After the Second World War, the Soviet Union needed a large number of narrow-gauge steam locomotives for use on forest and industrial railways with a gauge of 750 mm. As reparations, a total of 420 locomotives of the ГР (GR) series were built in the GDR, which stood for “Germanskaja reparazja”. The prototype stayed in the GDR and two more went to the Mansfeld mine railway, all others were delivered to the Soviet Union. The locomotives had wood firing in order to get cheaper fuel when operating in the forest. The second and third axles were laterally movable for better running characteristics in curves. They were retired between the mid 1970's and early 1980's.