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Chapter Fourteen


Captured German 7.7cm Cannon

Captured German 7.7cm Cannon



Company B, 344th Tank Battalion, Near Varennes, France

The German artillery battery was dug in, with a clear field of fire all the way to the wood line. About a company’s worth of German infantry, in full retreat from their original positions minutes ago, were getting organized in and around the guns. Hank thought furiously as he examined their fortifications through his field glasses. He and an infantry company commander named Toliver from the 167th Alabama lay in a thicket near, but not right at, the edge of the forest, careful to stay concealed as they reconnoitered the enemy position. This was the third angle from which they’d viewed the howitzer emplacement.

With earthworks and sandbags surrounding each gun they would have good cover against even his tanks’ 37 mm cannons. The German 75s would have a distinct range advantage, though they’d be slower to traverse and thus have a harder time targeting the moving tanks, hopefully, than his gunners could traverse to engage them. The tanks were going to be moving much slower than a man could run over this terrain, though, so their mobility advantage might or might not be enough to counter the protection afforded by the enemy defenses.

Normally, the smart thing to do would be to halt the advance and send a runner back up through the chain to call in artillery on this strongpoint. The only drawback was that it might take an hour or more to get shells landing on target. Thus far, they’d advanced through the St. Mihiel salient at breakneck speed and all across the line the Germans were showing signs of rout, even panic. The Americans had all the momentum; this was their battle to lose.

Hank tapped the Alabaman captain on the elbow and raised his eyebrows questioningly. The infantry company commander nodded, indicating he’d seen as much of the enemy position as he needed as well. They crawled their way more than a hundred yards back into the woods through thorns and twigs and brush. Even this far back they didn’t stand straight up but rather kneeled to have a hasty conversation.

“What are you thinking, Thornton?” Toliver’s Alabama accent was a bit slower and syrupier than Hank’s own Texas drawl. The man was of medium height and thickly built with dark stubble covering his cheeks, lip, and jawline.

“I’m thinking they’ve got a great field of fire,” Hank said. “And those guns can definitely knock out my tanks. We’re going to have to be clever.”

“I’ve found that hollerin’ for as much artillery as you can get is just about the cleverest thing you can do for most tactical situations,” Toliver volunteered.

Hank snorted and gave a low chuckle.

“I would normally agree, but I don’t want to give them the breathing room it would take. We’re more than two miles from the nearest field phone to the artillery.” Hank gestured eastward. “When we traveled the woods in that direction, the trees were too close together in most places but there was a dry streambed just big enough for one of my Renaults to travel until it opens up on the enemy’s left.”

“You’re thinking we bypass their position?” Toliver asked.

Hank started drawing in the dirt with his finger. He traced one big oval to represent the enemy position, then a series of lines for Toliver’s infantry platoons and boxes for his tanks.

“Not exactly, just an envelopment. You keep two of your platoons and half my tanks, the ones carrying the Hotchkiss MGs. You form a base of fire against the enemythe trees are lighter here so the tanks can play peekaboodrive forward, pepper the enemy, then reverse back into the trees. While you’re fixing them in place, I’ll take one of your platoons and the other half of my tanks, those equipped with 37 mm cannons, up the streambed and envelop the enemy.”

Toliver nodded as Hank swept his right index finger through the dirt, indicating the maneuver.

“All right, your tanks will likely draw the artillery’s fire, so I’m going to put some lateral separation between them and my infantry.”

“Probably smart. Make sure everyone keeps their fire to the left of the lead tank in the flanking force, I’ll have your men follow behind my tanks so they don’t get nailed by friendly fire.”

Toliver nodded.

“Let’s get it done.”


With riflemen out to the flanks for security, Hank led his tanks up the streambed. The relative serenity of the sun-dappled forest was in sharp contrast to the staccato pops of machine guns and the basso booming explosions of the artillery resounding from their west. Listening to half of his command exchanging fire with the Germans without being able to see for himself how the fight was progressing wracked his nerves.

The shriek of an artillery round split the air, punctuated by the screech of shearing metal and a louder explosion than previous impacts. A moment later, a gray column of smoke rose over the woods to their west.

Hank fought the urge to break into a sprint. There was no point, as the Renaults couldn’t get through this forest any faster than the quick march. Showing up by himself, or with only the infantry who would be cut to pieces in the open terrain between the woods and the enemy position without the tanks, would do no one any good.

A few more agonizing minutes of travel brought them to the place where the streambed widened out into the plain. This angle on the German position revealed howitzer crews feeding rounds into their cannons at breakneck speed while their riflemen frenziedly worked the bolts on their rifles and their machine gunners cleared feed trays and swapped belts and drums of ammo.

