HELL ON WHEELS! The Story of the 2nd Armored Division "Blood and guts!

" was the recipe for victory that Patton hammered into the tankers of the 2nd Armored as they swept 1,700 miles to the gates of Berlin By BRUCE JACOBS in SAGA Magazine, January 1956 On emergency orders, the 2nd Armored Div. made a forced march of 75 miles through the snow and ice to meet the Germans

THIS is the story of the division General George Smith Patton built-the 2d Armored Division. Though others were to command it in combat as Patton rose to the command of an Army in the field, it was he, nevertheless, who gave it its impetus, who molded its character, who made it a breeding ground for great combat leaders. Fifteen years ago the Division was born into the "growing pains" Army of 1940. It and a sister division (the lst Armored) were

formed less than a month after the Nazi Army's blitzkrieg crushed France and opened the era of mobile warfare. The Division came into being in the "Frying Pan" area of Fort Benning, Georgia-but when the first officers and men reported for duty it seemed that the existence of the 2d Armored Division was one of the Army's best kept secrets. One early arrival (only 99 officers and 2,000 men answered the first muster) signed the officers' register outside the post adjutant's

office, then asked the Officer of the Day to direct him to the 2d Armored Division. The OD looked puzzled and said he never heard of any such outfit on the post. Then he snapped his fingers and his expression brightened as though the answers to a troubling mystery had just been revealed to him. "There was a wild-eyed general around here raising hell about something," he declared. "Maybe that's his outfit you're looking for!"

The "wild-eyed general" was the dynamic and excitable Major General Charles L. Scott, the Division's first commanding officer. Then in his 57th year, Scott did not long remain commander of the 2d Armored. In September

threat at Ardennes. Ambushing and annihilating the crack 2nd Panzer Div. at Calles, it turned the tide of the Battle of the Bulge.

35

(scarcely six weeks after the Division was formed) he was boosted to command of the First Armored Corps and the mantle of Division leadership descended upon the shoulders of strapping George S. Patton, Jr., then a little-known but experienced tank commander. The choice of Patton was not illogical. He was one of the few senior Army officers who had commanded tanks in combat in World War 1. What's more, the armored regiments of the 2d Division were the historical descendants of the very battalion he had commanded. Two of Patton's World War I soldiers-Corporals Donald M. Call and Harold W. Roberts of the old 344th Tank Battalion-had earned Army immortality as winners of the Medal of Honor. Roberts (for whom Camp Roberts, California, was named) earned his decoration posthumously. In the dank Montrebeau Woods he hurtled his tank through a clump of bushes to protect another U.S. tank that had been hit. Suddenly his lightly armored vehicle slithered out of control and plunged into a rain-filled shell hole ten feet deep. There was only enough time for one of the tank's two occupants to scramble to safety. "Well," Roberts said to his gunner, "only one of us can make it-so out you go!" He then pushed his buddy out the back opening of the tank and was himself drowned. Ultimately reorganized (after many numerical changes in designation) in the 2d Armored Division as the 66th Armored Regiment, the 344th Battalion's historic past was represented in the early days of the Division's organization by

Lieutenant Colonel Harry H. Semmes, a Washington lawyer and reserve officer who had served under Patton's command (and earned two DSCs) in the old 344th. He asked Patton for a combat assignment and was given command of a battalion of the 66th AR. Troops earmarked for the new division poured into Benning by train and truck load. A few were regular army men, but most were one-year selective service soldiers. The 2d Armored was a stepchild at Benning and so the embryonic tankers lived in flimsy, temporary shacks along the fringe of the airfield. Every day brought a new crisis: a fire in a mess tent . . a shortage of drinking water ... of fuel oil for lanterns (no electricity) ... of tools for repair work ... of weapons for training. To get a shower 2d Armored Division soldiers had to chisel the loan of a barracks shower room on the main post. Gradually, under Patton's sure hand the core of regular army officers brought a measure of orderliness to the new division. There was the artilleryman, Thomas Troy Handy, later to command all U.S. troops in Germany as a full general; there was 1. D. White, a cavalryman famed in dusty Berming for his dazzling boots-today he's one of the Army's top generals; there was Howard L. Peckham, the sharp commanding officer of the l7th Armored Engineers, who was to become a major general and a high-ranking officer of the Quartermaster Corps. Handy and Peckham were then lieutenant colonels, White was a major.

Armored cars of the 82nd Recon Battalion spearhead the advance of a tank column through a French village under Nazi fire. 36 Exactly one year before Pearl Harbor what might be called its first "public appearance"-a motor march to Panama City, Florida, and return. This was a total distance of 600 miles-the longest trek yet undertaken by a U.S. armored division. In Patton's procession were 101 light and 24 medium tanks, some horse units-and 200 trucks, brand-new from the factory in Detroit. One of the ancient mediums pooped out before it even left the post. Its over-eager commander rounded up a wrecker and said he'd make the march if SAGA he had to be towed the whole way. He was finally talked out of it at Dothan, some 50 miles down the road.

