepower; for long distances it was transported by railways. Thor fired 2,170-kg concrete piercing shells to a range of 6.5 km (7 miles) with an elevation of 60°. These shells could penetrate 2.5m-thick reinforced concrete and 350mm-thick steel armor.
The Siege of Sevastopol also known as the Defence of Sevastopol was a military battle that took place on the Eastern Front of the Second World War. The campaign was fought by the Axis powers of Germany, Romania, and Italy against the Soviet Union for control of Sevastopol, a port in the Crimea on the Black Sea. On 22 June 1941 the Axis invaded the Soviet Union during Operation Barbarossa. Axis land forces reached the Crimea in the autumn of 1941 and overran most of the area. The only objective not in Axis hands was Sevastopol. Several attempts were made to secure the city in October and November 1941. Under the command of Erich von Manstein, Axis forces were unable to capture Sevastopol during this first operation.
After the failure of their first assault on Sevastopol, the Axis opted to conduct siege warfare until the middle of 1942, at which point they attacked the encircled Soviet forces by land, sea, and air. On 2 June 1942, the Axis began this operation, codenamed Störfang (Sturgeon Catch). The Soviet Red Army and Black Sea Fleet held out for weeks under intense Axis bombardment. The German Air Force (Luftwaffe) played a vital part in the siege, its 8th Air Corps bombing the besieged Soviet forces with impunity, flying 23,751 sorties and dropping 20,528 tons of bombs in June alone. The intensity of the German campaign of airstrikes was far beyond previous German bombing offensives against cities such as Warsaw, Rotterdam or London. At the end of the siege, there were only 11 undamaged buildings left in Sevastopol. The Luftwaffe sunk or deterred most Soviet attempts to evacuate their troops by sea. The German 11th Army suppressed and destroyed the defenders by firing 46,750 tons of artillery ammunition on them during Störfang.
Finally, on 4 July 1942, the remaining Soviet forces surrendered and the Germans seized the port. The Soviet Separate Coastal Army was annihilated, with 118,000 men killed, wounded or captured in the final assault and 200,481 casualties in the siege as a whole for both it and the Soviet Black Sea Fleet. Axis losses in Störfang amounted to 35,866 men, of which 27,412 were German and 8,454 Romanian. With the Soviet forces neutralized, the Axis refocused their attention on the major summer campaign of that year, Case Blue and their advance to the Caucasus oilfields.
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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD and 2k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com
