Stalingrad Front
General Gordov directed the withdrawal of the battered survivors of the Kharkov battle behind the line of the Chir River to regroup and receive reinforcements. On 5 August 1942, the Stalingrad Front was split to defend a shortened Pavlovsk-Volga River line-ironically not covering Stalingrad proper despite the name of the Front. The German 6th Army attacked Red Army forces west of the Don River before Gordov could fully organize the defenses, and by 15 August the Stalingrad Front units were largely pushed across the Don River, with the loss of some 43,000 dead, wounded and prisoners, 270 tanks and 600 artillery pieces in the Battle of Kalach. As the disaster was unfolding, General Andrey Yeryomenko (sometimes spelled Eremenko) arrived to take command over a reconstituted South-East Front, with Gordov relegated as Yeryomenko's deputy commander.