This is the remarkable story of a German soldier who fought throughout World War II, climbing the ranks from a simple soldier to a captain of a heavy weapons platoon on the Eastern Front. William Lübeck, at the age of 19, was recruited into the Wehrmacht in August 1939 and as a member of the 58th Infantry Division, he experienced baptism by fire during the lightning war against France in 1940.

On June 22, 1941, his division advanced into the Soviet Union on the left flank of Army Group North as part of Operation Barbarossa. After long and arduous marches, passing countless Russian corpses, burned-out vehicles, and screaming Baltic civilians, the fierce battle brought Lübeck's unit to the outskirts of Leningrad, where they achieved the deepest penetration into the city of any German formation.

Trapped in a siege, the Germans fought against both the counterattacks of the Red Army and the extremely cold winter temperatures. In the spring, the 58th Infantry Division was moved southward and fought for months in marshy terrain. They were then transferred from one side of the Army Group North front to the other, from Novgorod to the Demiansk corridor, and at one point repelled Russian assaults that occurred over the frozen surface of Lake Ilmen.

As a soldier who preferred to be close to the action, Lübeck served as a forward observer for his platoon throughout these operations, directing heavy weapons fire in support of the infantry, targeting the underground shelters of the Red Army, and, on one occasion, calling in artillery fire to halt a Soviet tank attack. However, his concern was not limited to just the front, as news arrived of the devastating Allied air bombardment of Hamburg, where his girlfriend Anneliese was training as an Army nurse.

In late 1943, Lübeck was awarded the Iron Cross First Class and sent to the officer candidate school in Dresden. When he returned to the Eastern Front in May 1944, Army Group North was in full retreat. After being assigned as commander of his old heavy weapons platoon, Lübeck led his men in a fighting withdrawal towards East Prussia the following year. In April 1945, the platoon became trapped in a traffic jam during the retreat and was nearly annihilated in a deluge of enemy fire. In a final desperate attempt to reach the West, Lübeck managed to board a German destroyer participating in the evacuation of East Prussia. The next morning, on May 9, 1945, he learned that the war was over.

When liberated from British captivity, Lübeck married Anneliese in late 1945, but the desperate living conditions in Germany soon forced them to cross the borders of the Iron Curtain to obtain food from the family farm located in the Soviet-occupied zone.

When the Russians arrested him during one of these expeditions, Lioumbek managed to achieve a daring escape before they could learn his identity as a former officer of the Vermacht. He and his wife eventually immigrated to North America and became US citizens in 1961.

With the help of David M. Hart, William Lioumbek dug up the notes he had kept during the war, the letters he had sent, his personal military booklet, a history of his division, and, most importantly, his personal memories to tell the story of his four years on the front. The book "At the Gates of Leningrad" includes rare firsthand accounts, both of triumphs and of destruction, and provides a fascinating glimpse into the daily reality of the battle on the Eastern Front.