Patton grinned hugely when he heard the story. The Division built its own cantonment at Benning that spring-and quite a job it was since no one knew exactly how large an armored division was supposed to be. Ultimately the divisions of this branch were to go through seven reorganizations. Naturally the cantonment had to be changed each time the Division's structure was altered. In recalling those days when military funds, even for barracks building, were notoriously tight, Colonel Redding F. Perry (USA-Ret.) of Alexandria, Virginia, recalls that, "by devious means the Division bought two sawmills and cut over 9,000,000 feet of lumber to build maintenance sheds and bridges. Roads were hornswoggled out of a confused contractor"-and thus was Benning's "Sand Hill" born. Gen. George S. Patton (right) looks over his tanks with Major Gen. Hugh Gaffey, CO of the 2nd Armored Div.

Under "Blood and Guts" Patton's dynamic leadership the Official U.S.Army Photos

Riflemen of the 2nd Armored Div. pick their way through the rubble of a German strongpoint, leveled by tanks and artillery.

January, 1956

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The equipment comes first. The crew of a self-propelled artillery piece settles down to eat after camouflaging its 105 mm. Division thrived and took on a character not unlike that of its commanding general. It was proud, tough, cocky and cantankerous. A tanker who served with it in those fledgling days recalls, "Everybody that had any contact with us hated us-we were good and we knew it." In April, 1941, when the Division was less than a year old, it was stripped of many of its trained officers and noncoms who were sent to Camp Beauregard, Louisiana, to cadre the newly formed 3rd Armored Division. Many of this new division's top leaders (including two commanding generals) came from the 2d Armored which was to win something of a reputation as a breeding place for top combat leaders. A rugged series of maneuvers were ahead for the men of the 2d Armored Division as 1941 progressed and replacements were trained to fill the holes left by the departed cadre. June found the Division in Tennessee to participate in General Ben Lear's Second Army maneuvers. The Secretary of War, the Hon. Henry L. Stimson, laid aside desk duties in Washington and traveled out into the field to see how his one-time "protege" was faring. Patton had served as one of Stimson's aides before World War I and down through the years Mr. Stimson continued to follow Patton's Army career with interest. Patton eagerly anticipated showing Mr. Stimson the great striking power of the 2d Armored. His script called for the establishment of a bridgehead across the Duck River to be followed by the swift movement of an armored column that would strike deep into the "enemy's" rear. The 17th Armored Engineers got their bridge in place as Patton, Mr. Stimson, a host of VIPs and staff officers in old-style tin hats assembled on the riverbank to watch the tankers strut their stuff. But the first vehicle to break from cover was not a tank belching death and destruction-it was a shiny red Coca Cola truck! That entire summer was spent in the field as the Division took part in the Third Army maneuvers under General Walter Krueger. Then the 2d was ordered to take part in the big war games between Second and Third Armies. Patton was ordered to cut loose and encircle the enemy. He sped to the Gulf of Mexico and roared back up the Texas side of the Sabine River. His division moved like greased lightning for 48 hours and wound up in the enemy's rear. When he had run out of oil he cranked up, went out to the refineries, and bought what he needed to keep his tankers on the move. What he would have given for such a source of supply a couple of years later when he was stymied at Metz for lack of fuel oil! After he "ripped them apart" in Louisiana, Patton took his division, by this time nicknamed "Hell on Wheels" back up north to the Carolinas and the important First Army maneuvers. The First Armored Corps (the 1st and 2d Armored Divisions) was used as a whole for the first time in those maneuvers which pitted Lt. General Hugh A. Drum's Army against Major General Oscar W. Griswold's IV Corps. Griswold's Corps though smaller numerically than Drum's Army was supposed to make up this deficiency by use of the striking power of its massed armor. The maneuvers were an important step in the U.S. development of its own "panzer warfare" techniques, but several of the infantry generals growled that the armored people had a tendency "to operate independently and without too much apparent regard for other members of the team." War came to the United States on December 7, 1941--SAGA 38 first anniversary of the "Hell on Wheels" motor march to Panama City. And the 2d Armored was having its war, too, with the rest of Fort Benning. There was many a bloody beachhead on the Phenix City side of the Chattahoochee River in those days. Now the Army had to move fast in its wartime expansion. On Christmas Day the War Department ordered the formation of the Second Armored Corps. There was some upper-echelon reshuffling and General Scott was moved from First Armored Corps to command of the Armored Center at Fort Knox, Kentucky. George S. Patton, meanwhile, had acquired a second star and in February he was given command of the First Armored Corps-the first of a series of important promotions. After 16 rugged months in which he had pulled the 2d Armored Division together and welded it into a fighting team, Patton bid farewell to what was to remain, to the end of his days, his best loved command. He assembled the "Hell 6n Wheels" soldiers and said goodbye in his own inimitable fashion which is best understood by soldiers. He prefaced his final remarks with the words, "When the 2d Armored Division crosses the Rhine River.. ." and there was a spontaneous roar from his men. They were to think of his prophecy three years later when they smashed across the river barrier into the heartland of Hitler's Germany. For a time the Division came under the command of Major General Willis D. Crittenberger (whose son Dale serves in the Division today). "Critt," like Patton, was a senior tank expert and it was he who was largely responsible for readying the Division for its service overseas although he was destined never to command the "Hell on Wheels" in combat. In June, 1942, in a movement cloaked in secrecy, the Division's 390 tanks, self-propelled guns and half-tracks were loaded on railroad flat cars and sent thundering up from Benning to a secret railhead on the South Carolina-North Carolina border. Wheeled vehicles, meanwhile, sped north on the highways from western Georgia, while the troops rode by rail and motor to rendezvous-for another session of arduous maneuvers. Once again it was "the reds vs the blues" and for five full weeks the raring-to-go 2d Armored took the field to bedevil the "enemy," its own superiors and the poor umpires who grew to dread a situation in which "Hell on Wheels" units would be involved. "They oughta send them over; they're ready," growled a (Continued on page 75)

"Hell on Wheels" slowed down long enough on Sicily to take in a USO show, featuring Al Jolson singing his immortal "Mannny.

