the 11th and 18th Army elements already present before their own arrival on the 28th. The following month the division then participated in the counter-offensive, moving from the south to pocket the Soviet force. On February 19, 1943, the 102nd Grenadier Regiment launched an attack on the Kaliningrad town of Novokolhoznoe (also known as "Tschernyschewo"). The muddy terrain made the attack largely-ineffective, and two support tanks attached to the 502nd Heavy Panzer Battalion were stuck. The division went through a command change the following week, with General of the Mountain troops Kurt Versock, an Iron Cross recipient, taking over. In March 1943 Soviet activity around Lake Ladoga was revived as sixteen Red Army divisions prepared a pincer movement in the hopes of recapturing the Kirov railway line desperately needed for supplying the city. Resisting the attack were the 24th and 215th Infantry Divisions; the 4th SS Polizei Division and the Spanish "Blue Division", which all made up L Corps. The division remained along the Volkhov Front into January 1944. On January 16 the Soviet VI Rifle Corps made contact with a regiment of the 24th's, which was sent by XXXVIII Corps to defend the Novgorod railway lines needed for transport. With more pressure from Soviet forces, Colonel General Georg Lindemann ordered German forces in the area to abandon Novgorod; the division retreated in response. With the immediate area around Leningrad re-captured by the Soviets, the 18th Army was pushed westward to Pskov. During the retreat, Lieutenant General Versock was wounded, and his role was replaced by Lieutenant General Hans Freiherr von Falkenstein, while the division moved southward to the 16th Army's position in Polotsk in April. The division went through yet another command change as the situation became dire: General Kurt Versock retook command in June. On 22 June the 1st Baltic Front began pushing into the German lines at Vitebsk; in reaction, the division was given to Army Group North to defend Polotsk with the 3rd Panzer Army and 909th Assault Gun Brigade. Colonel General Lindemann, the new commander-in-chief of Army Group North Ukraine, ordered both the 24th and 190th Infantry Divisions to defend his far-right flank from the oncoming Soviet forces. The following day, the 24th Anti-Tank Battalion engaged the Soviet I Tank Corps while the 24th Engineer Regiment charged into enemy lines to cover the 252nd Infantry Division's retreat. While doing so the division came under heavy