378th Rifle Division
military unit
The 378th Rifle Division was an infantry division of the Red Army that began forming in August 1941 in the Siberian Military District, before being sent to the vicinity of Leningrad, where it spent most of the war. The soldiers of this division fought until early 1944 to break the siege and drive off the besieging German forces, distinguishing themselves in the liberation of Novgorod. Finally, the division was redeployed to advance into the Baltic states in 1944 and into East Prussia in the winter of 1945. As the war was ending the 378th was disbanded to provide replacements for other divisions. Nevertheless, it had compiled a very creditable combat record for any rifle division.
Formation
The 378th began forming on August 10, 1941 at Achinsk in the Siberian Military District, based on an RKO order of that date that included the 372nd, 374th and 376th Rifle Divisions. It was destined for the 59th Army in Volkhov Front. Its order of battle was as follows:
1254th Rifle Regiment
1256th Rifle Regiment
1258th Rifle Regiment
944th Artillery Regiment
318th Antitank Battalion
443rd Reconnaissance Company
661st Sapper Battalion
832nd Signal Battalion (later 832nd Signal Company)
466th Medical/Sanitation Battalion
459th Chemical Protection (Anti-gas) Company
496th Motor Transport Company
235th Field Bakery
804th Divisional Veterinary Hospital
1429th Field Postal Station
752nd Field Office of the State Bank
The division's first commander, Col. Ivan Petrovich Dorofeev, was appointed on November 1. The division was given about six weeks to form up before it was sent by rail to the front, arriving at Vologda, east of Leningrad, and was assigned to 59th Army by November 15.
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This entry incorporates text from “378th Rifle Division” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.