Hell on Wheels continued from page 39 mud-streaked lieutenant colonel-umpire who had nearly been run down by all irate tank sergeant of 1. D. White's Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron. Then. with the formation of another Armored Corps (the Third), Crittenberger left -the third of the 2d Armored Division commanders to leave for ;I higher command. The Division thereupon came under a man on whom a good deal of its combat career was to rely-- Nason Harmon, a New Englmider (from Verillont by way of West Point) known in the Army as "Old Gravel Voice." Ernie Harmon, a tough former cavalry man also became a Corps commander after a while, and it Was lie whom General Eisenhower handpicked to head up the crack Constabulary Force in Germany after World War 11. Today "Old Gravel Voice" is the vigorous, hard-working president of Norwich University. which few people seem to realize is the oldest private military college in this country-older even than VMI or The Citadel. Harmon led the Division to Fort Bragg where it Went into bivouac and sweated out its orders. In small parcels, elements of the Division were attached to the Amphibious Forces for invasion training in Chesapeake Bay and some very damp "dry runs" were made against enemy held beaches on Solomon's Island in the lower bay.

Then, early in September (1942), three invasion teams were selected from the Division and organized amid great mystery and secrecy. The invasion teams were moved out one at a time until all had quietly cleared the Fort Bragg area. They didn't know it at the time of course. but they were headed for a combat rendezvous on the French Moraccan coast with their old mentor-Patton. Patton commanded the Western Task Force with the mission of capturing Casablanca and French Morocco. Other U.S. Forces, meanwhile, were to seize Oran and Algiers. The great Allied invasion of the Dark Continent was launched at 0400 oil November 8. 1942. The landing teams under Patton's command headed for the beaches at Fedala and Port Lyautey above Casablanca. and Sall, 140 miles below the port city. At Fedala, 16 miles above Casa, the 2d Armored landing team encountered heavy resistance on the beach but soon encircled the city and waited to learn how the others had fared. The Port Lyautey landing teams had to battle a heavy surf, and several lighters carrying armored vehicles capsized. On the beach the light screen of French resistance Was overcome but around eight A.M.. when onlv seven of his tanks were on the beach. Sernmes' battalion of the 66th Armored Regiment was attacked by a force of 32 French tanks (two-man Renaults). The "Hell on Wheels" tankers, though outnumbered, counterattacked quickly and pushed the French armor back to a wadi (Arabic word for an arroyo or gully caused by erosion) three miles inland. Later in the morning, 11 more light U.S. tanks joined the fight, and by three in the afternoon the French Were routed-only eight of their tanks survived the wadi fight. Meanwhile soldiers of the 41st Armored

Infantry and the 17th Armored Engineers engaged a French regiment and drove it back into the hills. In both of these fights, the 2d Armored units Were attached to other commands. But Safi was strictly a "Hell on Wheels" show with Ernie Harrmon in command of the landing team which included the 47th Infantry Regiment of the 9th Division, his own Combat Command B led by Brigadier General Huge J. Gaffey, and Colonel I. D. White's 2d Armored "Sea Tra in""--a ssa Lilt units with supply and maintenance elements in support. Harmon's landing team swiftly overcame the defenders of Safi and overran the airfield and port installations. By nightfall the entire landing team Was in an assembly area ashore. Shortly before noon the following day reports reached Harmon that a large French force from Marrakech was headed their way to join in the defense of Casablanca. Gaffey's Combat Command B (CCB) rolled out to make the intercept and defeated small detachments on the road. The main French force, however, moved into the hills about 25 miles east of Safi and Hari-non prepared to march on them with his full striking force, Fortunately, before any additional French and American blood was spilled, an armistice was signed on November 11. This brought the Division's first combat experience to a hasty conclusion and after a few days in Casablanca, the 2d Armored was ordered to the FrenchSpanish Morocco border to stand guard duty and continue training. Around the first of the year (1943) it was joined by the remainder of the Division, which had come overseas from Fort Dix, New Jersey. Harmon and the 2d Armored marked time on the Moroccan border while other divisions engaged the Afrika Korps in Tunisia. Then came Kasserine Pass and -hurriedly-2,000 men from the 2d had to be rushed to the fighting front to help save the lst Armored. The latter division was beset by one reverse after ,inother. The weakened "Old Ironsides" failed to take the high ground near Maknassy and General Patton (commandinct II Corps) was about fit to bust. He peremptorily sent for Gravel Voice Harmon and ordered him to relieve the commander of the lst Armored. This switch set off a chain reaction in the 2d Armored chain of command. Harmon took with him Colonel (later Brigadier General) Maurice Rose, his chief of staff. General Gaffey was taken from CCB to become Patton's chief' of' staff and Brigadier General Allen Kingman who had brought the remainder of the Division overseas, was named commander. But Harmon, Gaffey and Rose maintained their close ties with the Division and returned to it, from time to time, to brief it on the progress of the fighting and to pass along reports on their own combat experiences. In May Kingman was sent to organize French armored forces and Gaffey returned to take command of the Division and receive his second star. Rose, too, returned and took charge of Combat Command A (CCA) then in the Fifth Army Invasion Training Center in Algeria. Combat Command B fotlowed. It was evident that the 2d Armored was about to start slugging again, The next target was the island of Sicily, just across the narrow straits from Italy itself. July 10 was designated D-Day and Maurice Rose's CCA hit the invasion beach in the 3rd Infantry Division sector and fought its way north despite heavy fire from snipers, anti-tank weapons and German dive bombers. For nearly five days it maintained contact with the enemy on a 30-mile front. Combat Command B landed near Gela in the Ist Infantry Division sector and was still working with the Big Red One when the vaunted Hermann Goring Panzer Division launched its D plus 1 counterattack that threatened the Allied beachhead. A tank platoon from CCB swung into action and helped the doughfeet throw back the 40-tank attack. One of the 2d Armored mediums was credited

