Can anybody give me information on the tank William Desobry commanded at the Bulge? I am looking for type as well as unit and special markings. He was one of the true heros of the tank fighting as he was in actual combat defending the town of Noville in the early days. I knew him years later when he was a MG and later LtGen

As commander of 20th Armored Infantry Battalion, would he have commanded a tank? I pinched the orbat for Team Desobry below from here. The only place an armored infantry battalion would have had its own tanks was in the assault gun platoon in the HQ company, which by then should have had 105mm armed Shermans

http://www.army.mil/cmh/books/wwii/Bastogne/bast-fm.htm

Team Desobry

Commanding Officer: Major William R. Desobry (also commanding officer, 20th Armored Infantry Battalion). Major Charles L. Hustead took command after Major Desobry was wounded.

20TH ARMORED INFANTRY BATTALION (LESS COMPANIES A AND C)

HEADQUARTERS COMPANY: Capt. Gordon Geiger; Lt. Eugene Todd

COMPANY B: Capt. Omar M. Billett

COMPANY B, 3D TANK BATTALION

ONE PLATOON, COMPANY C, 609TH TANK DESTROYER BATTALION

ONE PLATOON, COMPANY D, 3D TANK BATTALION (LIGHT TANKS)

ONE PLATOON, COMPANY C, 55TH ARMORED ENGINEER BATTALION

ONE PLATOON, COMPANY C, 609TH TANK DESTROYER BATTALION

ONE PLATOON, TROOP D, 90TH RECONNAISSANCE SQUADRON

The medium tanks of 10th AD were probably M4A3 as one of the higher-numbered divisions. Dragon's M4A3 105 HVSS has markings for the 20th, but for later on in 1945 in Germany.

David

That is an interesting point. Do you have the TOE for the armored infantry battalion, and if so what does it indicate for the vehicles in the "HQ section"? That should be where the "intended" vehicle for the Battalion Commander was identified.

But what the TOE indicates and what the actual commander on the ground choose to use would often vary, especially if the TOE allocated a wheeled vehicle such as a jeep to the battalion commander as "his" vehicle. And the practice I remember in tank units in the 70s was that a battalion commander had both a jeep and a tank that were "his".

As the references indicate, you can see the concept of cross attaching smaller units of company and platoon size all over the place to mix the assets across all types of units so that the commanders of each of the various subordinate units had everything they needed. Very units ever fought "pure".

So as the commander of that team, certainly he would have had tanks available to him to use. And it could well be that armored infantry battalion commanders did choose to fight from one of the tanks in the assault gun platoon in HQ company.

Not being an armor guy, nor an expert in the specifics of the thinking of tactical employment of armor during that period, a good answer to know would be what specific purpose or employment was the assault gun platoon intended to serve? And if it was being employed in that purpose, could a battalion commander effectively fight his unit from there? For example if it was intended to be employed separately and away from the main part of the battalion, it wouldn't necessarily be the right place for the Bn Commander.

One other thing I know from talking with my late father who was an armor officer and actually did quite a lot of study on the evolution of armor TOEs (both US and German), is that the ideas of how to construct a unit (what vehicles etc) and how to fight that unit that the US armored forces started with at the beginning of the conflict didn't always square with what commanders in combat found to be effective, so there was a lot of evolution of the TOEs to reflect the doctrine which was found to work.

So it might well be that Desobry did choose to have one of those assault gun platoon tanks with his name on it, and from what I know about bumper number schemes, it might well have been either "HQ-6" or "HQ-66".

Tom

My thinking is along the same path as Tom's. Generally, in the 70's era HQ-66 was the BN CMDR's track. If Creighton Abrams had a tank why not Desobry? OK we have the 105mm Sherman M4a3 as a start, any idea if there was a cute name given to the tank (I think Abrams was Thunderbolt IV).

According to the TOE in Zaloga's US Armored Divisions an armored infantry battalion didn't have 105mm Shermans either. The HQ and HQ company had M8 75mm HMC. An A.I.B. didn't have any actual tanks at all, just HMC, half-tracks, trucks, jeeps, and ARVs.

