Battle of Stalingrad on Soviet records, over 10,000 German soldiers continued to resist in isolated groups within the city for the next month. Some have presumed that they were motivated by a belief that fighting on was better than a slow death in Soviet captivity. Brown University historian Omer Bartov claims they were motivated by National Socialism. He studied 11,237 letters sent by soldiers inside of Stalingrad between 20 December 1942 and 16 January 1943 to their families in Germany. Almost every letter expressed belief in Germany's ultimate victory and their willingness to fight and die at Stalingrad to achieve that victory. Bartov
Stalingrad Madonna made for the prisoners' newspaper. He titled it "The Prisoners' Madonna". Reuber did not live to see another Christmas, dying of illness a few weeks later on 20 January 1944. Stalingrad Madonna The Stalingrad Madonna () is an image of the Virgin Mary drawn by a German soldier, Kurt Reuber, in 1942 in Stalingrad (now Volgograd), Russia, during the Battle of Stalingrad. The original is displayed in the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, Berlin, while copies now hang in the cathedrals of Berlin, Coventry and as a sign of the reconciliation between Germany and the United Kingdom and Russia, which were