- PPK 30
- PPK 33
- PPK 35
- No
(Пистолет-пулемёт Шпагина — Википедия)[4].
Formation of the regiment
From the beginning of the war, the formation of fighter battalions, militia detachments and combat workers’ squads began in the Tula region. In Tula, 79 destroyer battalions were created[1]:204. As noted by the head of the Directorate of the FSB of Russia in the Tula region, Vladimir Lebedev, the formation and armament of the destroyer battalions was entrusted to the NKVD bodies[2]. The extermination battalions included proven communists, Komsomol members and Soviet activists capable of wielding weapons[2]. On October 23, 1941, the city defense committee decided to form the Tula Workers’ Regiment consisting of 1500 people, uniting five battalions. The regiment was headed by the head of the 4th Department of the NKVD Directorate of the Tula Region, Captain of State Security Anatoly Gorshkov[2]. The regiment’s commissar is Grigory Ageev[1]:206.
The regiment was not a regular military unit, its supply was carried out by the Tula party organization and the city defense committee. The personnel were provided with warm clothes, felt boots, and hot food[1]:214. The regiment was the only unit that received submachine guns designed by S. A. Korovin, specially manufactured at the enterprises of Tula[3].
Defense of Tula
During the Tula defensive operation, the Soviet troops had the goal of repelling the Wehrmacht’s offensive in the Tula direction and preventing the bypass of Moscow from the south. Tula was defended by units of the 50th Army under the command of Lieutenant General Ivan Boldin, the local garrison and the people’s militia. On the German side, the offensive was led by the 2nd Panzer Army of Colonel General Heinz Guderian. The Tula defensive operation played an important role in the successful completion of the Battle of Moscow for the USSR.
According to the memoirs of I. V. Boldin, the Tula Workers’ Regiment took its first battle at 7:30 a.m. on October 30, 1941, defending the Rogozhinsky village. About 40 German tanks, supported by submachine gunners, began an offensive in the area of the brick factory located south of the village. The battle lasted more than 4 hours, the German units were unable to overcome the anti-tank ditch during several attacks. Squad leader Pyotr Salikov knocked out the first enemy tank[1]:213. Soon the German tankers discovered a weak spot on the western outskirts of the village, where an anti-tank ditch had not been prepared due to the water that appeared in the ravine. The tanks attacked from the rear. The regiment was forced to retreat to the eastern outskirts of the village, taking up defense in the area of Komsomolsky Park and blocking the way to the village of Krasny Perekop. In the afternoon, Commissar Grigory Ageev died. Attempts by German units to take Krasny Perekop ended in failure[1]:214.
The memoirs of I. V. Boldin somewhat differ from the data of the report of the head of the Southern combat sector of the city of Tula, Hero of the Soviet Union, Major I. Y. Kravchenko[4] and with the diary of the chief of staff of the 956th Rifle Regiment of the 299th Rifle Division, Senior Lieutenant V. A. Bentsel[5]. They provide information that on October 30, 1941, at 8:00 a.m., the enemy attacked the defense sector of the Tula Workers’ Regiment in the Osoaviakhim Park[6] with the forces of 34 medium and heavy tanks and up to a motorized infantry battalion from the direction of Gosteevka[4]. According to V.A. Bentsel, there were no anti-tank obstacles in the regiment’s sector, and the fire of four anti-aircraft guns was also not a serious obstacle for tanks. Tanks methodically drove up to the front line of defense, crushed the soldiers with tracks and shot with machine guns. Some of the soldiers of the workers’ regiment could not stand it and left their positions, a panicked retreat began of the 2nd Rifle Battalion of the 156th Rifle Regiment of the NKVD, which held the defense on the right of the Oryol highway in the direction of the Tula Mechanical Institute, where the headquarters of the Southern Combat Section of the city of Tula was located.
Soon the Tula Workers’ Regiment was scattered and fled in an unknown direction, after which German tanks and motorized infantry broke through to the city, and the tanks took possession of the Osoaviakhim park, coming close to the church. The situation of the sector became so complicated that the leadership decided to blow up the bridges on the Upa River in the city, and some commanders proposed to move the command post to the city, which would lead to the flight of all defense units and to the surrender of the city. Riots, looting, panic, and looting of shops had already begun in the city.