Based on the list David posted it sounds like Team Desobry was a patched together unit of whatever was available. If that is the case the sky is the limit, Major Desobry could have "acquired" whatever tank he wished.

Unless you have firm evidence stating exactly what type of tank he might have commanded you could just about use your own judgment as to what to portray him in.

I did find a listing for something called The Desobry Papers at the US Army Military History Institute of Carlisle, PA. Perhaps this would have some kind of information? You could try to contact the archivist at the school.

Thanks for the tip Rodger. The sad thing is that I knew both him and his wife quite well as they were avid golfers. I unfortuneatly didn't know all hat I did about the Battle of the Bulge until a dozen or so years afterwards. It would have been kind of cool to get it straight from the horses mouth. I did have the opportuinty a few yars ago to meet Uwe Feist and ask a lot of questions about Tiger, Panther and Jagdpanthers. I also met the Pilot of the p-51 named Detroit Miss to find out he had full invasion stripes on the aircraft for a while. Well here is hoping that the guys with all the big expensive Sherman books can find something to fill in the blanks. NOt a big Sherman fan, but as I did know the guy, I thought I might do one, or fix up one of the ones I have already done.

Given the chaotic conditions which were standard during the Battle of the Bulge, that certainly is a possibility, however, looking over the entire list, I suspect that it's not nearly as random as one might believe. Given the way the various units have been sub-divided and cross attached, (the 20th appears to have "donated" two Armored Infantry companies to other teams, gained a tank company from the 3rd Tank battalion, as well as an additional platoon of Light tanks from D Company of the 3rd Tank battalion, one platoon from a Tank Destroyer Battalion (or is it two?), a platoon of Armored Engineers and a platoon of recon), this has all the classic signs of a typical task organization for combat, and I'll bet this is by design. Looking at the composition of the other teams found in the referenced link seems to show similar cross attachments.

It probably didn't involve a long meeting, and a lot of paperwork, but I'd be willing to bet that there was an operations order which determined how this task organization was to be made.

And Gary makes a great point. If Desobry was an Infantry officer, and since there appear not to have been any tanks allocated to his battalion, it might not have been a good a idea to jump into one of the tanks attached to his team. The biggest problem with that is that he would have broken up the regular crew and would likely not have been very effective in "fighting" his vehicle, possibly taking one more gun out of the fight.

It probably would have been difficult to avoid the temptation, but unless he was an experience tanker and worked with a regular crew, I'd have given him an "A" for enthusiasm and an "F" for judgment if that's what he did, at least if he started the fight that way. One of the toughest lessons a senior commander has to learn is that it isn't the best way to fight your total unit by fighting a single element in the unit.

Tom

The Armored Infantry battalion orbat I used came from Bayonetstrength, which indicated that the M4 105s replaced the M8s at some point in 1944. Just to add to the confusion, the history I linked to above mentions both 75mm and 105mm assault guns in the account of the fighting at Noville.

http://www.army.mil/cmh/books/wwii/Bastogne/bast-07.htm

David

Well Blaster Lt Col Abrams Commanded a Armored Battalion so he gets a tank and Maj Desobry commanded an Armored Infantry Battalion so no tank(though He more than Likely had a Halftrack). He was Wounded and Evacuated from the HQ Building when hit by a Shell, that Also Killed his Senior Tank Commander. Tanks were up the road.
HTH
Jeff

OK, I can accept this. Desobry was the Commander of Ft Knox in the early 70's that post is generally for Armor only folks, SO I would say that Desobry was a tanker and not a grunt, but as my experience shows our Bn Cmdr very rarely did anything in his tank, (the same held true for my Company CO but that was more becasue he was a jackass) Me, I loved the tanks. I remember stowing away on one during an FTX and crewing it because I was so sick of being a controller all the time. We got 2 kills and opened up the flank of the OPFOR for the rest of the platoon to roar in. Lucky for me my CO was cool and gave me a pat on the back rather than a boot up the ass (different CO) as my NCO handled the controller duties

