Hello All:

I am not a Sherman expert, so please take it easy on me with this question. Maybe it is not even a Sherman I am asking about, but here it goes:

I was in a meeting yesterday with a friend and his father's WWII experience came up. His father is now deceased so he can not get me a lot of details. TO HIS KNOWLEDGE his father was a company commander in the 784th and they fought in the Netherlands into Germany. He thinks his father was in the HQ comapny. I found a website that discusses the HQ company as having 105mm assault platoon. My friend thinks his father was in some type of Sherman that was uparmored or upgunned, and the engine was larger to accomodate this.

I thought of the Jumbo Sherman, but I don't think it has a 105mm gun. What type could this be with a 105mm gun in the HQ company? M4 or M4a3...?

What would the bumper codes be? It appears they were attached to the 104th Infantry Division but later re-assigned to the 35th Inf Div. Would that make any difference as to the vehicle's appearance (I know some units had black camo in Europe, but most were plain OD green).

What would be the best place to start asking questions as far as available photos of this unit? Patton tank museum? US Army Military Institute? Somewhere else?

Thanks.

Bob

Interesting post. I did a google search and found this:

http://www.784th.com/

The HQ company usually commanded the howitzer tanks (105). Given the 784ths deployment date (Dec '44), I'd assume that it was issued M4A3 (105)s rather than the M4 (105).

Given the photos of the tanks, it looks as if they stayed OD.

I found some material a year or so ago which indicated the following about a "GENERIC" Armored Battalion. This was specifically the TO&E of a battalion that was organic to an Armored Division, and there COULD be a difference if the Armored Battalion was part of an Infantry Divison, but probably not.

This reference indicated that within the HHC (Headquarters & Headquarters Company) it called for an Assault Gun Platoon, which was "authorized" 3 each M4A3/105mm and 1 Officer and 26 men. Bear in mind that the actual composition of any unit against the "authorizing" document (the TO&E) could be all over the place.

If we assume the unit did have it's authorized equipment, if your friend's father was the HHC Company Commander, he SHOULDN'T have been in one of those tanks. That should have been the ride of a Lieutenant who was the Platoon Leader.

This same document shows that within the HHC, the Battalion Headquarters (consisting of the Battalion Commander and his staff) was authorized 3 Tanks plus 1 M3 Half Track. You can BET the Battalion Commander had one of those Tanks and being a Lieutenant Colonel, he'd have his pick of the entire unit. As far as who would fight the other two, it could be any number of people, but I would GUESS that the job of the HHC Company Commander would likely keep him OUT of a tank and in one of the 4 Jeeps also authorized. But again it would depend on how the unit wanted to work it.

As far as bumper numbers go, NORMAL practice would be to have both the Divison number as well as the Battalion number on the LEFT side as you face the vehicle. On the RIGHT side as you face the vehicle, you'd probably see HQ-xx with the x's being the vehicle's assigned number. Most units I'm familiar with still use a system pretty much unchanged from that period. I'd expect to see HQ-1 on the Company Commander's Jeep, and the Battalion Commander would have HQ-6, although in some cases I think I've seen HQ-66 on the Bn Commander's Tank and HQ-6 if he also has a Jeep, which isn't that uncommon. But every unit would have it's own little quirks.

If Steve Joyce is up on the net perhaps he can comment on how they did it over in 1/68.

Tom

Wow, thanks guys. In my attempt to keep the intro short I failed to mention that my friend's father was seriously wounded during an attack at Linfort (Netherlands I think). he believes he was in a tank. I think he mentioned the rest of the crew was injured/killed as well. Thus, again, he believes he was in a tank. I think he mentioned the story goes that they were strung out on a one lane road and the Germans had it pretty well covered with 88s and/or panzerfausts. Of course, every US soldier thought he was up against an 88 or Tiger or Panther in those days. I have already emailed him and asked for some more details, if he has anymore.

These are the kind of stories that inspire. Who knows, maybe I can do a decent model of an M4 howitzer. I assume there are kits of this out there that are good.

Bob

There is the Tamiya M4A3 105mm that is a great kit. I don't know if the M4 105mm is just a matter of swapping turrets

Hi there,
PLease excuse my ignorance and I don't wish to offend anyone but was this called the Negro battalion because it was only African-American soldiers in it?
I'm asking because an American soldier asked when he heard the British regiment " The Black Watch" was going to Camp Dogwood in Iraq if that was were we put all our black soldiers.
Many thanks
Robbo

As a separate tank battalion, the 784th would not have carried a divison number as part of the bumper code, just the battalion number followed by the Armor triangle. See these tanks from the 761st as an example

The dozer tank in this shot from the gallery on the 784th site is definitely an M4A3, can't see whether it's a howitzer tank or not. Interestingly, it has a second antenna mounted on the turret and is a command tank.

See also the Porsche turret Tiger II in the same gallery.

Yes. The 784th was an all black unit. At that time we kept are African-American soldiers separate from the rest of the army by sticking them in all black units.

Sorry I really don’t know much else about the 784th

From what I've read, the 3 black battalions (758th, 761st and 784th) were given inferior training and weapons, but despite this proved themselves to be fantastic soldiers and earning all due respect along the way... the 761st even received the Presidential Unit citation...
Cheers
Brad
P.S. Building a M4A3(105) would be great as you have that history to draw upon

Now my friend thinks his dad was the company commander of Company C. I noticed that the website provided has a contact person, so I have asked them for some help. We shall see if they can or will want to help.

As Jacob noted, there were segregated units as the US military had not been integrated as yet. There were white officers, but I do not know if all were white or if there were African American officers too.

Kareem Abdul Jabbar recently co-authored a book on an all black tank unit that I think operated in France, or was it Italy? I think that is the 761st. I think they want to develop a movie about this unit. I would love to see a well done movie a la Spielberg and Hanks, but not a Hollywood one like The Big Red One or Battle of The Bulge. I suppose one like the movie made for the Tuskegee Airmen would be good. It showed the struggles those guys went through to get respect and also how well they fought. Just as long as they don't go Hollywood and change facts to make a better story. Usually the real life story is at least just as good as what a Hollywood writer can dream up. In The Big Red One one squad single handedly won WWII with the worst storytelling of all time (A German squad pretending to be dead to get into hand to hand fighting when they could of just blown away the US squad from many meters away as they approached - ludicrous).

But I digress. I will report back if I find anything of interest by the site owner of the 784th. But anybody with info on what a tank would look like from Company C would be appreciated.

Bob