Will Fey and the 14 Shermans he claims for 7/8/44

[Michael Kenny]

To clarify Michael, 7 August is the date their status was changed from MIA to KIA? If so, then they could have been killed anytime since 0600 20 June when the first MIA of the division was recorded.

I made assumptions. That a book published in 1945 by the Division itself would have up to date information (August 1945) on casualties that at the time (Aug 1944) were just listed as MIA. I went through the sub-unit listings of KIA , which is in in alphabetical order, to get a days total.


This is the best view I can get from Google showing the position of the Tigers on Pierres ridge and on the far ridge the position of 23 Hussars.

Modern IGN Map. Note the deep valley between the two sides.

1947 air view of the exact same area as above. Map reference for Tigers the pink/yellow spot.

The distance from the map reference to Presles is just over 2km.

[Michael Kenny]

It is also interesting that the division reported 7 KIA and 8 MIA as of 0600 8 August, but 13 KIA and 37 MIA as of 0600 7 August.

If there are no transcription errors in the above then stragglers returning to the Unit?

[Michael Kenny]

Further question about the unit history of the 11th. Is this the book you guys are referring to "The Black Bull: From Normandy to the Baltic with the 11th Armoured Division (Stackpole Military History Series)". I don't want to buy the wrong book

That book is very common and you should be able to get one of the original Sutton hardbacks very cheap. Do not let anyone tell you it is rare.



The 1945 book is 'Taurus Pursuant' and good copies are scarce/expensive. However reading copies are fairly cheap.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Taurus-Pursuan ... s+Pursuant

Another good 11 AD book is 'The Charge Of The Bull' by Jean Brisset and is not too scarce.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Charge-Bull-Ar ... 0951234900

However I can tell you that tank losses are not as important in British accounts as they appear to be in German ones. You will not get much hard info on numbers from any of the books. Aug 7th gets very little mention.

[Shermaninterest]

The book i mentioned was available for Kindle and only 5 bucks so i thought i would buy it to be able to follow the discussion of you guys. But it's not the book sadly.

Do you have any idea why 17 were listed as ko'ed? Being an avid reader of the Villers Bocage thread it feels like this incident here is pretty bad documented and the actions in general which just doesn't allow for anything conclusive judgement. So i think guessing based on odds is the closest we get to truth so i wonder what you think?

My 2 cents are that given 5 tank casualties were reported i assume that the two or more Tigers were picking some Shermans off over the course of the day, maybe one of Sqn B maybe one of the 3RTR maybe one of C Sqn 23rd. Fey in my opinion took part in actions which he later tries to recall. He seems to take some memories and weave them together with more less "made up" stuff this sounds kinda harsh but i think thats the best explanation. Which wouldn't be suprising if his intention was to write a good book rather than history book. You are correct that with your frustration that those books are treated like a primary source, Wolfgang Schneider used Feys account in his books like its an exact description, thats not ok i guess. But on the other hand given the data available i think 10 Shermans getting Ko'ed around 7233 is reasonable to think. Obviously this is meaningless guessing but for me personal its always frustrating to notice that most of the stuff that happened will be unknown to us forever. The Villers Bocage thread is a welcomed change with all the detailed informations knowing which persons were involved and what happened to them.

[Richard Anderson]

It is also interesting that the division reported 7 KIA and 8 MIA as of 0600 8 August, but 13 KIA and 37 MIA as of 0600 7 August.

If there are no transcription errors in the above then stragglers returning to the Unit?

Sorry Michael, I was not clear. I was talking about the daily casualty reports, compiled at 0600 for the previous 24 hours, and not a cumulative count. Periodically, the counts did adjust, by "returning" MIA in the cumulative totals, but that was not the case in this one.

[Richard Anderson]

However I can tell you that tank losses are not as important in British accounts as they appear to be in German ones. You will not get much hard info on numbers from any of the books. Aug 7th gets very little mention.

As I am sure I mentioned earlier at some time, 11 AD had 17 tanks "KO'ed or not fit within 24 hours" as of 2200 hours 7 August, 13 M4 75mm and 4 M4 17-pdr. There were also 4 M4 75mm in repair "fit within 24 hours" and 2 M4 17-pdr in the same category. Unfortunately, there is no way to tell which were combat damage, which were breakdowns, which suffered crew casualties, and which did not. The regimental diaries are a much more accurate measure of that and Michael has already well covered those. Certainly though, the 7 KIA, 45 WIA, and 8 MIA personnel casualties reported for the same day do not indicate a particularly intense battle.

[Michael Kenny]

i think 10 Shermans getting Ko'ed around 7233 is reasonable to think.

7233 is a square with 1 km sides. If a map reference is given as 4 figures it refers to the square to the right and above the intersection of those 2 lines.

A full reference is 6 figures and 720345 can be located much more precisely. The chosen square is assumed to have sides of 10 x 10 and the 3rd numbers 720345 are the intersection of lines drawn from 0/10ths of 72 (the base of 72) and 5/10ths along 34 as below

6F-6 Vire, 1-50,000ggggggggggjk.jpg (70.03 KiB) Viewed 665 times

[Shermaninterest]

Nice thanks for the explanation i wanted to know it but was too afraid to ask haha