They were focused on the woods to their south, where the wreck of one Renault FT17 smoldered amidst dozens of muzzle flashes from rifles and machine guns. The remaining tanks in that element were pulling forward to fire, then reversing back into the trees between bursts as planned, making it harder for the German artillery to score another direct hit.

Hank and his element hadn’t been spotted yet. He held up a hand signaling for the column to stop, then he straightened his arms out to his sides, parallel to the ground, indicating that the tanks should come on line as soon as they cleared the woods. He indicated with two fingers that they should bound in sections of two, one section advancing while the other kept up fire on the enemy from a stationary position.

As the tanks spread out for the attack, the Alabaman infantrymen fell in behind them, using the armored vehicles as mobile cover in the terrifyingly open terrain. Hank took up a perch atop his lead tank, crouched behind its turret where he could talk to the gunner commanding the vehicle. By the grace of God and carefully rehearsed maneuvers, they were in formation by the time the Germans saw them and shifted some of their firepower to the flank.

Rifle bullets ricocheted off steel and the German howitzer crew nearest them put their backs into the piece’s trails, swinging its muzzle around toward the new threat posed by Hank and his men. Hank shouted through the open hatch of the tank turret.

“Kowalski, kill that howitzer!”

Kowalski already had his eye to the gunsight, training it on the enemy, so Hank stood back up and shouted at the top of his lungs to be heard over the gunfire and tank engines.

“Concentrate fire on that howitzer!”

The Alabamans shot down three men of the howitzer crew, but the Germans must have known getting the piece into action was their only chance because each dead or wounded artilleryman was replaced on the trails by another soldier until the howitzer was pointed their direction.

Kowalski’s tank and his wing tank each belched fire and smoke, sending projectiles into the German lines. Hank rocked with the mild recoil of the Renault’s 37mm cannon. Both rounds landed beyond the howitzer, wounding a handful of German infantrymen but leaving the artillery piece untouched.

The German cannon answered the higher-pitched chorus of American small arms and tanks with a full-throated roar as it returned fire. The High-Explosive 77mm shell impacted behind the trail tank in 2nd Section with a bone-rattling BOOM. The gray burst of its fragmentation enveloped one of the rifle squads, sending several men to the ground screaming and clutching jagged-edged wounds.

The artillery piece was unquestionably more powerful, but the tank cannons were quicker. Four 37mm shells flew towards the howitzer; two landed astray again, but two struck home, blasting the breech of the cannon into wreckage and shredding the crew who had been trying to clear the breech for their next round.

With that artillery piece out of play, the Alabamans poured more fire onto the Germans, willing to poke their heads out from behind the tanks now. Hank leaned forward to talk to Kowalski through the hatch again.

“Great shot! Advance to that dip in the terrain, two hundred yards front-right.”

Hank held on tight as the tank treads churned the French field beneath him, bringing him closer to the enemy. While the ride crouched on the back deck of this contraption was about as different from a saddled horse as one conveyance could be from another, the cavalry officer in him was suddenly right at home.

The Alabamans were following his tanks unhesitatingly, stopping only briefly to fire at the Germans now and then. Back over Hank’s left shoulder, the other two tanks in the platoon fired two more high-explosive rounds every four seconds, supplemented by rifle and machine gun fire from the infantry that were traveling with them.

With their attention now split between two axes, the Germans were losing fire superiority in both directions. 1st Section halted in the depression in the ground, securing the defilade Hank had been angling for. At much closer range now, their first volley claimed another howitzer. Kowalski’s victory whoop was audible even over the din of battle.

By the time second section was on line, the Germans were flinging their rifles to the ground and throwing their hands up. The Alabama boys surged forward, urging their newly captured prisoners into neat rows on their knees with their fingers laced behind their heads. Captain Toliver brought up his other two platoons from the support-by-fire position. The surviving Hotchkiss-equipped tanks rolled up slowly behind him.

“Well done, Thornton,” Toliver grinned. “Your rattletraps are pretty darn useful.”

Hank chuckled.

“I’ll admit I had my doubts at first, but yes, I think you’re right,” Hank said. “We better push a security element north into the woods, just in case the Germans get their act together for a counterattack. We’ll need some more fuel and ammunition before we continue the advance.”

Hank dispatched one of his junior NCOs to find Major Brett or Colonel Patton to relay Company B’s situation and request fuel and ammo resupply. In the meantime he took stock. One of his tanks was a total loss, but miraculously both crewmen had survived, seriously wounded and a little crispy, but both had been conscious and intact as the litter teams carried them back to meet the ambulance. The rest of his tanks were fully intact and combat capable, provided they were fueled and rearmed soon.

