Battle - Of Stalingrad Worksheet

On January 31, 1943, Paulus surrendered, disobeying Hitler’s orders. On February 2, the last pockets of German resistance ceased. Of the 300,000 men of the 6th Army, only about 91,000 survived to become prisoners of war. Of those, fewer than 6,000 ever saw Germany again. The Axis total losses (killed, wounded, captured) exceeded 800,000.

“September 15, 1942. The factory is on fire. The Volga is on fire. The sky is black. We fight for every room. The Germans are thirty meters away. I cannot remember the last time I slept. Yesterday, my friend was killed by a sniper. Today, I killed two Germans with my shovel. There is no front line. There is only the floor you hold and the floor you take. We are not soldiers. We are ghosts.” battle of stalingrad worksheet

Hitler refused to allow a breakout. He promoted Paulus to Field Marshal, implying that no German Field Marshal had ever surrendered (and hinting that Paulus should commit suicide). The Luftwaffe promised an air bridge to supply the trapped army, but it failed catastrophically, delivering less than 20% of needed supplies. The German soldiers faced starvation, frostbite (temperatures dropped to -30°C or lower), and relentless Soviet attacks. By January 1943, the pocket had shrunk. Of those, fewer than 6,000 ever saw Germany again

Worksheet Student Name: _________________________ Date: _________________________ Class: _________________________ Part 1: Reading Passage – “The Furnace of War” The Battle of Stalingrad (August 23, 1942 – February 2, 1943) is widely regarded as the single most brutal and decisive battle of the Eastern Front, and arguably of all World War II. It marked the first major defeat of Adolf Hitler’s German Wehrmacht on land and shattered the myth of German invincibility. The factory is on fire

Instead of a swift capture, the battle devolved into vicious, block-by-block, and room-by-room fighting. Soviet forces, under generals Georgy Zhukov and Vasily Chuikov, took advantage of the ruins. Chuikov’s tactic was simple: “Hug the enemy.” By keeping Soviet soldiers as close as possible to German lines, they negated the Luftwaffe’s air superiority and the German advantage in long-range tank fire. Snipers like Vasily Zaytsev became legends. Soldiers fought over a single staircase, a factory floor, or a cellar. The fighting for the Mamayev Kurgan (a hill overlooking the city) changed hands dozens of times.