"That didn't suit me at all, as there was no shooting there and I had to do all my fighting with a fountain pen."

 25. 02. 1943

"All of usjust hope that now the entire world understands what is at stake here and that it is a worthy cause! Out here the men do not ask for their portion from the field kitchen but for ammunition. The infantry goes without hot food for fourteen days and more and their fighting spirit is unbroken. Our youngest soldier understands that everything is at stake here . . . All the customary and minor things have fallen away from us, I never thought that one could adapt so. Nothing can scare us - and you must adapt yourselves too, so that we can calmly do our duty out here. I'm sitting in a stinking sod hut, at least ten persons are squatting by the stove, with them a pig and a goat, hens and doves sit on shelves. The air is thick enough to cut. Four weeks ago I had a tiled bathroom and a bed with white sheets, and now my feet are frozen; I'm infested with lice, my face is seared from the cold, and I recently had my first good, long sleep in a haystack, only because all their efforts to wake me failed. That is our war. - I'm not writing to complain - none of us want to complain, we only want to let those at home know what is being done here so that the homeland will remember. No one can rob us of our humor! If the homeland is as strong as our young men out here, then even the entire world can't overrun us."

H von Westernhagen

24.03. 1943

"What lies behind us is frightful. There can scarcely be a repetition and it can never be worse. You wouldn't recognize Kharkov if you returned to it now. There is scarcely a house intact and no one will ever forget the street battles. No one can describe what took place here in the winter battles. Every Single man deserves the Knight's Cross. In Kharkov itself we drove our assault guns to within thirty meters of fortified houses and fired into them; our enemies tossed hand grenade clusters down on us and as soon as the brick dust and powder smoke had cleared they opened fire again."

H von Westernhagen

"What lies behind us is frightful. There can scarcely be a repetition and it can never be worse. You wouldn't recognize Kharkov if you returned to it now. There is scarcely a house intact and no one will ever forget the street battles. No one can describe what took place here in the winter battles. Every Single man deserves the Knight's Cross. In Kharkov itself we drove our assault guns to within thirty meters of fortified houses and fired into them; our enemies tossed hand grenade clusters down on us and as soon as the brick dust and powder smoke had cleared they opened fire again."