Hitler's Panzers
Hitler's Panzers
This week's excerpt looks at the arrival of the Tiger 1 in North Africa, where they caused a brief upset to the Allies but were unable to turn the tide
Anthony Tucker-Jones has written widely on warfare and World War II, with a particular interest in armoured warfare. He has been very successful in finding rare photographic material for the hugely popular Images of War series. I recently featured Life and Death on the Eastern Front: Rare Colour Photographs From World War II. In 2020 he used his extensive research to produce a more detailed narrative history Hitler's Panzers: The Complete History 1933–1945.
This tracks the development of the Nazi regime's main armoured vehicles from rudimentary beginnings to the very heavy panzers that Hitler had such high hopes for. He contrasts the decision-making process that led to the production of these tanks with the reality of their deployment on the battlefield, and how the Allies developed their response.
This volume has a good selection of illustrative images but there are many more to be found in Tucker-Jones' other books. A highly readable, well-researched, one-volume introduction to a subject that has many aficionados
The following excerpt looks at the arrival of the Tiger tank in Tunisia in 1942, as Hitler urgently sought to respond to the Torch landings:
Hitler’s senior commanders, including Guderian, tried to stop him despatching the Tiger I to Tunisia in the closing months of 1942 but with no success. The situation for the surrounded German forces there was at best precarious and few could understand the rationale for sending their latest and best tank to an uncertain fate. Guderian wrote in his memoirs,
‘Units were still being sent over to Africa and there committed to the flames, among others our newest Tiger Battalion. All argument against such a policy was quite ineffective ’
The 501 had to wait three months before it received its first Tigers. It then moved to southern France in October 1942 with twenty Tigers and sixteen Panzer IIIs. The following month the battalion travelled by rail down through Italy and the first three Tigers of 1st Company arrived in Bizerte in Tunisia on 23 November 1942.
Any illusions that the panzertruppen may have had about enjoying warmer climes in Italy, Sicily and Tunisia were soon dispelled by the winter weather. They deployed from Germany via Italy to the port of Reggio. Those involved in the move were keen to avoid the mishaps that had beset the panzers when they had first deployed to Libya with Rommel.
Once they were in Sicily the Tiger crews cannot have been immune to the rumours that the war was not going well across the Mediterranean following the British victory at El Alamein and the American landings in French North Africa. German troops had been successfully rushed to Tunisia to protect Rommel’s rear. Nonetheless, the Luftwaffe flights bringing back a steady stream of wounded did little to help morale and there was unease amongst the Italian garrison on Sicily.
Convoys had to hug the coast. The Mediterranean was not safe with the Allied air forces escalating their attacks on Rommel’s maritime supply lines. Long-range Allied fighter-bombers and submarines operating from Malta were a particular menace. Axis shipping losses in the Mediterranean were heavy, but luckily for the Germans, the Tigers made the crossing unscathed.
The Tiger battalion found the docks at Bizerte and the outlying airfields hives of activity as the Germans sought to expand and defend their bridgehead in Tunisia. This time, instead of being met by mud and forests, the Tigers were confronted by mud, rain and mountains. The nights were also bitterly cold and the mountains were capped by snow and frost. They first went into action in early December and throughout the month more tanks were shipped across to Africa.
The Tigers did not get off to a good start. The first tank to arrive seized up on the dock in Bizerte; the second then broke down on the road west. Four others made for Djedeida under Captain Nikolai Baron von Nolde, who eccentrically insisted on wearing gym shoes into battle.
On the morning of 2 December 1942 they smashed into the positions of the British Royal Hampshire Regiment. Although the British were overrun, the Germans got a hot reception. Nolde foolishly clambered from his tank to give an order to another officer. He was killed instantly when both his legs were blown away by an anti-tank shell. A sniper killed the second exposed officer. The German attack rolled on into Tebourba and Allied losses included 55 tanks, 53 field guns and 300 other vehicles.
The US 1st Armored’s 2nd Battalion lost forty-two M3 General Grant tanks around Djedeida and Tebourba by 10 December 1942 when it was pulled out of the line. By this stage the Tiger crews had learned that they were impervious to the 75mm gun on the M3 General Grant/Lee medium tank, whereas surprisingly the 37mm gun on the M3 Stuart light tank was more of a nuisance.
On 6 December 1942 Major Leuder with the 501 noted:
Fleeing enemy columns and tanks were observed as soon as the Tigers appeared. These fleeing enemy infantry could only be engaged with difficulty, because the hilly terrain constantly provided cover for the opponent ...
One Tiger was hit in the idler wheel and the road wheels by self-propelled 75mm gun. However it remained driveable. From covered positions on the heights north-west of Medjerda, medium enemy batteries fired at the Tigers without success.
The US 1st Armored’s 2nd Battalion lost forty-two M3 General Grant tanks around Djedeida and Tebourba by 10 December 1942 when it was pulled out of the line. By this stage the Tiger crews had learned that they were impervious to the 75mm gun on the M3 General Grant/Lee medium tank, whereas surprisingly the 37mm gun on the M3 Stuart light tank was more of a nuisance.
Accurate fire at the Tiger driver’s visor, commander’s cupola and the gap between the turret proved a problem. In one instant a shell fragment jammed a Tiger’s turret, putting the panzer temporarily out of action. The solution was a deflector channel similar to that on the Panzer II and III. Land mines also proved a threat to the Tiger’s running gear.
At 600m Allied 37mm and 40mm anti-tank guns were only a threat to the Tiger’s road wheels and tracks. Artillery only tended to cause minor damage to the road wheels. In contrast the Tiger’s 88mm gun easily dealt with the Lee and Stuart tanks.
The panzertruppen of the 501 were not long in making field modifications to their tanks, which included altering the mudguards to cope with the dust and sand and lowering the headlights to make them less conspicuous. The Tiger deployed to Tunisia and southern Russia was a tropical version known as the Tiger (Tp). It was fitted with the Feifel air filter system attached to the back of the tank and linked to the engine via the engine cover plate. This was a luxury that could well be dispensed with and it was discontinued on all production vehicles from early 1943 onwards.
The British Army claimed several of the 501’s Tigers in early 1943, when they destroyed one and captured another. The British first came up against the Tiger I near Pont du Fahs when 6-pounder anti-tank guns took on nine Panzer IIIs and two Tigers. The British had been forewarned of the attack and concealed their guns with orders to hold their fire until signalled to open up at very close range. Both the Tigers were knocked out at 300-500 yards.
The British soon found that their best weapon for countering the Tiger was the 17-pounder (76.2mm) anti-tank gun. This had similar hitting power to the German 88mm gun and had been first issued to the British Army in the summer of 1942. Hurriedly mounted on a 25-pounder gun carriage, they were ordered to supplement the 6-pounders in Africa.
Under the codename ‘Pheasant’ 100 of these prototype 17/25-pounders were rushed to North Africa and first saw action in February 1943. As a towed gun it proved to be the best anti-tank weapon in the Allies' armoury. However, installing it into a tank was to prove to be an altogether different matter.
This excerpt from Hitler's Panzers: The Complete History 1933–1945 appears by kind permission of Pen & Sword Books Ltd. Copyright remains with the author.