The FReeper Foxhole Remembers the Duel at Dessau (4/21/1945) - Dec 9th, 2004

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[SAMWolf]

Lord,

Keep our Troops forever in Your care

Give them victory over the enemy...

Grant them a safe and swift return...

Bless those who mourn the lost.
.

FReepers from the Foxhole join in prayer
for all those serving their country at this time.

.................................................................. .................... ...........................................

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DUEL AT DESSAU
3AD's "Super Pershing"
vs
Germany's "King Tiger"
WWII's two most powerful tanks meet in a historic encounter

Only three days before the 3rd Armored Division's final combat action of WWII, a Super Pershing of the 33rd Armored Regiment met and defeated the most powerful and most heavily armored German tank of the war - the legendary 77-ton King Tiger, also known as the Tiger II or Tiger Royal. It would be the first and only meeting between a King Tiger and the Super Pershing, a modified standard M26 Pershing weighing 53 tons - an almost "secret" tank that, to this day, remains largely an enigma to military historians.

Only two Super Pershings were ever built, and the 3AD had the only one in the European Theater - an experimental version with its remarkably long barrel. Arriving very late in the war (March, 1945), it was field tested and modified inside Germany and subsequently saw about ten days of actual combat action, beginning several days after the Battle of Paderborn and ending with the Battle of Dessau on the Elbe River.

The Super Pershing (aka T26E4-1) was equipped with a new long-barreled T15E1 90mm gun that was designed to out-perform the German high-velocity 88mm on the King Tiger. This new U.S. gun had successfully penetrated 8.5 inches of armor at 1,000 yards at 30 degrees. Even more remarkable, it had penetrated 13 inches of armor at 100 yards. The special 90mm ammunition had produced a muzzle velocity of 3,850 feet per second, or some 600 feet per second faster than the 88mm of the King Tiger. But in testing, the new 90mm also proved to have amazing range and accuracy.


The "Super Pershing" T26E4-1 (originally designated T26E1-1) is shown at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, in early 1945, shortly before being shipped to the 3rd Armored Division inside Germany via England. Additional armor plating and other modifications were made in Germany.

Army ordinance technicians (in the U.S. and Europe) had been anxious about getting the new tank into combat, hoping to match it against a King Tiger. But by April, 1945, German armor west of Berlin had dramatically thinned out, not to mention an extreme shortage of fuel, and the odds of spotting the monster German tank were slim. But in Dessau on April 21, "luck" would befall the Super Pershing crew commanded by SSgt Joe Maduri, a veteran 3AD tanker in his tenth straight month of combat.

The 3AD had begun a four-pronged attack on the city, which was heavily defended. Division armor were finally able to enter the city slowly after numerous concrete tank barriers were destroyed. With 3AD tanks fanning out, and 36th Infantry riflemen following, the Super Pershing reached an intersection and began to round a corner to its right. Unknown to its crew, a King Tiger had apparently been waiting in ambush at a distance of two blocks or roughly 600 yards away, and in the same direction that the Americans were turning into.


German King Tiger, or Tiger II.

At this distance, easily within its capability, the Tiger fired at the Super Pershing. But its infamous high-velocity 88mm shell, of the type that had destroyed so many American tanks and vehicles during the war, went high and was not even close. Gunner Cpl John "Jack" Irwin, only 18 years old, responded almost instantly with a round that struck the Tiger's huge angled glasis, or front plate. But the shot, a non-armor-piercing high explosive (HE) shell, had no effect. Ricocheting off the armor, it shot skyward and exploded harmlessly. The Super Pershing had been loaded with an HE only because Irwin had been expecting urban targets, such as buildings, personnel, and light anti-tank guns. "AP!", he shouted to his loader "Pete," which meant an armor-piercing shell would be next.

Maduri and crew then felt a concussion or thud on the turret. It was never known if this shot came from the Tiger, or from some other anti-tank weapon. In any case, no serious damage was done - probably a lucky glancing impact. In the next instant, Irwin aimed and fired a second time, just as the royal monster was moving forward and raising up over a pile of rubble. The 90mm AP round penetrated the Tiger's underbelly, apparently striking the ammo well and resulting in a tremendous explosion that blew its turret loose. With near certainty, the entire crew was killed.


