Rank: Red Army Troop type: Ground troops, Air Force (except Naval Aviation), Coast Guard, NKVD troops, Border Guard From the memoirs of Major General of the Reserve, Chief of Staff, Division Commander M. I. Shchedrin - "31st Army in the Battle of Kalinin" on December 26, after a ten-minute artillery RAID, the army resumed the attack, but only the 250th division, which captured Leushkin and repulsed the German counterattack, managed to break through the enemy defenses in the north at night Chukhin. To make the breakthrough, the commander led the 54th Cavalry Division (commander Lieutenant Colonel Tsarkov) and a rifle regiment of the 250th Division. By morning the enemy had built up reserves and completed the breakthrough with a strong counterattack. The cavalrymen entered the Smagino area, defeated up to 170 Hitlerists, then advanced to Kokonyagino and Chernovo and smashed the hinterland and the German headquarters. Under the onslaught of superior enemy forces they retreated to Smagin and organized a circular defense here and with the infantry of the 922nd Regiment (Commander Major Gritskevich). For three days the Soviet soldiers held out behind enemy lines, fended off all counterattacks and inflicted heavy losses on the Nazis. They held the occupied line until our main forces approached. The Military Council of the Front thanked the soldiers of the 54th Cavalry Division and the 922nd Regiment for their extraordinary bravery, courage and heroism, and gave an example of their actions to all units, with the fierce fighting often ending in close combat. During the 26th to 29th of December, the villages of Leushkino, Kostenevo, Chuchino and Sidorovo went hand to hand several times. The evening of November 29 in the Battle of Kostenevo was initiated by the second squadron of the 5th Division, and in the night of December 30 the army broke through the German defense on the Kostenevo - Cugino area and repelled counterattacks, widened and deepened the breakthrough. The stubborn resistance at the intermediate line can be judged only by this fact alone in Gostenev, the fascists left 70 soldiers' corpses untidy, left 7 rifles, 12 machine guns and many other weapons. Now the army resumed the pursuit, but the enemy continued to resist stubbornly.1 January 1942 soldiers of the 247th Division liberated the city of Stariza, which was simultaneously occupied by units of the 29th Army from the north.