with the destruction of three Mark VI Tiger tanks, a personnel carrier and an ammunition truck. July 18 the Division reorganized to fight as a unit for the first time. Patton, as Seventh Army commander, formed a Provisional Corps that was to clean up the western tip of the island and it was to this force he assigned the 2d Armored. After Campobello, General Gaffey fought his division westward until it reached the Belice River. Then he pivoted north lot, the assault on Palermo. As the Division pushed nearer Palernio, enemy resistance stiffened. Combat Command A was in the van with CCB following when the "Hell on Wheels'' encountered a strong force of Germans holding a vital pass four miles northwest of San Guiseppe. Dismounted patrols supported by tank and artillery fire had to close with this enemy and loot him out. Finally Palermo fell and it was turned over to the 3d Infantry Division-the 2d Armored moved on. A detail was ordered to move out in advance of the main body to fill a large crater in the only available route through Gagliano. The ten-man detachment had scarcely begun work when two German machine guns opened on them. Sergeant Gerry Kisters, from Bloomington, Indiana, headed for the first gun and, with the help of another soldier, captured the position and the four-man gun crew. At once the captured machine-gun nest became the target for fire from the other emplacement. This time Kisters went it alone. He crawled angrily toward this position and on the way he was shot in both legs and his right arm-and that didn't slow him down. He vaulted into the gun emplacement with his pistol blazing to kill three of the crew. A fourth fled for his life. Soon all of the Axis defenses in the western sectors were destroyed and while it waited for the Military Government people to take over, the 2d Armored set up shop in a number of towns and villages to help restore law and order. Then Gaffey regrouped his tankers and training was resumed. The Division said goodbye to Sicily on November 11 and, at sea, its convoy was joined by another carrying the Division's rear echelon which had remained behind in North Africa. After a routine trip the Division debarked in England, November 26, and moved swiftly to Tidworth Barracks in Salisbury Plain. This British Army post 100 miles west of London was to be the home of the "Hell on Wheels" Division until it left for the invasion of France. Armor had its critics in the U. S. high command. As D-Day approached one of the Army's top commanders wondered aloud, "whether armor will pay its freight remains to be seen." Late in May the Division started moving to secret ports of embarkation along the southern coast of England. Brigadier General Rose boarded a vessel carrying elements of the 2d Infantry Division as his orders were to get ashore quickly and establish an advance command post. The 2d Armored was scheduled to be placed ashore on June 9- plus 3. Its destination was a place called Omaha Beach . . . Omaha Beach, on D plus 1, was a blood-drenched strip of sand on which elements of five battered U.S. divisions (three infantry and two airborne) had a foothold that was tenuous at best. A steady stream of reinforcements bolstered them and soon it was evident that we had come to France to stay. General Rose, on D plus 1, reached the officer in charge of beach operations and asked when his troops could come ashore. He was told the 2d Armored units would have to wait, that nothing must