3AD soldiers above in 1945: Staff Sgt. Joseph Maduri of Massachusetts, commander of the Super Pershing, is shown in portrait at right and in middle of group photo. Corporal John P. Irwin of Pennsylvania, the tank's gunner, is at right in the group. Crewman at far left is believed to be "Pete" (last name not yet known). Not in the photo are the two remaining crewmen, whose names are not yet known (Photos from the Maduri family)

But there was no time to examine their "trophy." A battle was raging, and the Super Pershing continued down the street, passing the lifeless and burning King Tiger. Tough fighting still lay ahead, as German bazooka, Panzerfaust, and machine-gun fire came from windows and doorways.



The encounter with the King Tiger had been "short and sweet," lasting less than twenty seconds. It may not have been the titanic "slug fest" that could have occurred on an open field, but it was an overwhelming victory for the quick-reacting Super Pershing crew. The battle for Dessau would end completely on the following day, but not without the Super Pershing destroying another German heavy tank (believed to be a 50-ton Panther Mark V) with two shots. The first disabling its drive sprocket, and the second round completely penetrating the tank's side armor. That apparently set off an internal blast, again probably from stored ammo. And, still in Dessau, that was followed by Maduri and crew forcing the commander of a German medium tank to surrender without firing a shot. For the German crew, out of ammo for their main gun, the intimidating "look" of that long-barrel 90mm gun that must have destroyed any remaining will to fight or flee.

[Valin]

Re:"Prayer for a Freeper's Husband" from yesterday

Thanks you everyone for the company on my sleepless night.It helped keep my mind off of things.Ed had 2 blocked arteries -1 was 90 percent and 1 was 70 percent.They could find no heart damage.He comes home tom.God bless,
Betty


http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1296711/posts?page=193#193
193 posted on 12/09/2004 7:23:56 PM CST by fatima (Pray for our troops.)

And

Looks like lil Sara is ok too!
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1296711/posts?page=182#182

Kudos to 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub for the ping.


BIG smile here!


Night all.

[SAMWolf]

Thanks for the update Valin.

[Valin]

"We modified these tanks. These are the fastest tanks in the ETO..forward or backward. I like to think we can get out of trouble faster than we got in it."

[w_over_w]

[PhilDragoo]

Aberdeen engineers swarm knocked-out King Tiger

Reporter Edward Lee Fitz being embedded.

Not shown: Fitz' National Guard marionette informing "insurgents" inadequately armored vehicles coming your way--must call Mother.

[alfa6]

MULLIGAN!!!

Regards

alfa6 ;>}

[snippy_about_it]

embedded. LOL. That's the way to do it.

[E.G.C.]

BTTT!!!!!!!

[E.G.C.]

BTTT!!!!!!!

[Iris7]

To be fair to the HMMV design and those implementing it, the machine was intended for the North German Plain war that mercifully never happened. That ground is flat, wet, muddy, and sandy, and high vehicle speed vital to Air-Land Battle doctrine.

Lots of time, years, to worry about what might happen when that war that never happened broke out. Lots of folks thought surrendering to the Soviets preemptively was the hot setup.

That war was going to reach from Hamburg to Moscow, by way of Gdansk and Leningrad. Right through most of Poland. The Soviets kept promising they would use nuclear weapons massively, kill half of Europe. Be a lot, a lot, of dead Poles. Bet you our Polish Foxhole comrades in arms still believe it would have been worth the price. The other choice was the iron boot stamping into your children's face, maybe for a very long time. The Thousand Year Reich for real.

Then the Reagan Soviet policy bore fruit, and the war we had prepared for did not happen. Not to say that the world became "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" ever after, haw haw.

[SAMWolf]

Morning Phil Dragoo

Aberdeen engineers swarm knocked-out King Tiger

Are those "professinal engineers"?

[SAMWolf]

Oddball: To a New Yorker like you, a hero is some sort of weird sandwich, not some nut that takes on three tigers.

[SAMWolf]

I like the HMMV, it was just never designed to be a combat vehicle, except for possibly the "scout" version. It's a troop transport that replaced the jeep and 3/4 ton

[Iris7]

You know, Matthew, I think about that war that never happened yet today.

In 1980 or so I did some targeting analysis, not the real thing, but just to satisfy my curiosity, since real numerical information was lacking. Worked on it since then when better numbers came out. In those days I read "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons" all the time.

