The Tiger I and Tiger '503'

[Erich]

Guys, thanks for the info again. Yes, I need to pick up Chorley's 1944 volume, I have 1945 which is excellent along with Martin Middlebrooks big book, Bomber Command war Diaries.

It may be of interest but slightly off topic, since we are mentioning Normandy, but the highest scoring Luftwaffe day fighter unit was III./JG 54 with over 100 victories over Allied a/c.

I'll go ahead and check others sources since you both have picked up my curiousity. Thank you gentlemen !

E 8)

[Darrin]

Erich, Zetterlings 'Archive' source for the Allied aicraft losses is another book. L.F. Ellis, Victory in the West. H.M.S.O. 1963 page 88. Norman L. Franks in his definitive work on Fighter Command losses 1944-45 lists a total of 786 2nd TAF lost 6/6/44 to 31/8/44. This total includes all Squadrons serving in 83 and 84 group TAF as well as 11 Group who were Air Defence Of Great Britain Group. The toal of 786 includes training crashes and losses to the Luftwaffe on all fronts, that is every single Aircraft lost anywhere and for any reason. I have nothing authoritative on 9th A.F.

WOW you are right I read out ref 3 for 4! Still the gooderson art is probably a good place to look as well.

Actually one of the only complaints is a lack of allied archive references and discussion for normandy. When you consider the amount of info and detail he has for the ger forces and it is 462 dense pages. The title and subject matter is Normandy 44 and ger mil org, combat power and org eff. He intentional limits his topic to just one side and only uses a few references to the allies. Because of the less organized incomplete state of the ger archives at this point in time esp aug 44 he probably had to check many more reports to find the material he was looking for then the US or CW would. He probably did not have enough time or res to do the same job to both.

[Darrin]

Erich, Zetterlings 'Archive' source for the Allied aicraft losses is another book. L.F. Ellis, Victory in the West. H.M.S.O. 1963 page 88. Norman L. Franks in his definitive work on Fighter Command losses 1944-45 lists a total of 786 2nd TAF lost 6/6/44 to 31/8/44. This total includes all Squadrons serving in 83 and 84 group TAF as well as 11 Group who were Air Defence Of Great Britain Group. The toal of 786 includes training crashes and losses to the Luftwaffe on all fronts, that is every single Aircraft lost anywhere and for any reason. I have nothing authoritative on 9th A.F.

WOW you are right I read out ref 3 for 4! Still the gooderson art is probably a good place to look as well.

Actually one of the only complaints is a lack of allied archive references and discussion for normandy. When you consider the amount of info and detail he has for the ger forces and it is 462 dense pages. The title and subject matter is Normandy 44 and ger mil org, combat power and org eff. He intentional limits his topic to just one side and only uses a few references to the allies. Because of the less organized incomplete state of the ger archives at this point in time esp aug 44 he probably had to check many more reports to find the material he was looking for then the US or CW would. He probably did not have enough time or res to do the same job to both.

[Darrin]

Zetterling consulted over 100,000 pages of ger archive reports and microfilm to write Normandy 44. It was an incredible labour to produce just the normandy book and the archives he consulted were only part of the total normandy archives that were present. He is the expert on the ger army by a huge margin. NO author has EVER tried to do this level of reserch with any army before or since. He created a new level of reserch that few will ever even attempt. All other writers pale in comparison to zetterlings normandy book.

Without putting down Zetterling, who indeed did a great job, try to understand that dozens of researchers did and are doing similar conducts. Stating that All other writers pale in comparison to zetterlings normandy book is not only the most ridiculous statement possible, its also an insult to those people who, just like Zetterling, write the books you so blindly adore. People like Mark Yerger, John Moore, Michael Miller, Michael Kenny, Yann Yaoult and among dozens of others, yes, even my humble person, do our best to do similar conducts and who is some "Darrin" to tell us we're nothing?

Well the books I have read and with the the type of info I like. Many books can be fun to read but the actual educational or even factual material is pretty thin. If you think zetterling a proven preofessional and someone like michael kenny are even on the same playing field think again... Will some of these peole write a book most people might prefer to
zetterlings perhaps. I find his book a refershing change from a survey of other books with a few vetern interviews thrown in.

Chill Out

To each his own...

[Michael Kenny]

Timo DO NOT BITE! I actualy laughed out loud when I read it. Wonderful stuff!.

[b_c_ries]

Anybody have information or speculation as to how many Allied Tanks were knocked out by Panzerfausts, anti-tank grenades, those magnetic mines you run up to a tank with(what are they called) in Normandy. It seems to me that Normandy was filled with opportunities for a motivated National Socialist infantryman to use these weapons against the forces of Democracy and that many Allied tank losses should be attributed to these stoic infantrymen instead of the more photogenic tankers.

