 On that date, the commander of the Berlin Defence Area, General Helmuth Weidling, surrendered to the commander of the Soviet 8th Guards Army, Lieutenant-General Vasily Chuikov.Chuikov was a constituent of Marshal Georgiy Zhukov's 1st Belorussian Front.The sector in which most of the fighting in the overall battle took place was the Seelow Heights, the last major defensive line outside Berlin.