In the spring of the year the Front was forced over to the defensive, but by August the division was part of the 34th Guards Rifle Corps of the same Army, fighting into the Donbas and towards the Dniepr River and winning a battle honor in the process.

During the winter it took part in the fighting around Nikopol and Krivoi Rog in the Dniepr bend before being reassigned, with its Corps, to the 6th Army in the 3rd Ukrainian Front.

In April, as that Army advanced towards the Dniestr River the division was awarded the Order of the Red Banner for its part in the liberation of Odessa.

In November, as the campaigns into the Balkan states continued the division made its final transfer, to the 6th Guards Rifle Corps of 57th Army, still in 3rd Ukrainian Front.

[2] On January 8 the commander of Southwestern Front, Col. Gen. N. F. Vatutin, had reported to the STAVKA on his plans to further develop the winter counteroffensive:The enemy along the Morozovskii and Shakhty axes is completing the withdrawal of his defeated forces behind the Northern Donets...

[3]By the beginning of February the 3rd Guards Army held a bridgehead over the Northern Donets River south of Voroshilovgrad from which it broke out in a drive to liberate that city.

Two days later German forces counterattacked the 61st Guards but were repelled; on February 7 a more powerful attack was made by elements of the 3rd SS Panzer Division supported by 40 tanks which broke through the Soviet front and captured Orlovka, Belo-Skelevatyi and Nizhnii and Verkhnii Gabun.

[7] Vatutin and the STAVKA had every intention of pressing on towards Stalino, but on February 20 the German 4th and 1st Panzer Armies began the counteroffensive that would become the Third Battle of Kharkov.

[9] During the pause in operations during the spring of 1943 the division was substantially rebuilt and in June it was noted that 95 percent of its personnel were of Kazakh nationality, with the remainder mostly Russian.

The troops who participated in the liberation of Slavyansk and nearby towns, by the order of the Supreme High Command of 8 September 1943, and a commendation in Moscow, are given a salute of 20 artillery salvoes from 224 guns.

Malinovsky met his deadline with time to spare as 1st Panzer Army's forces abandoned Zaporozhe, destroying the dam and the railway bridge as they withdrew to the west bank.

The northern portion fell back toward the Dniepr, forming a bridgehead south of Nikopol which was soon invested by 3rd Guards Army on the right (north) flank of the Front.

[15] A cold wave in the first week of January, 1944 firmed up the ground enough for the 4th and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts to begin moving against the remaining German positions in the Dniepr bend.

I. T. Shlemin, received orders to move across the river to occupy positions south of Tiraspol that had been vacated by the 6th Guards Rifle Corps of 37th Army.

The 59th and 61st captured the forward defensive positions of the 97th Jägers and advanced roughly 1.5km westward by the end of the day but were unable to seize the strongpoint at Grădinița.

The 61st captured height 151.7 and Fantina-Mascui by 1100 hours but then came under heavy small arms fire from Plop-Știubei and several counterattacks from Cîrnățeni which delayed the progress of the division's right-flank regiment.

Meanwhile, the 189th Guards Regiment on the left flank continued to advance and by 1300 hours had captured some houses in the ravine southeast of Plop-Știubei.

Taking advantage of this success, at 1330 hours General Lozanovich committed his 187th Guards Regiment from second echelon into the fighting in the direction of height 210.4.

An hour later the 189th Regiment, in conjunction with the 187th and heavily supported by direct-fire artillery, attacked Cîrnățeni and captured this stronghold after a short but bitter fight.

Following several attacks the 61st Guards captured height 138.6 but was unable to take Căușeni, which had been made into a powerful strongpoint with the addition of two regiments of the German 384th Infantry Division.

00442, assigning a mission of "beating off the enemy rearguards, throwing them back to the north and, by the close of 22 August... [to] capture the Sălcuța -- Taraclia -- Kenbaran -- Saka River area with the rifle formations."

The division launched a night attack which cleared the defenders out of Căușeni Vek and threw them back across the swampy flood plain of the Botna River in the direction of Zaim.

By the end of the day, owing to the 57th Army lagging behind, the 61st Guards was pulled back into reserve behind the Corps' right flank in the Sălcuța area.

A favorable situation soon arose to split part of this force and the 66th and 9th Guards Rifle Corps converged on the village of Gura Galbenei from the east and north respectively and foiled a breakthrough attempt.

From there the Corps entrained for the Belgrade region of Yugoslavia where it unloaded on November 2 at the Pirot and Tservonarevka railroad stations and began a route march towards Paraćin.

In further orders on November 22 Tolbukhin directed the Corps to cross to the west bank overnight to secure the right flank of the bridgehead in preparation for the 4th Guards Army entering it four days later.

[37] Over the following days this resistance continued to intensify and during December 8 the 57th Army repulsed 23 counterattacks while engaged in heavy defensive fighting against infantry and tanks; 6th Guards Corps was holding a line in the area of Marcali and Nagyszakácsi.

[38] Budapest was surrounded by December 26 and on January 1, 1945 the German Army Group South began relief operations which continued for most of the month.

In the process, on March 30 elements of the division took part in the recapture of the town of Marcali and this was recognized in Moscow with a salute of 20 artillery salvoes from 224 guns.

57th Army was made part of the Southern Group of Forces in June and returned to Romania where the division, still in 6th Guards Corps, was stationed at Brănești.