Stukas, Sailors, and Sabers at Stalingrad: The Cossacks Ride!

A Hungarian infantry company with artillery and antitank guns is tasked with holding a railhead until an armored company can arrive.

Unfortunately, an entire Cossack Regiment and a Tankovy Regiment are both bearing down on them....as is a Naval Infantry Battalion that has assembled in assault craft on the far side of the Volga

All that stands between the Hungarians and the approaching Red Horde are two squadrons of the Savoia Cavaleria...

As the morning fog begins to lift, the Colonel of the Savoia sees the Cossack horse crest the rise in front of his small force.

He draws his sword, and orders a saber charge...

Yelling "Avanti, Savoia!" the Italians charge up the hill....one squadron dies to a man in combat with a troop of cossacks....but the other, led by the colonel, breaks a cossack squadron, rides through them into the machinegun chariots which, caught by surprise, turn and run...and the Italians continue on, into a mass of dismounted cossacks - which outnumber them 10 figures to one...

and there, the Savoia Cavalleria dies - but most valiantly.

and not in vain, for with their lives they have bought the Hungarians precious time to dig in....

and just in time, for the Tankovy regiment, with its BA-6 armored cars, its T-70 light tanks, and its T34 main battle tanks - each with a squad of submachinegun-armed assault infantry on their backs - roars in toward the desperately outnumbered Hungarians

...the iron storm crests the rail embankment....and runs afoul of a hidden anti-tank ditch....yet the Red Army rolls forward...

...and as if that is not enough to test the mettle of the embattled Hungarians, breaking through the rising mist on the Volga -- the Sailors and Naval Infantry of the Red Banner Fleet cross the river, and hit the beach - where a single platoon of Hungarians awaits...

..and takes a heavy toll, as the Volga flows with Red...blood

The Naval Infantry (what's left of them) break through the treeline at the beach, and charge into a second platoon of Hungarians ....just as the cossack cavalry charges the Hungarians at the same time...

In the meantime, although many of the T34s and T-7osare burning - others crash through, and with their tank riders smash into the main Hungarian defense line...

...then, just as all seems lost, the Hungarian Panzers arrive, led by their armored cars...along with Stuka dive bombers in support...

....the few Hungarian infantry and guns that are left are rescued...but, alas, the rail head has fallen to the Red Army, as the Cossack Regiment swarms into, around and past it....