Hank did a quick estimate counting the rows and columns of the captured Germans. There were at least seventy enemy POWs kneeling on the ground, Enfield 1917s leveled at them. A like number of German dead lay in and around their howitzers. Toliver’s Alabamans had lost nine killed and sixteen were wounded badly enough to need evacuation.

Nine dead and sixteen wounded Americans and one tank out of action in exchange for an enemy artillery battery and nearly ten times their casualties in enemy dead and captured. Hank couldn’t call it a bad day’s work.

Colonel Patton agreed wholeheartedly when he showed up. Surveying the captured Germans and cannons, he clapped Hank on the shoulder.

“Damn fine work, Thornton. Major Brett has A and C Companies rallied about a mile northwest of us. Meanwhile your old friends in the 69th have taken Essey with some help from the French.”

I hope Sigi is doing well.

“Yes, sir,” Hank said. “Our men did extremely well, the Alabamans, too. This is the first time I’ve seen the Germans break like this.”

Patton nodded, his expression turning thoughtful.

“We’re close to the end, Hank,” Patton’s tone was wistful. “We know it, the Germans know it. We’ve only got a few more weeks, maybe a couple of months, to really get it stuck in. This war may be over soon, but it won’t be the last. The reporters were full of shit when they labeled this The War to End All Wars. There isn’t a War to End All Wars until Kingdom Come. In the meantime, the tank is going to be vital to ground maneuver warfare, and if our brass aren’t convinced to invest in them, we’ll be caught behind when the shells start flying again.”

Hank hadn’t thought much about what came after the Great War. Hell, he hadn’t counted on surviving it. Much was made of Patton’s eccentricities, and Hank had witnessed them himself in the short time he’d served in the man’s brigade. Here he was, though, already contemplating how to win the next war. The man’s harsh leadership style and considerable ego aside, Patton was committed to the art of war more deeply than most men committed to anything.

Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of General Douglas MacArthur. He appeared from the wood line south of the artillery emplacement, several nervous-looking staff officers trailing him as MacArthur walked, unconcerned, toward the front.

“Would this be his royal nibs, Hank?” Patton asked, sotto voce, while MacArthur was still several dozen yards distant.

“Yes, sir, that’s General MacArthur.”

“Well, let’s go say hello.” Patton marched toward MacArthur and Hank fell in step just behind and to Patton’s left. They came to attention a few paces in front of MacArthur and his party and saluted crisply.

“Good morning, sir,” Patton said. “Lieutenant Colonel Patton, 1st Tank.”

MacArthur returned the salute with a touch of his swagger stick to the brim of his cap. MacArthur would not deign to wear anything so mundane as a helmet.

“Patton, I’m MacArthur, I command the 84th. Your tanks have been very helpful in our advance,” MacArthur said.

“Thank you, General,” Patton said. “With your permission, I’d like to get priority for my gasoline and ammo trucks to move forward to refuel and rearm my tanks to continue the advance.”

Before he answered, MacArthur’s eyes rested on Hank and his expression went cold.

“Henry, I see you’ve been promoted. Congratulations.” MacArthur’s tone was glacial. “I’m glad to see you’ve found gainful employment, though one thinks you might have rendered me the courtesy of a visit before departing my service.”

“I meant no offense, General,” Hank said, trying not fidget under MacArthur’s glare.

“I’m afraid it’s quite my fault, General,” Patton interjected. “You see, I got word of a young fire-breathing Texas Cavalryman about to be released from hospital and I had to snatch him up. I got his orders cut, got him trained up and in command of one of my companies so fast he had limited time for the courtesies you would normally expect.”

To Hank’s relief, MacArthur’s cold glance returned to Patton, who seemed utterly unfazed by it.

“Of course, I understand.” MacArthur’s voice was devoid of sincerity. “Exigencies of the service. I’ll see about your fuel and ammunition, Patton. Carry on.”

MacArthur strode away, off to spread joy to some other corner of the battlefield. Hank exhaled and slumped as soon as the man was out of earshot. Patton glanced at him and laughed.

“It seems General MacArthur is a mite peeved with you, ‘Henry,’” Patton said, imitating MacArthur’s tone on Hank’s Christian name. Though he’d been grateful that Patton had defended him, Hank was now annoyed with Patton’s mirth at his expense.

“He didn’t seem to like you very much either, sir.”

Patton shrugged.

“I’ve known MacArthur’s reputation for years, Hank; I’m not surprised,” Patton said. “I may be a prima donna, but do you know the difference between Doug MacArthur and God?”

Hank snorted.

“I can think of several, sir.”

“Certainly, but chief among them is that God doesn’t think he’s Douglas MacArthur.”




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