only as far as Lepel in two days. Further south Borisov, defended by the remnants of the 13th Army and the Borisov Tank School, fell to the 18th Panzer Division of the 2nd Panzer Group's XXXXVII Motorised Corps on 2 July. The Germans captured the road bridge intact despite Yeryomenko's personal instructions that it be destroyed. Timoshenko was ordered by the Stavka (the Soviet High Command) to restore the situation with Kreizer's 1st Moscow Motor Rifle Division. The XXXXVI Motorised Corps also captured a bridgehead across the Berezina on 2 July when the SS Motorized Division Das Reich captured Pogost, but were then for two days hindered by the 13th Army and 4th Army's 4th Airborne and 20th Mechanized Corps. On the southern flank, the remnants of the 4th Army's Rifle Divisions were only able to offer light resistance to the German XXIV Motorised Corps; instead the attackers were repeatedly halted by destroyed bridges at the Berezina, Ola, Dobosna and Drut Rivers. Kreizer launched his counter-attack against the German bridgehead at Borisov on 3 July, but the defenders had been forewarned by radio intercepts and air reconnaissance, and with their superior tactics beat back this isolated Soviet attack. Defeated, Kreizer accordingly retreated behind the Nacha River and fought during the withdrawal towards Orsha, where his troops were aided by the arrival of the 20th Army. Also on 3 July, the spearheads of the XXIV Motorised Corps reached the rain-swollen Dniepr, with the 3rd Panzer Division arriving at the river north of Rogachev and the 4th Panzer Division advancing to Bykhov. By nightfall the Western Front could report that remnants of the 4th and 13th Armies had been able to retreat across the Dniepr, however hardly anything of the 3rd and 10th Armies remained. Moreover, parts of the 13th Army and 17th Mechanized Corps were still west of the Dniepr. Accordingly, Timoshenko ordered his 21st Army to shore up its defences along the river and help the withdrawal by sending out forces to spoil the German advance. On 4 July, the 19th Panzer Division seized a bridgehead across the Western Dvina at Disna from the defending 51st Rifle Corps of the Soviet 22nd Army, where it was reinforced by the German 18th Motorised Division. The Smolensk pocket The Front took part in the fierce Battle of Smolensk (1941), which managed to disrupt the German blitzkrieg for two months. The Germans successfully