interfere with the schedule that had been arranged. Rose left him and said nothing. But within a few hours the advance party of the 2d Armored was ashore-General Rose having made his own arrangements for unloading. For this the beach-party officer never forgave him, but thanks to Rose CCA was ready when the 101st Airborne was in desperate need of help at Carentan. This was possibly the most vital point in the beachhead because U.S. forces were spread thinly. The gallant paratroopers had been holding on grimly since their air drop hours before the seaborne forces struck at Omaha. Rose's CCA and elements of the 101st teamed up for a dawn attack. The enemy, hardly expecting U.S. armor this early in the fray, was taken completely by surprise. Several days later (June 13) an important German Army Field Order was found which disclosed the plan whereby the Nazis had hoped to drive a wedge into the Allied beachhead to split the landing force. All that had prevented them was the sudden and unexpected appearance of CCA with its armor. It turned out to be a damned good thing MaUrie Rose was so impatient to get his outfit established ashore. The 2d Armored ranged out into Normandy, pulverizing the enemy at close range. until July 2 when it relieved the British 7th Armored south of Livry and established defensive positions. On July 17 it was relieved by the British 50th Brigade. From the assembly area Brooks was ordered to take the Division into the VII Corps sector to ready it for the assault that was to crack open the Germans' formidable St. Lo-Vire River line. The "Hell on Wheels" tankers had been picked to exploit the gambit that was to go down in the history books as the "St. Lo Breakthrough." On the morning of July 26, Combat A sliced through the enemy's lines to seize Canisy and to engage two enemy panzer divisions in the running duel that followed. This was armor versus armor-what the "Hell on Wheels" tankers had been waiting for. The 2d Battalion of the 66th Armored Regiment fought a series of running battles that led to the award of a Distinguished Unit Citation for having "met and decisively defeated some of the best panzer and panzer grenadier units in the German army." During the height of the bitter struggle the battalion commander's tank was shot out from under him. There was no time to get another so he perched himself on one of his company commanders' tanks and rode pick-a-back through the rest of the engagement. He was shot in the side and painfully hurt, but he "stayed in the saddle" and led his battalion's fight through to the finish. The Germans resorted to fierce night attacks in an effort to unbalance the "Hell on Wheels" timing. Once, when the infantry outposts were overrun, the artillery and tank destroyers had to fire at point-blank range to drive the intruders out. In one night-time action, 800 tank-supported Nazis stormed the Division reserve outpost line and hand-to-hand fighting ensued. When this Donnybrook ended 250 Germans had been killed, 500 had been taken prisoner. During an attack near Grimesnil, France, Sergeant Hulon B. Whittington of the 41st Armored Infantry Regiment, took command of his platoon after its lieutenant disappeared in the swirl of battle. Whittington checked the men in their defensive positions, then stiffened as he saw a column of Mark V tanks lumbering toward his roadblock. He raced for the nearest U.S. tank, clambered aboard and, by shouting through the turret, he "talked" it into firing Position and directed its fire. --Now!" lie yelled hoarsely as enemy machine-gun fire whined around him, "Fire"' The tank cannon roared, recoiled, and roared again! The lead tank was disabled and the entire German panzer column crashed to a halt. Whittington leaped off the tank and

rallied his infantrymen. "Okay," he shouted, "now ,N,e go to work!" The men surged after him to attack the stalled German armor with hand grenades and bazookas. German infantrymen who had accompanied the tank thrust surged out to meet Whittington's men. The sergeant from Bastrop, Louisiana, called for his men to fix bayonets. Then he led them in a bitter charge which drove the Germans from the field. In the closerange exchange of gunfire the platoon's aid man was hit. Whittington dropped beside him to apply first aid. Suddenly the shouting stopped and the rifle fire slackened. "Where are they now?" Whittington asked as he looked up from the blood-spattered medic. "Done gone, sergeant," one of the boys replied with a broad grin. Finally the breakthrough was a fait accompli. The Division continued its dash across France toward Belgium. On the way, General Brooks pulled an intricate tactical maneuver as he sent the Division artillery and armor on a 50-mile sprint against the enemy's vulnerable flank near Barenton. Thus the German movement toward Avranches was shattered and the 2d Armored stayed on that front a week to play an important part in the near-annihilation of the German 7th and 15th Armies as they fled eastward through the narrowing Falaise-Argentan gap. Then-off to the races again! Two daylight marches resulted in the seizure of 60 miles as the 2d Armored crossed the Seine and pursued the enemy through northern France. By the second day of September another 145 miles had been ticked off as the "Hell on Wheels"living, up to its name-smashed across the Somme, scene of great World War I battles. There wasn't time to give the old battlefields more than a passing glance as the Division swept aside everything in its path and thundered on toward Belgium. General Brooks, seated in a jeep, was parked at a crossroads near Cambrai as his warriors clattered by. His last tank cleared the road junction as a Frenchman toiled up the intersecting road, pumping an ancient bicycle furiously. "Les Boches, les Boches- " lie exclaimed, pointing back over his shoulder. Brooks flung his radio operator a warning to get the transmitter warmed up and asked the old man how many Germans he had seen. "Beaucoup, beaucoup-" came the breathless response. Brooks hurriedly called back part of his column and swiftly deployed it on both sides of the road. A few minutes later the German column rode right into the trap. When the advance was resumed , patrols of the 82d Recon plunged over the Belgian border neat, Runies and the "Hell on Wheels" became the first liberating unit into Belgium. The advance from the Somme had taken exactly 36 hours. Now the Nazis were getting a lesson in U. S. techniques in panzer warfare. The Division attacked as far as the strongly defended Albert Canal and paused. It was here that electrifying news reached the tankers. General Brooks was named V Corps commander and Old Gravel Voice was back' Fresh from fighting the Ist Armored Division through Italy, Ernie Harmon, at his request was back for a second tour as commander of the 2d Armored. Harmon booted the Division across the Albert Canal and sped toward the Gel-man border. The "Hell oil Wheels" knifed across the border at Schimmert. Then, on orders from up high. it halted in its tracks and organized defensive positions near Geilenkirchen. Here, it was arrayed before the vaunted defenses of Hitler's West Wall, the Siegfried Line. Harmon's attack on the Line got underway when Combat Command B sent its armor storming across the Wurm River toward

