614th Tank Destroyer Battalion - A Winter On The Defensive

A Winter On The Defensive

The closing days of 1944 found the gun companies assigned as follows: Company A with the 410th IR, Company C with the 411th IR and Company B with various part time assigments which included guarding the division CP, attachment to the 44th Infantry Division or the 106th Cavalry Group and at times with the battalion CP. The companies participated in a number of small engagements and, at one point, fired artillery missions on attachment to the 928th Field Artillery Battalion. Notable engagements included one on 1 January – where an isolated outpost killed nine and captured two of an enemy patrol in a small-arms firefight – or 12 January, when a two-gun section fired 143 rounds over forty minutes at an observation post, scoring 139 direct hits – a rate of a round every thirty-five seconds from each gun, with 97% accuracy.

When the 103rd Division moved back to prepared lines in the Hagenau Forest on 20 January, the battalion withdrew alongside them. Weather conditions, with snow and ice covered roads, proved to be unfavorable for the 614th's equipment with three 3" guns and six half-tracks having to be abandoned and destroyed in situ. The 2nd platoon of Company C did manage to save a 3" gun by eventually reaching safety pulling it, and carrying the platoon leader and 14 men, with a 1/4 ton "jeep". On the 25th, Company C was stationed in Schillersdorf when approximately 450 German SS troops attacked. All the men were able to vacate the town except for one officer and 11 enlisted men who were captured. All of the men were liberated and returned home after the war. The battalion remained on the defensive through February, helping fend off raiding parties and infiltrating patrols, and mounted a platoon-strength raid itself that month, with great success. Five members of the unit were awarded Bronze Stars for their part in the raid. The record of this engagement in the contemporary divisional history described the battalion as "the crack negro 614th", testifying to the high regard in which the unit was held by the 103rd.