Tank Aces

Otto carius, started with pz 38(t) and ended the war with Jagtigers, between 150 -200 kills.

 

http://www.3ad.org/wwii_heroes/pool_laf ... nance1.htm

His crew consisted of driver, Wilbert "Baby" Richards, one of the best drivers in the ETO according to Pool; Bert "Schoolboy" Close who was just seventeen years old and was his bow gunner. Given the choice of prison on a manslaughter rap or the Army, Del "Jailbird" Boggs elected to be Pool's loader. Willis "Groundhog" Oller was the gunner. Pool said of Oller "He could shoot the eyebrows off a gnat at 1500 yards." He was very quick and alert. One time near Origny in France it was getting dark when the order came down to halt and coil up for the night. Pool opened his mouth to say "Driver, Halt," but found himself looking down the barrel of a German 88mm in the gloom ahead. He said "Gunner, Fire!" and Oller, without hesitation, holed the enemy gun before its crew could recognize the Sherman Tank.

 

Quote from "KV-1 & 2 Heavy Tanks" by Zaloga/Kinnear :

On 19 August 1941, a platoon of four KV-1s of the 1st Tank division successfully ambushed a German tank column advancing near the Voiskovitsy collective farm near Leningrad. The platoon leader, Sr.Lt. Zinoviy Kolobanov, knocked out the two lead tanks in the column. The following tanks apparently did not realise what had happened and continued to unwarily move forward. Kolobanov´s platoon moved into the midst of the German battalion, and in the melée that followed, Kolobanov destroyed a total of 22 German tanks, ramming at least one in the process. Kolobanov´s tank was hit 135 times during the firefight. The other three KVs destroyed a total of 16 other German tanks. Kolobanov´s feat made him the second highest ranking Soviet tank ace of the war.

Well, a few tanks short and not all by himself, but it is refreshing to hear about someone else than Wittman for a change.

One question which leaps to my mind however, is who the highest ranking Soviet tank ace was ?

 

Tank ace

Damned if I can remember the name but I did come across an account of a Russian recon tank armed with a 20mm peashooter that managed to take out two Tigers by dodging and weaving around infront of them until they exposed their flanks to anti tank guns

 

Here's another one:



http://www.achtungpanzer.com/gen10.htm


This mentions the actions of just THREE King Tigers of Schwere SS Panzerabteilung 103(503) on April 19th 1945. These three King Tigers wiped out over 100 T34/85s and and entire company of IS 2s in an ambush in some woods. Korner scored 39 possitively.

Later on that day these three King Tigers, with the assistance of a fourth King Tiger knocked out a further 30 plus T34s.

 

A KV-1 was a mean machine in 1941. You can understand how exasperated the German tankers must have been if you play Steel Panthers and start shooting a KV-1 with 37mm Panzer IIIs. The sound of shells bouncing off will drive you crazy. All you can do is hope for a track hit.

 

You can say that again!!

 

Indeed. It can be argued that the KV-1 was the best fighting tank available in 1941.

 

There were 3 Germans aces of aces. Otto, Wittman, and another German whose rank was only a sergeant-major. This sergeant-major was suppose to be the best as his 150+ were tanks, whereas Otto and Wittman listed theirs as vehicle kills.

Man, wish I could remember his name.

 

Maybe you are thinking of Ernst Barkmann (Panther ace)? The Germans had many panzer and assault gun aces, far more than any other combatant nation. As well as the famous ones such as Witmann, Carius and Barkmann there were other great aces such as Paul Egger (Tiger- 113 kills), Willy Jahde (Tiger), Fritz Herzig (Tiger), Albert Kerscher (Tiger), Karl Nicolussi-Leck (Panther), etc etc, I'm just picking out random names. There literally many of them.

 

One of the Sturmgeschütz aces, Oberwachtmeister Karl Pfreundtner of Sturmgeschütz-Brigade 244, here seen at Stalingrad, September 1942, receiving the Ritterkreuz for destroying nine Russian tanks within 20 minutes with his Stu.G. III Ausf. F/8.

 

Good post Christian. Assault gun aces were plentiful. An interesting subject. A good book is The Combat History Of Sturmgeschutz Brigade 276 by Heinz Fleischer published by JJ. Fedorowicz. It's all about assualt gun fighting on the eastern front 1943 to 1945.

 

One more for the whish list. My bookcase is already completely full, but I'm planning to soon move to something larger (not solely for this reason ), so that I can have more bookcases...

Christian

 

I like how in that picture of the Stalingrad StuG that we can see it is sprayed in a sand yellow base coat long before the official order came in (Feb 1943). Most interesting and it goes to show that quite a few German armoured vehicles had the dunkelgelb or the other early shade ('Afrika yellow shade') in practice long before the official order.

 

This is another photo showing Africa camouflage (most likely Gelb-braun base with Grau-grün or Grau camouflage).

It is a Pz.Kpfw. III Ausf. L, and is taken in Woronesch 22 July 1942. It is a vehicle from 16. Inf.Div. (Mot.)

 

You can get a really nice view of the spaced hull and mantlet armour there.

 

Yes, it is definately one of the better photos in my collection.

 

Re: Tank ace

Now there is a chain-gang crew to be granted full pardon, if they lived through that. I don't think they BC Bud yet.

 

If I remember rightly, that would make the tank a T-60?
Which mounted a specially designed 20mm gun which alledgedly had the penetrating power of a 45mm weapon...

 

The most succesful gunner in the Werhmacht was Feldwebel Knispel of Tiger Batallion 503. He totalled a personal tank kill score of 162.