the enemy's guns. Then CCA raced into battle and the knockdown, drag-out fight of armor vs. heavily fortified stationary defenses was on. Lieutenant Colonel Harry L. Hillyard's battalion (the 3rd of the 67th Armored Regiment) earned the honor of being first to pierce the West Wall. Hillyard's tankers suffered terrible losses in the fight as they pressed the attack time and time again until the victory was theirs. Hillyard's magnificent four-day battle paved the way for the Division and XIX Corps. Meanwhile elements of CCA became involved in the effort to Close the Aachen gap. In one of the crucial spots was Captain James M. Burt's Company B of the 66th Armored Regiment. Burt was attached to an infantry battalion fighting near Wurselen. The task force to which he was attached ran into a violent hail of small-arms and mortar fire and was stalled. Burt calmly clambered Out of his tank and moved out in front of the infantry. With the enemy concentrating its fire on him lie motioned his tanks into good firing positions. With this impressive firepower to back them up, the infantrymen surged forward as Burt leaped back on his tank to direct the action from the exposed rear deck. He was hit in the face and neck but stuck to his post until important advances had been made. Then he moved his tanks up to the infantry's advance positions and deployed them to help defend the ground that had just been captured. There was a powerful German counterattack the following morning and Burt, upon learning that the infantry battalion commander had been badly wounded, raced 75 yards through murderous gun fire to reach the wounded officer's side. In the eight hellish days that followed, it was Burt who held the battered force together and kept it at a fighting pitch. Soaked by rain, harassed by artillery bombardment the task force seemed to be fighting a war all its own. Burt's example led them to overcome the wretched and hazardous situation and enabled them, finally, to close the Aachen gap. After six weeks in holding positions east of the Wurm, the Division was ordered to begin a new assault November 16. Its purpose was to cross over the Roer, to reduce Julich on the road to Cologne. D-day was marked by the same miserable weather that had plagued them for weeks-heavy rains causing flooded streams and washed-out roads Ernie Harmon was plenty worried. He hopped into a tank and plunged into the fields to see what it would be like. Even in low gear he could negotiate only two or three miles an hour. He was more worried than ever when he turned to the young tank commander. "Well," he rasped, "Can we make it, sergeant?" "Yes sir!" Harmon looked at him quizzically then sloshed back to his CP. He put in a call call to Lieut. General William H. Simpson, the Ninth Army Commander. "General," he yelled into the field phone, "the mud's going to be a serious handicap but it won't stop the 2d Armored!". He launched his attack shortly after noon (following an intense artillery barrage) and gains were reported all "along the front that first. day. But. the Germans hit- back-hard. -Tiger tanks manned by Afrika Korps veterans came up to engage the Shermans of the 2d Armored. Harmon's new tank destroyers .swung into action. The TD boys had spanking new self-propelled nineties. They helped the Division beat off four frantic panzer attacks in three straight days. Then, on November 20, it was once again tank versus tank and the "Hell on Wheels" was again locked in mortal combat in what German military historians choose to call "the greatest tank battle of the Western Front." Each American advance drew a fresh counterattack. For 12 days this running tank duel continued until the 2d Armored Division bagged the town of Barmen, the last

objective west of the Roer in its sector. Nearly 100 enemy tanks had been destroyed in battle in the march to this new river line. Consolidating the Division's positions the infantry took over. Company F of the 4 Ist Armored Infantry led by -Lieutenant George F. Bonney jumped off to assault a prominent ridge. They moved forward cautiously and were surprised that they: drew no enemy fire. Staff Sergeant Paul W. Gritman almost stumbled over something-then quickly realized he had come upon two sleeping German .soldiers. Around them- was a small arsenal: - 14 burp guns, several rifles -and a bazooka. Gritman and Lieutenant G. Schnittker checked the area and found 14 more., Gernlans-all fast asleep. Awakehed for a march to a PW camp the group said they had been sent to hold the ridge but had gone to sleep instead. Harmon remained west of the Roer until mid-December. To -keep the enemy alert he sent frequent patrols across but all plans for continuing the November offensive and a quick dash to the Rhine were disrupted as Von Rundstedt launched his Ardennes offensive December 16. Five days later General Harmon received the emergency order which resulted in the Division's night forced march (75 miles in 22 hours) from Germany to the Huy sector in menaced Belgium. The 2d Armored plunged into what history was to name the "Battle of the Bulge". "We fought the Germans and the weather," recalls General Harmon. "As enemies they were almost equally deadly. Frozen feet-cost me more men than German bullets. The deep snow was murder on tanks. They had to move slowly and were easy targets for enemy gunners on the high ground. I remember an incident when 12 tanks sank in snow, and almost disappeared from sight. I saw tanks bumping one another during courageous night attacks." An engineering feat which in retrospect seems almost an impossibility kept the Division's armor in action through those terrible days, and later earned a DUC for Lt. Col. Louis W. Correll's men of the 17th Armored Engineer Battalion. During the Ardennes fight a supply of rubber tank tracks arrived-and -it was essential that they replace the steel tracks, which had proven practically useless in the snow and on ice. 'Those steel tracks," recalls General Harmon, weighed a ton each. Removing them was a rugged job-but our en gineers did it without slowing the momenturn, of our fight." The engineers withdrew tanks in groups of twos or threes and in this way the whole Division was re-equipped while on the move. It had been hoped that the Division's presence in Germany could be kept secret. But - the Germans turned unexpectedly toward the Division and ran into Harmon's Recon Patrol December 23. 'The patrol leader quickly reported back to Harmon and the general, without wasting a moment, raced to where Lieut.. Colonel Hugh R. O'Farrell had bivouacked his tank battalion. Harmon sent O'Farrell on his way toward the enemy with the throttles wide open while Combat Command A raced to secure the Belgian village that figured to be the enemy's objective. O'Farrell, leading his 3d Battalion of the 66th Armored Regiment through the pitch-black darkness heard the unmistakable noises of a German armored force moving toward him. ******************************************************* 2nd ARMORED DIVISION MEDAL OF HONOR WINNERS

