Photograph by Erik Suijkerbuijk © 2009. No un-authorised use.
The Panzer-Füsilier-Regiment GD, spread thinly over several kilometres outside Schaulen, takes on a defensive posture. Not knowing how long they will be there, men from the I. Battalion occupy a captured, part-completed Soviet trench system and start to prepare for an enemy counterattack.

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.
Awaiting allocation to a position, this Füsilier contemplates the situation. The many days of forced route marches and frequent clashes of arms lead to utter exhaustion for those who come through unscathed.

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.
The trench system is adapted to accommodate one of the Battalion’s 8cm Gr.W.34 mortars.

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.
A lone Soviet helmet is all that remains of the previous inhabitants of the trench system.

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.

With the exhaustion comes hunger.

The men break into their rations. The field kitchens have yet to catch up with hot food, perhaps later, in the darkness, when the men carrying the food containers are not so easy victims for the Soviet sharpshooters.

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.
The excellent little ESBIT Model 9 heating tray was small enough to fold up and tuck away in a tunic pocket.

Said to have been designed by the entrepreneur Erich Schumm, the real success behind these ‘stoves’ were the solid fuel tablets.

Smokeless and non-explosive, they allowed an individual to ‘brew up’ hot food or beverages when deliveries from the field kitchen were erratic.

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.
Apples filched from local orchards, cigarettes from Turkey and Russia, tins of fish from the North Sea...

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.
...and captured Soviet stocks supplied from the United States of America are something different to try.

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.
Taking time to mull over a letter from home, perhaps distressing news.....Allied bombs....casualties...food shortages...

Photograph by Simon Patrick © 2009. No un-authorised use.
Fresh supplies of ammunition have been brought up and distributed throughout the platoon. Each small cardboard box contained fifteen 7.9mm cartridges for rifles and machine guns. The MG 42 machine guns could spit out up to 1,200 of these bullets per minute...