A View through the eyes of GI's - Knocked out German Armor

[W Petz]

Last Surrendered vehicle #11

[W Petz]

I forgot to mention that these pics are in a photo album that belonged to a Medic CPL George Maier 307th Tank Battalion, 2nd Armored Division. there are some real vivid pics of liberated Concentration camp (Belsen) in the album. Bill

[werner geier]

#191, 199 the story continues. another shot of castrated "632". the other pic i posted was taken nov. ´44. thanks to fred we know now the tank had been disabled in august. any idea, how long the wrecks usually were left in situ, before cleanup? of course this must have varied greatly from place to place, but are we generally talking about weeks, months, years?

[Stefan De Meyer]

Clean-up time...

As far as the bulge is concerned the major clean-up by scrap dealers happened in 1946/47 though some wrecks remained on the battle-field as late as 1950.
Vehicles that were useful for evaluation disappeared though within weeks after the area was liberated by the Americans.
I also have the impression that the Americans quickly made a tour of the battle-field and salvaged all tanks that could be re-used by them. I have been told that there was a tank repair park in Spa. Barely 15km away from the front that was repairing Shermans while the bulge was being fought. (Would love to find some pics of it).
Cheers,
Stefano

#191, the story continues. another shot of "632". the other pic i posted was taken nov. 44, after the tank had been disabled in august. any idea, how long the wrecks usually were left in situ, before cleanup? of course this must have varied greatly from place to place, but are we generally talking about weeks, months, years?

[werner geier]

the americans obviously did some cleanup on their own besides picking out the armored cherries. these pics were taken at a dump in verdun feb. ´45 showing the more ordinary spoils of war.
note mobile crane in the back...

[werner geier]

pak 43

[werner geier]

251

[werner geier]

various junk

[werner geier]

puzzle, unsolvable

[W Petz]

Hello? anyone else out there besides Werner that would like to post some photos please do!!

Mike....do you have any more pics that you would like to post...please send - Bill

[August von Mackensen]

Hello to Willi and all the others here,

wunderfull Thread here, great and impressive Pictures!!

Greetings from Sidewinder

[para03]

Here's my contribution. Some neat shots of knocked out German armor.

-Chuck

[W Petz]

Chuck,

Nice postcard...first one that I've seen like that...I suppose the Division/Regiment had them made up as souvenirs to send home..is there anything written or printed on the back? Thanks for sharing and joining in on the thread. Bill

Here is a souvenir postcard of a Knocked out Panther on the Place de la Concorde Paris

[W Petz]

Here is a souvenir pic of the same Panther

[Michael H. Pruett]

More great shots folks, thanks to all for posting!
PARA03, that is a really nice GI photo card. What impressed me is the shot of the Jagdpanzer IV is the lower left corner of your card. I have two photos of this same vehicle (which will appear in a future book). This vehicle is numbered '212' in black, outlined in white. It appears that this vehicle was not KO'd but was abandoned due to engine trouble. Any other information on this card?
Thanks for sharing!
Mike