Russia 2008

Photos by Adam Jones

These photos were taken on a month-long trip to Russia in May-June 2008.

Gallery 8: Prokhorovka

I.

Whooping it up at a high-school graduation party at our hotel.

II.

The eternal flame monument to Prokhorovka's dead in World War Two.

III.

Walking out of Prokhorovka along the route followed by soldiers marching to battle the
German invaders, we passed through countryside with freshly-tilled fields of the glorious black earth of
southern Russia. This photo also gives a fair idea of the kind of terrain over which the tank battles of
July 1943 were waged.

IV.

The monument to the Prokhorovka battle, erected on Hill 252.2 about two kilometres from
the outskirts of town. This was the deepest point that the Germans were able to penetrate before their attack
stalled, and a Soviet counteroffensive threw them back. The monument was built to commemorate the fiftieth
anniversary of the battle in 1993.

V.

The monument includes this frieze showing Marshal Zhukov on his white horse, famously
trampling German standards at the victory celebrations in Moscow in May 1945.

VI.

A view along the main highway, up which the main German tank thrust advanced in July 1943.

VII.

Griselda by a memorial to the great tank battle ...

VIII.

... and Adam clutching a T-34, the workhorse of the Soviet tank forces, considered by many
the finest all-purpose tank of the Second World War.

IX.

Nesting in a tank barrel.

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