BATTLE OF RUSSIA: A Bridgehead Is Taken

The men reached the Dnieper at night. They looked at its grey and hostile face, shivered in the chilly wind, tried to fight the weariness that comes to a soldier after days of fierce fighting.

But the daybreak was near, the time short. Pontoons, captured from the Germans in earlier campaigns, were quickly launched. Guns, ammunition, supplies were hastily loaded aboard. Then, guided by guerrillas, the men cautiously crossed the river. By daybreak the entire mechanized unit had landed. Immediately trenches were dug, guns emplaced.

The Red Army's heavy tanks remained on the east bank, and through the terrible day which followed their guns helped to repel the German counterattacks. And all through that day, ignoring German shelling and air attacks, other men swarmed across the Dnieper on logs, empty gasoline drums, capes stuffed with hay. Behind them, on huge rafts, came tanks.

A bridgehead had been taken.

Along a 150-mile stretch of the river, similar engagements were being fought. Desperately, the German command was throwing fresh divisions into the battle: Hitler had ordered the Dnieper held at all costs. But the verdammte Bolschewis-ten—the damned Bolsheviks—had attacked earlier than expected, pierced the yet unready German defenses. Moscow reports spoke of Nazi troopers streaming out of sacked, blazing Kiev.

These, and other battles fought along Russia's 1,500-mile front promised major victories, which may come during the Tripartite Conference. During the week Moscow announced: > The capture of Nevel, key stronghold on the important Kalinin front. > The entry into Gomel's suburbs, the capture of villages within 62 miles of the Latvian border, 22 miles of Vitebsk, 30 miles of Mogilev.

> The clearing of the Caucasus by an army directed by square-jawed Marshal Semion Timoshenko. Stalin hinted the victory cleared the way for an attack on the Crimea, claimed the defeat cost the Germans 20,000 dead, 3,000 prisoners.