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DIGITAL COLLECTIONS ITEM TRANSCRIPT Mark Klotsman. Full, unedited interview, 2007 ID OH004.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41m3n ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN TABLE OF CONTENTS ITEM TRANSCRIPT ENGLISH TRANSLATION 2 CITATION & RIGHTS 13 2021 © BLAVATNIK ARCHIVE FOUNDATION PG 1/13 BLAVATNIKARCHIVE.ORG DIGITAL COLLECTIONS ITEM TRANSCRIPT Mark Klotsman. Full, unedited interview, 2007 ID OH004.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41m3n ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN TRANSCRIPT ENGLISH TRANSLATION —Today is June 7, 2007. We are in Cincinnati at the home of a veteran of the Great Patriotic War. Please introduce yourself and tell us about your childhood and your parents. How did the war begin for you, how did you come to serve in the army, and what was the war like for you? Please go ahead. I was born in Konstantinovka [Konstyantynivka], Stalino [Donetsk] Oblast, Ukraine, in 1922. —Please tell us your name. My name is Mark Borisovich Klotsman. My father was a public servant and my mother was a housekeeper. After graduating from high school, I attended a factory-training school and worked for a year before applying to military school following a Komsomol recruitment drive. My dream was to become a pilot, either civilian or military. However, the draft board said that I did not pass the most basic test. I had to spin around ten times and walk a straight line. I thought that it was pretty straight, but they said that I actually veered to the right. I took my papers and decided to apply to the Krasnodar Artillery and Mortar School, which had just opened and was recruiting its first class. There were two training programs there: anti-aircraft and mortar. Only those with higher education were accepted into the anti-aircraft program, but a high school diploma was enough to enroll in the mortar one. I studied there for a year and ten months. I had two months left until completion of the two-year program when the war broke out. A month or two later, I cannot recall for sure, the German forces were approaching Rostov. Over 200 of my classmates and I were sent to the front as soldiers. The result of throwing 200 essentially fully trained officers onto the field as soldiers was . only 70 of us survived. They brought us back to the academy, where we were all given the rank of lieutenant. We were then sent to different units . we saw that units were being commanded by junior sergeants, sergeants, and senior sergeants. They commanded platoons, batteries, and even companies. In other words, there were no officers. It was such a stupid thing for the high command to do, to just throw away trained officers by using them as regular soldiers. Our unit began assembling in Tikhoretsk, a town in the Krasnodar Krai, near the large Cossack stanitsa Kubanskaya. By that time, Rostov had already been liberated by our forces and we were assembling about 80 kilometers from Rostov and 60 kilometers from Bataysk. With no weapons. All the sailors from the Black Sea Fleet, which had been sunk, were sent to Tikhoretsk in order to form a marine infantry brigade. The sailors had already been serving for five years and were due to be sent home when the war broke out. Back then a naval tour of duty was five years. These guys were already older and experienced, having gone through naval service . When the war began, they became infantry soldiers. 2021 © BLAVATNIK ARCHIVE FOUNDATION PG 2/13 BLAVATNIKARCHIVE.ORG DIGITAL COLLECTIONS ITEM TRANSCRIPT Mark Klotsman. Full, unedited interview, 2007 ID OH004.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41m3n ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN They all arrived dressed in pea coats, even though it was November or December, already winter. We officers were quartered in Cossack homes. The Cossacks were hanging up their chokhas, which they never put on under Soviet rule, in order to give the Germans their warmest welcome. I cannot say that they were hostile . but they were not very friendly to us. We were stationed there for about a month and a half while the brigade was being formed. Men arrived in groups of twenty-five or thirty, and we would meet them at the train station. There was a church near the station. When enough men had arrived to form a brigade, we knew that we were going to be sent off by train in a few days, but did not know to which front . We were unarmed. They divided us into two teams, handed out dry rations, and told us to board . we boarded the boxcars and were taken from Tikhoretsk to the Moscow-Sorting Station . Well, what can I say about it, the conditions were terrible. It was a cattle car with two rows of bunks; there was no latrine. We draped a tent over one of the corners . We were usually notified when we were stopping for 10 or 12 minutes. We stopped to get hot water, get dry rations, and use the toilet. We arrived at the Moscow station and did not know where we would be sent. We spent a day there without . we were not allowed to leave. We only left the train to use the bathroom and take care of other needs. Boiling water for instance . A day later we were sent north and only then did we find out that our train was going to Karelia. The commandant of one of the stations, even though it was officially secret information, told us that we were headed for the Karelian Front. Then we knew. The Karelian Front meant fighting in the Arctic Circle, constant cold, and dense taiga. There were no human settlements for 100-150 kilometers around us. No villages or cities. We were sent to a section of the front near Kandalaksha. The Germans had taken all of the high ground and pushed our border guards into the swamps below. We were to replace the battered border guards and take over their defensive positions. We still did not have any weapons. It was winter, bitterly cold, and the way we were dressed—the sailors were still dressed in pea coats and black pants, making them easily visible from the air. They were ordered to hand in their uniforms and receive new ones, but not a single person obeyed the order. Everyone was issued snow camouflage and wore it, but with naval uniforms underneath. Eventually, two or three months later, we slowly began receiving quilted-cotton uniforms and fur coats for the officers received. I was assigned to a unit that was called the independent heavy-mortar battalion since I graduated from a mortar school. I remember my commander, Major Gromov, very well; he used to command a brigade, but had been demoted to the rank of major due to poor performance. He had a general’s position during the Finnish War and was now offered the command of the battalion once this war broke out. He was quite experienced and was no younger than sixty, while we were all in our early twenties and had finished two years at the academy. He was very experienced and taught me many things. After one month for some reason he recommended me . Oh, this was when we were just beginning to receive our equipment. We had not yet taken over the defensive positions from the border guards because we still did not have any weapons. We lived in dugouts that had been built before we arrived. The ground there consists of permafrost and to dig half a meter down you needed a day. First you had light the dry grass on top of the permafrost on fire in order to soften it, and only then could you dig at it bit by bit in order to get at least a 2021 © BLAVATNIK ARCHIVE FOUNDATION PG 3/13 BLAVATNIKARCHIVE.ORG DIGITAL COLLECTIONS ITEM TRANSCRIPT Mark Klotsman. Full, unedited interview, 2007 ID OH004.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41m3n ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN meter into the ground. We lived in dugouts and began training after we received our weapons. About a month and a half later, at night . yes . the officers were taken for a tour of their fighting positions. After that, we rotated in at night. We ended up . Oh, the 120mm mortars are supposed to be pulled by horses, but we only had the guns and no horses or trucks. We ended up having to build sleights and drag the mortars and ammunition on them ourselves. A single mortar shell weighs 16.7 kilograms. Plus the mortar itself, which includes the barrel, bipod, and a huge baseplate. It is meant to be pulled by horses or trucks, but we did not have either. When we finally took up our defensive positions, I immediately accepted control of a battery. I had two officers of my rank under my command. For some reason Gromov appointed me to command the battery right away. Usually you first serve as a platoon commander, and later . He appointed me immediately. Not even a month later he made me the head of reconnaissance for the entire mortar battalion. This unit included communications specialists, radio operators, rangefinders—about forty-five people total. This was already early 1942, in winter. From then on, I was the chief of reconnaissance for the rest of my time at the front. Here is what the position entailed. I always had to be with the infantry, go on recon with them, and provide them with covering fire, both at the start of a battle and during a retreat.