page_title: Battle of the Kerch Peninsula
section_title: Kerch landing, 26 December – 28 December
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of the Kerch Peninsula / Battle / Kerch landing, 26 December – 28 December
context_page_description: The Battle of the Kerch Peninsula, which commenced with the Soviet Kerch-Feodosia Landing Operation and ended with the German Operation Bustard Hunt, was a World War II battle between Erich von Manstein's German and Romanian 11th Army and the Soviet Crimean Front forces in the Kerch Peninsula, in the eastern part of the Crimean Peninsula. It began on 26 December 1941 with an amphibious landing operation by two Soviet armies intended to break the Siege of Sevastopol. Axis forces first contained the Soviet beachhead throughout the winter and interdicted its naval supply lines through aerial bombing. From January through April, the Crimean Front launched repeated offensives against the 11th Army, all of which failed with heavy losses. The Red Army lost 352,000 men in the attacks, while the Axis suffered 24,120 casualties. Superior German artillery firepower was largely responsible for the Soviet debacle.
  On 8 May 1942, the Axis struck with great force in a major counteroffensive codenamed Trappenjagd which concluded by around 19 May 1942 with the liquidation of the Soviet defending forces.
context_section_description: Group 2 disembarked at Cape Khroni to the northeast of Kerch. It consisted of the gunboat Don, the transports Krasny Flot and Pyenay, a tugboat, two motor barges that carried three T-26 light tanks and a few artillery pieces, and 16 fishing trawlers. Whaleboats were substituted for landing craft, resulting in tediously slow landings and the drowning of men and equipment. 697 men from the 2nd Battalion of the 160th Rifle Regiment landed at Cape Khroni by 0630 hours on 26 December and many drowned in the waves or were incapacitated by hypothermia. Another rifle battalion landed at Khroni later that day with a platoon of T-26 tanks and light artillery pieces. At Cape Zyuk, 290 troops got ashore in six hours but a few vessels foundered on the rocky beach. At Cape Tarhan only 18 soldiers got to the beach out of Group 3's landing force of 1,000 men due to a lack of whaleboats. West of Cape Khroni at Bulganak Bay the Azov flotilla landed 1,452 men, three T-26 tanks, two 76mm howitzers and two 45mm anti-tank guns. Two more landings at Kazantip Point and Yenikale were aborted due to stormy weather. By noon, the Red Army had 3,000 lightly armed men ashore north of Kerch in five separate beachheads. German resistance was minimal at first, but by 1050 hours He 111 medium bombers and Ju 87 Stuka dive bombers began attacking the Soviet landing forces. The cargo ship Voroshilov at Cape Tarhan was bombed and sunk with 450 troops aboard. One vessel with 100 men from Group 2 was bombed and sank off Cape Zyuk. Lacking radios, the lightly-armed and half-frozen Soviet formations north of Kerch moved only one kilometer inland before stopping and digging in for German counterattacks. The Soviet regimental commanders, with little to no communications link to headquarters, decided to wait for planned reinforcements that were delayed for three days due to the unfavorable winter weather and never arrived to help them.
  The 302nd Mountain Rifle Division landed at Kamysh Burun south of Kerch and ran into extremely effective German resistance. Two German battalions from Colonel Ernst Maisel's 42nd Infantry Regiment held perfect defensive positions on high ground that dominated the sand beaches. The landing at 0500 hours was stopped by an onslaught of German MG 34 machine gun, mortar and light-artillery fire that prevented the whaleboats and fishing trawlers from advancing to the shore. The 2nd Battalion of the 42nd Infantry Regiment devastated a Soviet landing at Eltigen. A Soviet naval infantry company landed at Stary Karantin but was annihilated by a counterattack from Major Karl Kraft's 1st Battalion/42nd Infantry. The second wave landed at 0700 hours and was also thrown back. Soviet troops seized the docks at Kamysh Burun, allowing the third wave to land there and create a foothold by afternoon. The Luftwaffe sank several ships offshore and only 2,175 troops out of the 5,200-strong Kamysh Burun landing force got ashore.
  Lieutenant General Kurt Himer was aware of the Soviet landings by 0610 hours but was uncertain where the Soviet point of main effort was due to the disunited nature of the Soviet forces. He ordered Colonel Friedrich Schmidt's 72nd Infantry Regiment to wipe out the Soviet force at Cape Khroni but lacked the troops to deal with the Bulganak Bay and Cape Zyuk formations. Himer improvised by ordering a headquarters company, 3rd Battalion/97th Infantry Regiment and an artillery battery of 10.5 cm howitzers to tackle the Cape Zyuk landing. By midnight, infantry regiment (IR) 97 had its 1st and 3rd Battalions and two artillery batteries in position for a counterattack the next day. At 1350 hours on 26 December, IR 72 reported that a captured Soviet officer from Cape Khroni had revealed the extent of the Soviet plan – to land 25,000 troops at Kerch. Himer acted decisively and decided to bring up 2nd Battalion/IR 97 from Feodosia as well to crush the Cape Zyuk force with IR 97's full strength. IR 42 would contain the Kamysh Burun landings until the northern Soviet forces were destroyed. A mixed alarm unit consisting of infantry, artillery a
caption: Cargo ship in German-controlled Kerch harbor in the winter of 1941.
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