I am engaged to General Desobry's (grandson, his name sake in fact. I want to answer these questions, and clear the air of the simple minded assumptions made by previous responses. 2300 Dec 18 CO 20th Armored Infantry Battalion, 10th Armored Division

General William Desobry was a courageous, brilliant, wonderful man. He was in battle IN a M 1 Abrams (there you are Jeff Larkin). The superior opinions of those not present in combat should understand that visability was zero due to heavy fog and these men deserve more then curt remarks from some (not all present on this forum) people who defend this great country from behind a computer.

God Bless America
Thank you all vets who have served

Ry: I don't think anyone is calling General Desroby's actions or personal character in question in the slightest. This thread is focused on a minute bit of trivia that AFV modellers are interested in: whether a unit commander would have been assigned an M4 medium tank or not. As I've read it, the discussion here has thrown out possibilites as no one seems to know for sure. If facts had shown that Gen Desroby was indeed not assigned a command tank, that would have been all.

It's known that Abrams and Irzyk WERE assigned tanks because they commanded armored battalions. If Gen Desroby's battalion was an armored infantry battalion, it's known that they were allocated much fewer tanks and it would have been a logical conclusion that the General may not have been assigned one of these valuable prioritized vehicles. Just common organizational stuff -- nothing at all about the commander himself.

This is the equivalent of an auto racing fan who wanted to know the details of a particular driver's car during a particular season. You're taking offense where none has been shown, IMHO.

Certainly, most scale modellers are very conscious of the soldiers who crewed the vehicles we model. I know most of the people who have been part of this thread have been (S Joyce, J Larkin, G Owsley?) or still are in the military (T Hathaway).

Actually, Roy, I've now retired after a total of 30 years combined Active and (mostly) Reserve service, but thanks for the complement. Not really sure what the poster was upset about or trying to say, because like you, I certainly didn't see anything derogatory in any of the discussion about the General's character or courage. Just about his ride during a battle now almost 63 years ago.

Tom

There's one thing I'm not clear on in this whole discussion:
Being allocated a tank, or being able to find a "surplus" one, is one thing. Comandeering one, is quite another, would one of the crewmen simply be told to go "peel potatoes"? That doesn't seem like a decision that would make sense, either for your carreer as a comander or tactical. I just doubt that WWII commanders really could just do as they pleased, especialy if it would deteriorate the combat performance of the unit.

Btw, I'm not in the military!

You're exactly correct. A tank crew trains as a team, and while everyone knows how to do everyone else's job (Tank Commander, Gunner, Loader, Driver) each crewman trains very hard to be good at that job and working together as a team.

In most Tank/Armor units the commanding officer (both at Company and Battalion) in effect wears two hats. In addition to commanding the unit, he is allocated a tank from which he operates, and is also expected to be the individual tank commander for that crew. Since these guys typically would have started out commanding a tank (and a platoon) as a Lieutenant, it's a natural progression, and you can bet by the time a guy is commanding a battalion he's got his pick of the best crewmembers in the battalion for his individual tank.

For the UNIT commander to NOT be an effective TANK commander, effectively takes one tank out of the combat strength of the unit, and is therefore not a good idea.

That's why, although the privileges of rank would allow an armored (or now Mechanized)INFANTRY battalion commander (who would not NORMALLY be allocated a tank in that type of unit) to "borrow" one to fight from, and as you suggested move one of the crew members out of the tank so he could be the Tank Commander, it's not necessarily a good idea and probably shouldn't be done. If you haven't been a regular part of that particular crew and worked together, you cannot possibly fight that vehicle as effectively as a crew that's worked together to become a cohesive team.

But commanders all throughout history have been known to do all sorts of things that in hind sight don't seem to have been the best choice. On the other hand, decisions made on the spot in the heat of combat should not be judged too harshly by those at whom the bullets are not aimed.

Tom