commander of the U. S. First Army, wrote: "Your division destroyed the 2d Panzer Division. Its overwhelm ing defeat by your division is regarded as an outstanding and distinguished feat of arms." Several days after the battle was broken off Harmon sat down to compose his report to General Bradley. It was masterly summary: "We got in front of the 2d Panzer Division on December 23, 24, and 25, and polished them off. Attached is a list of spoils we took --including 1,200 prisoners. Killed and wounded some 2,500. A great slaughter." On the very same day he received Harmon's report, Bradley also learned from Patton that the 4th Armored Division had broken through to relieve Bastogne. Armor was paying its freight! Harmon shifted eastward and teamed with the 84th Infantry Division for another attack against the Germans' Ardennes salient The two divisions struck at the Germans over ice-coated highways and steep, snow-filled trails. The Division's foot soldiers carried the burden of the fight through Ciney . . . Conjoux . . . Soinne ... Grandmenil ... Odeigne ... into the rubble of Houffalize. Now it was Ernie Harmon's turn to be rewarded for success. He was ordered to take command of the XXII,Corpsthefifth of the Division's commanders to lead a Corps. Now I.D. White who had joined the Division in its early days at Benning as a major, took command of the "Hell on Wheels" and became a major general. As the Division turned into Germany itself, he led it as commanding general. Quickly the Division surged back to the Roer to prepare to help launch Ninth Army's drive to the Rhine. This exploit, labeled "Operation. Grenade," was probably Ninth Army's most brilliant contribution to the victory in Europe and its success was in no little way due to the success of the 2d Armored. This was, in a sense, a continuation of "the interrupted' November offensive. General Simpson proposed to use his armor to force an opening for his Army. Combat Command B raced for the Adolph Hitler Bridge-but was foiled. It was too badly damaged to be used by tanks. Nevertheless the Division's rapid movement to the Rhine yielded important dividends as one. West Rhine town after another fell to the Ninth Army-- and now it was only a question of time until a bridgehead could be thrown across. With the Division assembled south of Krefeld, Division artillery concentrated on targets east of the Rhine while the engineers slaved to complete their biggest job of the war-an 1152-foot treadway bridge across the-historic Rhine. They did it in a record seven hours! Once across the Rhine, the rampaging 2nd Armored moved swiftly to disrupt all communications out of the vital Ruhr Valley rail, center of Hamm. It sliced across the Autobahn to sever the main supply routs between Berlin and the Ruhr. The 2d Armored hurled itself across the north rim of the Ruhr to Lippstadt. April 2, the day after Easter Sunday, the "Hell on Wheels" linked up with the 3rd Armored Division, the outfit it had spawned. From the "Spearhead Division" tankers the men of the 2nd Armored sadly learned, the details of Maurie Rose's death at Padeborn the day before. Rose had commanded the 3rd since his departure from CCA of the 2nd after Normandy. General Simpson again placed the "Hell on Wheels" in the lead in his postwar edition of the 2d Armored made dash for the Elbe. I. D. White sped north of the rugged Harz Mountains and on the evening of April 12 (309 days since the Omaha Beach D-Day) Combat Command B closed to the bank of the Elbe. It had rolled 71 miles in ten hours. The Division pushed a bridgehead across the Elbe, and the Germans sent three divisions barreling out of Berlin to smash it. A defensive line was

