Michael Wittmann
Michael Wittmann (April 22, 1914 - August 8, 1944) was a SS-Hauptsturmführer (SS-Captain) in Schwere SS-Panzer-Abteilung 101 during World War II, and one of the most successful tank commanders in history. He is famous for his June 13, 1944, ambush of elements of the British 7th Armoured Division at the Battle of Villers-Bocage in a Tiger tank. His death has also presented a mystery to historians on which no clear consensus has been reached.
Career
Wittmann began his career in earnest in April 1941, during Germany's intervention of the Italian campaign in the Balkans. He was a commander of a StuG III, a big step up from the armoured cars Wittman had used in his short experience in the Polish Campaign. Its 75mm gun was unwieldy as the Stug lacked a turret - the driver had to turn to tank to allow the gunner to aim at targets past its limited traverse.
Wittmann's unit, the Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler (LSSAH), distinguished itself for the first time in the capture of the Greek capital, and formed the spearhead alongside the 9th Panzer division which punched though the Greek countryside. After only 3 weeks of campaigning Nazi Germany added the Balkans to its ever growing list of possessions. Wittmann and his unit were sent to Czechoslovakia for a refit. The rest would not last long, however, as Wittmann's unit was soon dispatched to the Eastern Front to participate in the invasion of the Soviet Union. He initially served as a crew commander of the StuG III assault gun and it was using this weapon that Wittmann was to become an expert in the art of armoured warfare. He was assigned for officer training as well as training in tanks in the winter of 1942-43.
Returning to the Eastern Front as a newly commissioned officer, Wittmann was reassigned to a tank unit with the rank of SS-Untersturmführer, where he commanded a Panzer III tank. By 1943 he had graduated to the Tiger and by the time of the Battle of Kursk (Operation Zitadelle) he was commander of his own platoon. The year 1943 would provide Wittmann and his crew (including Balthasar "Bobby" Woll, his gunner) with many successes, and in January 1944 he was awarded the Knight's Cross for his continued excellence in the field. At this time he had destroyed 88 enemy tanks, and a significant number of other armoured vehicles.
By the time of his posting to France in the late spring of 1944 following the Allied D-Day invasion, Wittmann held the oakleaves to the Knight's Cross as well as the rank of SS-Obersturmführer. Perhaps his most famous exploit during the Normandy campaign was at the Battle of Villers-Bocage on June 13, 1944, where Wittmann's tank fought nearly single-handedly against a much larger enemy force, inflicting heavy losses on the British and bringing the advance of the entire 7th Armoured Division to a standstill. For his part in this famous action Wittmann was awarded the swords to the Knight's Cross, and was promoted to SS-Hauptsturmführer.
Death
Wittmann was killed in action less than two months after Villers-Bocage, on August 8. During the Allies' Operation Totalise, his tank was destroyed near the town of Cintheaux. While the manner of his death is clear - his tank was hit by two shots to the right rear hull which caused an explosion large enough to throw the turret from the vehicle - the weapon responsible is not.
One explanation has been that Wittmann was killed following a skirmish in which his company was ambushed from behind by tanks of the 1st Northamptonshire Yeomanry, part of the 33rd Armoured Brigade . The shots are claimed to have come from a single Sherman Firefly commanded by Sergeant Gordon and gunned by Trooper Joe Ekins, of Number 3 Troop, "A" Squadron, at approximately 1240 hours.
Other units in the area also have a historical claim to the fatal shots, specifically Major Sidney Radley-Walters of the Sherbrooke Fusilier Regiment of 4th Canadian (Armoured) Division, as well as the 2nd Polish Armoured Regiment of the 1st Polish Armoured Division.
The most recent book to study the subject is No Holding Back by Brian Reid, which provides a detailed topographical map of the engagement, and is benefited by extensive review of Allied and German records (the book is about Operation Totalise but devotes an entire appendix to the subject of Wittman's demise). Reid concludes that there are even odds between the Canadians and the British as far as responsibility for Wittmann's death.
There has previously been much speculation (for example, in After the Battle magazine) that a high-explosive (RP-3) rocket from a RAF Hawker Typhoon aircraft dealt the fatal blow to Wittmann's Tiger. Reid has discredited the Typhoon theory by close examination of 2nd Tactical Air Force logs, concluding "no tanks were claimed destroyed or damaged in the forward areas by immediate support aircraft and ... the only tanks claimed were by Typhoons on armed reconnaissance missions in areas away from the actual battle. Therefore Wittman and his crew almost assuredly did not fall victim to an attack from the air."[1] German records also seem to confirm this; Reid mentions that Kurt Meyer, Wittman's commanding officer, "made a point of remarking on the Allies' failure to use their tactical fighters on the morning of 8 August."[2]
Legacy
The number of enemy vehicle kills achieved by crews under Wittmann's command has never been surpassed. Wittman's crews (chiefly gunner Balthasar "Bobby" Woll, also a Knight's Cross holder) are known to have destroyed at least 138 tanks and 141 artillery pieces, along with an unknown number of other armoured vehicles. At the time of his death he held many decorations, including:
- Swords to the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
- Oakleaves to the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
- Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
- Iron Cross, First Class
- Iron Cross, Second Class
- Tank Battle Badge
He is buried in the graveyard of "La Cambe" in France.
External links
Footnotes
References
- Agte, Patrick. Michael Wittman and the Tiger Commanders of the Leibstandarte. JJ Fedorowicz (April, 1996). ISBN 0921991304
- Reid, Brian. No Holding Back. Robin Brass Studio (December 2004) ISBN 1896941400