Just seen this on Facebook. It can only be an M3 ..............
M3 experience.jpg (113.97 KiB) Viewed 4852 times
It also serves to demonstrate that those who fight in wars to defend us are a special breed !
All the best,
Chris
Re: The Reality of Fighting (in an M3)
Posted: Fri Sep 20, 2019 9:02 pm
by Stephen White
Many a true word Chris. Lovely quotation, really captures the spirit of a good tank crew.
If you’ve a strong stomach, I’ve a story in the same spirit. We were in the middle of a battle run (ie live firing) when we hit a bump and I smacked my head on the sight. Out popped one of my contact lenses. That’s it I thought and carried on as best I could. At the end of the run, we cleared guns when my gunner told the driver not to move off. He then turned around in his seat and taking something from his mouth, he offered me my contact lenses stuck on the end of his finger. “You’ll be needing this for the next one boss”. I was dumbfounded. He said he’d caught sight of it hitting his hand and Instinctively popped it into the only safe place he could think of. Being Fourth Tanks, it was thereafter referred to the Chinese Eye Trick. You get to know your crew pretty well and have to get on with them in such an enclosed space.
If you want to get a flavor of the extreme discomfort of not being at one with your crew or troop, I’ve read no better than the late David Render’s extraordinarily frank autobiographical account of his introduction to his troop of Sherwood Rangers in Normandy after D-Day. He was fresh out of Sandhurst and was initially given the cold shoulder by his battle hardened desert warriors who didn’t think he would do anything other than get them killed. His account is moving and frank, as he recounts the extraordinary transformation as they came to accept that he was a very fine officer and one who would look after them but equally would not tolerate any slackness. I’m sure you’ve read it but for anyone who hasn’t, it’s one of the best accounts of tank warfare ive read.
David Render and Stuart Tootal: Tank Action, published by Weidenfeld and. Nicholson