Pictured here is the Congressional Medal of Honor, awarded to soldiers, sailors and marines, who in action involving conflict with an enemy, distinguish themselves conspicuously by gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of life above and beyond the call of duty. It is the highest military decoration of the U. S. armed forces. WORLD WAR II Captain James M Burt, Lee, Mass. Sgt. Gerry Kisters, Bloomington, Ind. Sgt. Hulon B. Whittington, Bastrop, La. ******************************************************* He moved quickly and split his force along both sides of the road in the forest. The Germans lumbered into range And in the minutes that followed O'Farrell accomplished something that is extremely rare in battle-an armored ambush! The German force was wiped out and, General Harmon told SAGA'S writer that-this action without a doubt "blunted the edge *of the German spearhead trying to get across the Meuse River and, to my mind, was a very critical incident-one that had a great bearing on the successful outcome of the battle for us during the next four or five days.,' On Christmas day, I. D. White, now a brigadier general in command, of Cell, .swung southeast as the German 2d Panzer Division attacked near, Celles and cut off the Germans' escape route. Soon, the Germans in the Celles pocket were surrounded. But the German command launched a series of determined attacks against White in an effort to rescue the Panzer troops. Gen. John M. Collier's CCA, meanwhile, had gained the town of Humain, but had been counterattacked and driven out. The Germans counterattacked again and again, hoping to crash through Collier's lines to White's sector some 15 miles away. On December 26, White was attacked by a German column of Mark V and Mark VI tanks. Rather than slug it out with his Shermans, White contacted the British and asked for a strike by their rocket-firing Typhoons. The-British were willing but pointed out that none of the radio sets in the 2d Armored could contact the aircraft to guide them to the target. White had a ready answer for that. He grinned and called his artillery spotter. A few minutes later American troops on the ground were treated to the unusual sight of a tiny Piper Cub leading a squadron of Typhoons through the sky. Suddenly the Cub dived to mark the target tanks moving up the road toward Celles-then it streaked for home. The Typhoons screamed down. Rockets blazed from under their wings. They attacked again, then departed for home leaving shattered steel hulks that had once been Tiger and Panther tanks in their wake. The few tanks that survived the action skedaddled for safer parts ~ with I.D. White's troops in hot pursuit. Harmon then sent Collier and CCB counterattacking south while CCR (Combat Command Reserve) stormed back into Humain. In the Division's action, 30 Belgian towns and villages were liberated and 100 square miles of Belgian soil cleansed of Germans. Montgomery wired his congratulations to Harmon. General Hodges,

formed on the west bank of the river as the Division caught its breath. Then Combat Command A and the 30th Infantry Division launched an assault on Magdeburg. The German city and 2,600 PWs promptly fell. The end was clearly in sight. But there were still Germans who wanted to fight it out. A strong enemy force called "Combat Team Von Clausewitz" struck at the Division's rear in the Konigslutter Forest, White deployed his tankers and set up roadblocks, covering all exits from the forest. Division artillery thundered into action systematically destroying the enemy force. Five hundred Nazis survived this action and were taken prisoner. This brought to 95,000 the Division's PW bag in World War II. Now the 2d Armored was relieved by an infantry division. It moved back to the Braunschweig area where it, took over a military government mission for a while. It was ordered to reassemble in the Salzgitter-Immendorf sector in early May and arrived there just as the Germans capitulated and the war in Europe came to a crashing conclusion. After seven wartime campaigns in which it had wrested 1,700 miles of terrain from the enemy, old "Hell on Wheels" was done with fighting. The Division was shifted from the Ninth to the Seventh Army and before the end of June, 3,200 "high-point men" left for the States. General White departed and Brigadier General Collier took over. On July 3 the 2d Armored embarked upon a 100-mile march that took it through the Russian Zone to Berlin. When Collier led the "Hell on Wheels" through Berlin on U. S. Independence Day it earned the distinction of being the first American division to appear in the German Capital. New occupation duties were assigned to the scrubbed-up, spit-and-polish tankers. There were parades and review for the first time in years. The veterans of the 41st Regiment's campaigns fell out for a special detail, and perked up when they learned they had been chosen as President Harry S. Truman's special guard for the Potsdam Conference. General Patton came to Berlin to visit his old outfit for the last time before his death and his return brought back memories of Fort Benning, Louisiana Maneuvers and Patton's own prophecy that the Division would be among those to cross the Rhine. The end of July found the Division on the move once again-this time to Frankfurt. There it remained five months during which Major General John M. Devine took command. The war in the Far East came to an end and soon the entire military picture was changing. A vast redeployment was in store for the rapidly shrinking Army Soon the 2d Armored was on its way home even though it-was to remain in the active army. Under Major General John W. Leonard the victor of the Remagen Bridgehead, the Division reassembled at Fort Hoiod, Texas, in March, 1946. The new, postwar edition of the 2nd Armored made its first public appearance in the States on the occasion of San Antonio's Army Day parade. The 2nd had fought through World War II as one of the Army's two "heavy" divisions (the other was the 3rd Armored). Now it was reorganized and its bulky armored regiments were withdrawn. In their places were inserted highly mobile, power-packing tank battalions and armored infantry battalions. The, outbreak of war in Korea found the new 2d Armored still stationed at Fort Hood. Four battalions were bodily-detached -from the Division and dispatched to the Far East where they were to distinguish them selves while attached to new parent di visions., The 2d Armored provided thou sands of battle replacements during the early days of the Korean conflict and it readied 20,000 enlisted reservists who had been called back to the-colors. No one was surprised. when the "Hell-on, Wheels" was suddenly alerted for shipment to Europe in May of 1951, Communist aggression threatened troubledbled Europe and the NATO forces, needed a shot in - the arm, a division that would inspire respect and confidence. It was, clearly, a job for the 2dArmored Division. The "Hell on Wheels" gang in cluding a few of the old-timers like Master Sergeant George W. Murphy who has

been with the Division ever since it Was formed at Benning in 1940, once again found itself in Germany. For more than three years now it has bivouacked and maneuvered in the fields that could be the battlegrounds of tomorrow. The businesslike young men. of the new 2d Armored patrol their beats on the cold'-war front and sometimes they are reminded of the infancy of the Division, of the days when Georgie Patton told his tough tankers that wars are won with "blood and guts. "Blood and guts! Ever since the man -said it, that has always been the "Hell on Wheels" recipe for victory. * THE END