It's really interesting to see this day-by-day recounting. People in the day must have been in despair of the Sov's ever stopping the Germans.
People in the west had no idea of the staggering German losses every day on the Eastern front. Absolutely top of the line German troops were being thrown into a meat grinder in Stalingrad. Russian losses were much worse, but they had an unlimited supply of manpower to draw on. Zhukov was absolutely brilliant and rutheless. He fed just enough Soviet troops into Stalingrad to keep the Germans from capturing it while building up reserves to eventually attack the German flanks.