[Darrin]

Anyone who would put people like MK on the same level of the of zetterling loses a lot of credability. MK said the 503rd lost a tiger des as it fell though the bridge on the 6th of july. His evidence and the evidence of schieder was the veterns statment. If this was the only source of evidence I might agree with this satment to. But nowadays we have archive str reports on p 191 of zetterlings book. By the 13 july at least ALL 45 tigers are accounted for in the op 32 and 13 SR categories. The number in LR is even listed as 0. After less than 1 week the tiger that this vetern said was des is somehow back with its unit and not even listed as long term repair. Pretty good for a tank that somone thought was dead. The 503rds tiger are also all accounted for on the 17th at least OP 39, SR 1, LR 5 for a total of 45. No tigers were sent as reinforcments this early and only IIs MUCH later. Therefore this tank was not destroyed.

Zetterling did not make an error writing this out as he listed it twice with 2 dif numbers all adding up to 45. Niether did the archives or unit make a mistake for the exact same reason. Zetterling here and else where provides 2 indep sources that both say the same thing hallmark of a proffesional hiostorian. Instead of admitting MK, schieder and this vetern may of made a mistake he starts mumbling something about zetterling being wrong and all ger records being wrong.

We have a vetern from 55 years ago by memory say he saw the tank plunge through the brdige and get damanged. I will not question this part of the eye whitness testimony he was there as a lt tank commander in the coy that his CO fell through the bridge. Lets assume this part is true then he says the tank was recovered but was beyond repair. Now if he was with his unit moving fwd he could not have seen it recovered or seen first hand what type of damage it had. Siting at the bottom of a bridge 20´ you say maybe in bad light water vegitation etc... no one could say what would happen until it had been raised later on. Let alone some jr lt tank commander with little or no repair experiance. No ger records of this tanks des exist. No evidence except 1 witnes and the archives on two dates at least prove him wrong.

Seems like an open and shut case anyone... It is one of those funny little storys you can see gaining momentum. The first tiger the anglosaxons des was when we drove it over a bridge to weak destroying it for them. HA! HA! HA! Thier puny little tanks couldn't even dent our wonderful beast. A story we now know due to archive evidence is not true.

MK has a photo of this tiger and it was destroyed according to him. This really questions his ability to do what he said accuratly differentiate des tiger picture for a zillion important points. The first one of these being wether it is des just damaged short and long term or ready for the factory. He failed his test and still insists he is correct.

[Darrin]

Michael :

thank you for the information. Does he go onto list night fighter losses bu Beufighters and Mossies over the Normandy areas ? Or is this day fighter only ? I have a bit on the 9th although it seems to be a bit of a mis-mash in generality.

E

I have one other source for the US 9th AF in the ardenees from 16 to 27 dec with 600+ op FB. It lost 27 due to enemy action and 120 from all unknown causes flying 8000 sorties. During a period of less than two weeks normandy itelf was over 10 weeks long. At that loss rate it would roughly equal 750 des planes during normandy.

[Michael Kenny]

Sources: Tiger In Combat 1 (JJF) page 209. Another photo is on page 261 Combat History Of sPzAbt. 503 (JJF). . Ancient Chinese proverb say 'be careful what you ask for,you may get it'.

[Erich]

For 9th AF that sounds most probable. Losses primarily to AA as I have a somewhat complete listing of Luftwaffe claims and losses which are quite vast. The 9th providing chief dive bombing roles(jabos) in the P-47. The 8th flying the P-51 B was in constant contact with the Luftwaffe as well as the RAF with the Spitfire marks and Typhoons providing again ground attack measures.

E

[Darrin]

I mean look at that photo does that really look like a tank that was totally destroyed and irrepairable? Not to me but I am not an expert in tiger repair. Niether was was the ger tank commander who saw it fall but not recovered or clasified later on. Any info he provides is mearly it looked very damaged and I heard second hand hersy information it was des. If there was no other info then I would still tend to accept this vetern but even the picture raises more questions then it answers. The US tended to repair every tank as long as the turrent ring was not damaged was not burnt or exploded. None of these seem to apply to this tiger. The bat had not entered combat had an new unused allotment of mechanics and spare parts. New mech who probabaly needed some experiance and a tiger that was not a battle cas making it easier to work with.

Now we have new archive info in Zetterlings book from 2 different dates that account for all the 503rds bat tigers. On the earliest date all tigers are op or sr and none are in LR. In less than a week this tank that was supposed to be destroyed is not even in LR. The balance of evidence points towrds the tiger being recovered and repaired. So although I am not an expert and neither is MK as far as I know the ger EXPERTs on the spot recovered and decided to repair this tank because it showed up back in the str returns within a week.

[Michael Kenny]

3 Tigers lost by sPzAbt.503 on 18/7/44. 2 were photographed by British troops on 25/26 July. The other that fell into the crater is shown still there in a photo taken after the war so all MUST be total losses. 2 IWM photos and 1 from Tiger I/Western Front .

[Michael Kenny]

Post war photo of Tiger I in crater and photos of 2 '503' Tiger IIs written off on 18/7/44. 2 photos from Tiger I/Western Front and 1 from Panzers In Normandy Then And Now.