The Soviets were never as ready for war as the Politburo thought. To survive in that world you had to lie to everyone, especially your superior officers, and tell them everything was going perfectly, "110%". The one day to Gibraltar was a pipe dream. Even moving fuel forward fast enough for a one day war was not possible. Roads and rails are too small by a factor of about 20. Not enough transport, either, trucks especially. Maybe in two or three weeks.

Would have had to wreck rail transport and Baltic ports. City targets. The people would have to get out of the cities as fast as possible. Concentrations of vehicles would have been targeted.

If this did not stop them, rear staging areas were next. The most important rear staging area in the old Soviet Union is Moscow. All the rail passes through there. The Soviets could then missile American cities, if they decided they wanted to. The American counter threat was the SIOP, the Singe Integrated Operation Plan, which once started would be run through to the end, about three days. Two thousand thermonuclear weapons targeted at anything you can see from space. Towns down to around 5,000 population. Every deep bunker known.

Guys like your Colonel Kuklinski and the Russian Oleg Penkovsky (betrayed by John F. Kennedy) worked to prevent this.

The reliable word, word I trust, is not so hard on General Jarulzelski as you are, by the way. Not saying he was a saint. Believing Communist. If he had not been so trusted by the Soviets - and the GRU knew every word he ever spoke, pretty near - things could have worked out a lot worse.

Jarulselski was relatively honest about military readiness and morale, about the reliability of the Warsaw Pact formations under pressure, logistical capabilities, etc. The grandiose Soviet dreams could only survive separated from reality. Jarulzelski (more importantly Ogarkov)was of the "realism" school counseling prudence.

"Marshall Ogarkov began telling the leadership (early '80's) that they were buying too much of the wrong (rapidly obsolescing) stuff and that, to stay in the game of strategic competition, they had to modernize the economy, especially its technology base. My sense is that Ogarkov was less concerned about SDI than he was about precision munitions in conventional theater warfare and sophisticated reconnaissance to target them." - Fritz W. Ermarth

(Of course I cannot see into Jarulzelski's heart nor into his mind.)

So, Golitsyn and Gorbachev. Collapse of Soviet Union.

[Iris7]

Yeah, in your shoes I would never forget and never forgive Katyn Forest.

It wasn't just the Soviets who did such stuff. Heydrich in Bohemia-Moravia, Pol Pot in Cambodia, and others have gone for the wholesale murder of the best men and women living in conquered areas. Kill all the best, and have no fear of the rest.

I try to keep my analysis as cold blooded as possible, and when my stomach turns and the desire for justice becomes the desire for blood I try to take a break. Easier for me to be somewhat dispassionate about Jarulzelski than it is for you. I would respect you much less if Katyn did not burn unquenchable in your heart. First class men, good men, killed because they were good men, and for no other reason.

When Estonia was reconquered in '45 the Estonian best were sent to Gulag, and so were their children, down to the age of six. How long can a six year old survive in Siberia without his, her parents? Worked to death? Little girls raped? Grossly inadequate clothing and shelter? Maybe 300 - 400 Calories of food a day? Daytime temperatures of minus thirty centigrade?

The lust for blood returns. A little justice for little victims. Ten thousand dance the Danny Deaver on a row of long gibbets, no hoods, no leg or arm restraint. Hang them low, just an inch between tiptoed shoe and the grass, and watch them in the eyes as they died. A little justice.

[Mangani]

Unfortunatly, this Super Pershing vs King Tiger story is a complete myth. The reality is that there were never any King Tiger units anywhere near Dessau in late April 1945. The nearest unit with King Tigers would have been Schwere SS Panzer Abteilung 502, which was in action against the Soviets, just south of Berlin. In fact on April 21st/22nd the unit was located in the region of Arhensdorf, which is precisely 55 miles north east. This was the nearest unit with King Tigers to Dessau on April 21st 1945. There were no others anywhere near Dessau.

The Germans kept meticulous details of their Tiger movements and combat actions. See Wolfgang Schneider’s excellent 2 volume ‘Tigers In Combat’ series.

There are NO photos and NO unit descriptions of this mysterious King Tiger allegedly knocked out in Dessau in April 1945, which in itself is extremely strange considering that such a victory would have certainly been well photographed and documented. Tanks stayed on the battlefield in a ko’d state for months...yet there is NOT EVEN ONE photo of this supposedly destroyed King Tiger in Dessau?

