This article describes the activities of the Red Army units and individual soldiers during the Battle of Działdowo in January 1945. The research is based, above all, on unpublished sources from the documentation of units of the 5th Armoured Guards Army and award documents of persons serving in the 31st Armoured Brigade, singled out for involvement in Operation Mielno-Elblag, with an emphasis on merit in the clashes near Działdowo and within the city. It also presents the rules for decorating those serving in the Red Army with medals and the specifics records of their merits, describing their battlefield achivements, enemy losses and obtained trophies, bringing the struggles of the war to the level of individual efforts intertwined into the events of a specific episode of combat.