[Michael Kenny]

Lastly Tiger II of '503' knocked out and in Allied hands 18/7/44. From the 7 photos you can see proof that sPzAbt. 503 ALONE lost 6 Tigers in the days between 15/7/44 and 27/7/44. Zetterling of course assures us only 4 Tigers were lost in this time period by ALL 3 Tiger Abteilung. I can list other 503 and 101 Tigers lost in the same time frame but as the photos of them cannot be dated as accurately as the above photos I have not included them. Can it be that the paperwork might be wrong?

[Darrin]

It is not zetteling but ger army archives that show 4 tigers were des from 15 july to 27 july. Ob west archives report 19 des by the earlier date and army group record rep 23 des on the later date. 4 tigers des over two weeks seems small but that is what the records said.

Possible reasons the record shows a low number;

503 withdrew a coy of crews to retrain on TIIs on the the 20th after losses in this coy earlier in the month. The number of operational tigers dropped continually for the 503rd during this time since it first entered battle on the 10th. This bat also had the first TIIs 1 coy committed to battle if they were anything like the TIIs the rus faced for the first time in aug they would be very mechanically unreliable to start with. The crew only got thier first TIIs less than a month before during which time they spent at least a week on the train moving from ger to france. The crew and mechanics had little experiance using and maintaining TIIs. On the 23 the bat was transfered from 1 corps to another removing it from the front lines for a time and reduing the op number for a time as well. The bat was one of only 2 succesful raids by heavy bombers on tank units the Pz Lehr being the other. But even then the majority of the tank losses were not permantly des but damaged or in nead of recovery. Allied op res crews following up behind found that only 1 tiger out of 40 examined was destroyed by a weapon carried by airplane. So even though the tempoary losses may have high most were not total write offs. The 503rd is the only tiger bat where losses were not found in the ger archives by zetterling except as a compalation of the higher AG and OBW archives which are overall numbers. By the 1st of aug 29 tanks are still op or in short term repair the number in LR is not listed neither is those sent to factory for rebuilds Inspec panzer troops archives. The number des overall or during your brief window is impossible to guess from the few archive bits available but the bat may have lost 0-16 tanks from early july till the very end of the month.

101 by 5th july according to PGrW archives lost 15 tanks overall. From the end of july to the beg of aug this bat was attached to a res behind the lines KG. Exactly when this bat was pulled out zetterlings book does not say but by the 31 19 op tigers are listed here nothing about repairs pan gr west archives. On the first of aug 25 op and short term repairs were listed no LR or factory rebuilds listed. During the two week period in question this bat op avg is around 10 with a low of 1 on 17 july! The total number that might have been killed was 15-20 but during the period in question it had few op tanks and was pulled out of the line it had been fighting over a month during this time.

102 lost a tot of three tanks des by the end of the July acording to arhcives of corps that is belonged to. The bat went into action on the 9th but was still awaiting many tanks in transit until near the end of the month.

The panzer lehr also had 3 tigers with them in normandy but nothing about these tigers is listed in zetterlings book. He could not find reference for them.

Tot number of tiger Is 126 no reinforments. Total number of TIIs 12 no reinforment came before late aug at the earliest.

unit des min max

101 15-20
102 3
503 0-16
PL 0-3

Total number of des was at least 18 accordig to archives and would have been NO more then 42 accoring to archive info. The ger reported 28 on the 27th which is 4-5 days before the end of moth unit stats here. The individual unit stats would be more accurate than the higher levels because it takes time for info to move up the chain. The MAX higher losses are also because the unit reports are the end of the month and losses by even the 27th became higher for some units due to enemy overrunning thier repair center as happened with the PL center that day.

Since MK failed his exam the 503rd tank that went through a bridge on the 6th of july was not des. The vetern comments being the only real indictor the pictures he showed of the tank was not that baddly damaged. The archives proved him wrong which he still refuses to admit so his level of proof is not sufficent or accurate. He also insist the 102rd lost twice as many as archives show. I don´t see any reason to believe that his comments about the 503 during this period is any more accurate. The problem of identifying pictures is far more inaccurate then the ger own archives. Date, unit, front etc... Although some one might be able to do it it is clearly not MK.

His paperwork is definatly wrong due to the built in inaccacries of his method. At an earlier date he says he has proof the gers lost 42 yet the max number assuming worst case scen for the archive info is 42 by the end of the month. An avg situation would indicte 30 this indicates his numbers are too high. Then the photos even if they could tell the story accuratly don´t tell the whole story. I ve heard of at least one TII crew who abn thier vech intact only to come back later and recapture it intact. Any victory photo may have been pretty short lived as to its meaning. Plus lines swayed back and forth constantly allowing recovery of tanks that might also have been behind allied lines. The well armoued panther recvory vehicles could also have helped to recover tanks from grey zones as well.