More tellingly, there was only ever ONE Super Pershing used in Europe during WW2 and it ‘just so happens’ to stumble across one of the few dozen ultra rare King Tigers still fighting in the whole of Germany by April 1945??

It doesn’t add up. The lack of evidence, nevermind proof, puts this down as a tall tale, perhaps used for progaganda purposes to ‘prove’ that the most powerful American tank of WW2 managed to best the most powerful German tank of WW2...just in the nick of time before the war came to a close. Either that, or the tank ko’d in Dessau was more likely the quite similar looking Panther. If we believed all allied tanker’s tales about Tigers then the Germans must have produced about 10,000 of them rather than the circa 1,800 they actually produced. Allied tankers saw Tigers everywhere, even in places that none ever served.

Bottom line is that there is a claim made that a Super Pershing bested a King Tiger........in a location where no King Tigers ever were. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

[SAMWolf]

Interesting, it wouldn’t be the first time a “historic event” turned out to be a myth, especially since the Allies had a habit of claiming every tank they ran into was a “Tiger”, if only Germany had that many Tigers.

[Mangani]

“””Interesting, it wouldn’t be the first time a “historic event” turned out to be a myth, especially since the Allies had a habit of claiming every tank they ran into was a “Tiger”, if only Germany had that many Tigers.”””

Yes, quite so. If you are interested here is a rundown of the locations of all units equipped with King Tigers in April 1945. The alleged incident supposedly took place on April 21st 1945.

Battalion 501 = unit disbanded on 11th February 1945 fighting the Soviets. 3rd company used an ad hoc 2 Tiger Is, 1 Panther and 1 Pz IV in further fighting around Paderborn in March/early April 1945 (almost 200 miles west of Dessau).

Battalion 502 = early April in the Kassel region (150 miles south west of Dessau). On 19th April the unit disbanded near the Harz Mountains.

Battalion 503 = April 21st in Austria, north of Vienna (300 miles south east of Dessau), fighting the Soviets.

Battalion 505 = Last Tigers were self destroyed in East Prussia, near Pillau, on 15th April 1945 (400 miles north east of Dessau), fighting the Soviets.

Battalion 506 = unit disbanded at Iserlohn (the Ruhr) on 14th April 1945 (250 miles west of Dessau).

Battalion 507 = Last Tigers were destroyed on 11th April 1945 in Osterode, near Gottingen (some 100 miles south west of Dessau).

Battalion 509 = April 21st 1945 in Austria, near Amstetten, between Linz and Vienna (some 300 miles south east of Dessau), fighting the Soviets.

Battalion 510 = unit disbanded on 17th April 1945 near Braunlager, Harz Mountains (some 100 miles west of Dessau). Last Tiger from this unit destroyed on April 18th.

SS Battalion 501 = April 21st in Austria in the Wilhemsburg area (some 300 miles south east of Dessau), fighting the Soviets.

SS Battalion 502 = April 21st at Heinersdorf, near Ahrensdorf, just south west of Berlin (some 70 miles north east of Dessau), fighting the Soviets.

SS Battalion 503 = April 21st in the city of Berlin itself, (some 100 miles north east of Dessau), fighting the Soviets.

Grossdeutschland’s organic Tiger battalion never received any King Tigers, only Tiger Is. The same was true of battalion’s 504 and 508, thus completing all the Tiger units.

There were a couple of ad hoc units formed in 1945 that had single or a few King Tigers but again, these are also accounted for. Panzerkompanie Kummersdorf and Panzerabteilung Muncheberg. They were not anywhere near Dessau in April 1945 either.

We now have a complete historical account of all Tiger units, where they fought, when and where they were transported to various sectors...even when they took delivery of their Tigers from the Henschel factories etc etc. Much of this has only come to light in the last 10 to 20 years after deligent research among the German war records. There are a number of works now out that record the combat movements and actions of all the various Tiger units. There is no mention in any of them about the Super Pershing v King Tiger encounter at Dessau on April 21st 1945, particularly as no King Tiger units appear to have been anywhere within 50 miles of Dessau at that time and no King Tiger units travelled through Dessau and/or abandoned any of their Tigers there.