#44
Post
by Byrden » 05 Jan 2024, 14:46
I've been researching the Tigers of the 503, so I can return to this thread and correct my previous post, among other things.
- In the newspaper photo of Kurt Knispel, he is sitting on Tiger "101", the command tank of his company. It's the same Tiger with his famous pose in the cupola. Both photos were probably taken at the same time, because he looks identical. This is not his Tiger.
- The book by Kurowski is indeed of poor quality. e.g. his brief summary of the formation of the 503 and their first operations, is very confused. He claims that acquisition of a 3rd company brought them up to the goal of 45 Tigers: in truth it gave them only 23. Also there was no goal of 45 Tigers to reach! At that time the official size of a Tiger battalion was 20 Tigers in 2 companies. Kurowski should know that.
- Another confused section of the book was already summarised in this thread, so I'll just repeat that summary:
"Knispel returned to Putlos at the end of January 1943 and became familiar with the new Tiger tanks.....From Putlos, a group of men was sent to 500th Panzer Battalion at Paderborn. This group was led by Oberfeldwebel Fedensack and included Kurt Knispel, it was to become the 1st Company of the elite 503rd..."
What's the timeline there? If you start learning the Tiger at end January, you can't be on the front line for weeks or months. So this implies there WAS no 1st company until maybe April. But in reality, the 503rd had both 1. and 2. companies already fighting in February, long before Fendesack's group arrived.
David