The critical situation was rectified only with the help of three groups of tank destroyers and personnel of the approaching 1005th Rifle Regiment of the 173rd Rifle Division (Senior Lieutenant Savchinsky). By order of Major I.Y. Kravchenko, rifle units cut off the German infantry following them from the tanks that broke through, and two groups of tank destroyers and crews of two anti-tank guns took up the tanks themselves. As a result, 5 tanks were knocked out in the Osoaviakhim park, on the section of height 225.5 (Linkov’s group and 80 artillerymen of the 843rd artillery regiment) 8 tanks were disabled, and the rest of the tanks retreated. By 10:00 a.m., the situation in all sectors of the southern front of Tula was restored. There is no information about the participation of the Tula Workers’ Regiment in further battles on October 30 - November 1, 1941[4][5].
Heinz Guderian, recalling the first battles near Tula, noted that an attempt to immediately take the city ended in failure, faced with “strong anti-tank and anti-aircraft defenses.” At the same time, according to him, the German troops “suffered significant losses in tanks and officers.”
The Tula Workers’ Regiment participated in the battles until the very end of the defense of the city. It then joined the regular Red Army as number 766[1]:215. At the end of November 1941, Captain A.P. Gorshkov handed over the regiment to a new commander (the former commander of the 958th Rifle Regiment of the 299th Rifle Division, Major V.M. Baranov) and returned to the NKVD Directorate for the Tula Region[9].
The Tula Regiment and its worker represent the tenacity and ingenuity of the soviet people to fight for their land. The PPK-30 with 20 rounds would make a good br1 squad. A good-looking gun with a wood stock and exposed bullets a rare feature in smgs. I would love for every faction to have more event squads even the soviets.
https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/article/tula-hero-city-of-the-soviet-union/YY
#Оружие Sergei Aleksandrovich Korovin (September 5, 1884 – April 9, 1946) was a Soviet designer of small arms. In 1920, S. A. Korovin became a designer of small arms at the Tula Arms Plant and in 1920-1921 he developed his first self-loading pistol for the 7.65 mm Browning cartridge. On May 29, 1923, the Artillery Committee, on the basis of field tests of several types of weapons, concluded that the pistol of the Korovin system had advantages over other pistol systems in terms of constant readiness for battle, safety of handling, reliability of the functioning of mechanisms, and therefore was suitable for arming the command staff of the Red Army. At the same time, the large weight (915 g) and the design difficult to produce were the shortcomings that did not allow the pistol to be adopted for service.
By order of the sports society “Dynamo”, supervised by the NKVD of the USSR, Korovin developed a version of the pistol for the 6.35x15 mm cartridge, which was then used in many countries as ammunition for self-defense weapons. with the same dimensions of the cartridge, placing a more powerful powder charge in it, which made it possible to increase the muzzle velocity of the bullet from 200 to 228 m/s. In 1926, this model of “civilian” personal weapon began to be produced under the name TK (Tula Korovina).Continuing to work on improving the pistol, in 1927 the designer again converted it to the caliber of 7.65 mm, and in 1929 - to the caliber of 7.62 mm. along with the developments of S. A. Prilutsky, F. V. Tokarev and several models of Walter, he participated in the competition of 1930.
The Korovin pistol surpassed all samples in terms of accuracy, but consisted of the largest number of parts (56) and turned out to be less reliable in adverse operating conditions (failure due to dusting). In this regard, preference was given to the lighter in weight, compact in size and easy to assemble and disassemble pistol of F. V. Tokarev, which in the same year was adopted under the name TT. At the beginning of 1930, Korovin developed a submachine gun for a 7.62 mm pistol cartridge, with which he participated in the competition for the best submachine gun for adoption by the Red Army. Tokarev, Degtyarev, and later Prilutsky and Kolesnikov also took part in the competition. In 1936, Sergei Alexandrovich took part in the competition for the creation of an anti-tank rifle.On May 17, 1938, by order of the People’s Commissar of Defense and the People’s Commissar of the Defense Industry, a competition was announced for the development and manufacture of a 7.62 mm automatic pistol for armament of the Red Army.
Designers Tokarev, Rakov, Voevodin also participated in the competition. In 1939, Korovin presented his own version of the pistol. In March 1941, comparative tests of pistols were carried out, the end of the competition was prevented by the outbreak of war.
During the war, Korovin worked in Tula, where he developed simplified versions of the submachine gun and 82 mm mortar, which were assembled in besieged Tula from improvised materials, tested in the trenches and entered service with the Tula workers’ regiment.
