By Milton Long
A tank BN is made up of three medium and one light tank companies, a Headquarters Company and a Service Company. Service Company was responsible for the maintenance, and supply of all vehicles in the BN. In combat this would mean providing gas and ammo to the combat vehicles including anything attached to the BN. In Service Company we were divided into two groups, those with the job of supply and those with the job of maintenance.
I drove the Transportation Officer, Lt. Glenn. My job was to take the trucks up to re-supply the tanks and then go back to the supply points and replace the gas and ammo that we had issued. This would require driving some distance back to the rear and then back to the company. Some times we had the trucks split between being with units and being with division trains. This made us able to answer the needs of the tankers no matter where they might be.
We spent a lot of time in convoys headed up to the fighting. This sometimes made it necessary to re-supply on the road. As you might guess the Service Company people spent a lot of time in hurry up and wait situations. We never lived in tents once we left the staging area in Southern France. We either lived in our vehicles or in buildings along the route. We sent out billeting parties to find suitable places for the company to stay when we knew we would be in the same place for a while. I had this job on many occasions and I looked for space to park all our vehicles out of sight and where buildings would house the troops.
We didn’t always move when the combat elements moved. Our troops were quick to make a place home and out of the weather. They had stoves and all kinds of lighting setups. The cooks were making meals from the back of a truck unless we stayed in one place for a long period of time.
The winter of 1944-1945 was really cold so it was important to get the men into a warm place. I found beer halls made a good place for the Service Company headquarters, for all the right reasons. I think WH (WH Howard) hauled ammo in his truck most of the time. This was the 75 and 76 mm tank ammo as I remember. The drivers would switch jobs once in awhile so they could get some sleep while on the road.
I don’t know much about what the maintenance section did, as I wasn’t involved with their mission. They were a great bunch and they did a good job. If anything really serious was needed, they would either take the vehicle back to ordnance or ordnance would send up a team to fix it. Captain Burns was in charge of the maintenance section.
We drove with headlights on when we were some distance from the fighting. The light line was usually a couple miles from the fighting and you drove blackout forward of that point. They had an MP shanty stationed on the road to remind you to turn your lights out. We had the habit of driving out of the combat area with our lights on and going like h to the rear. We always felt that the enemy had to know we were in the area after over an hour of trucks moving in the area and the tankers throwing their empty gas cans off onto the ground for our pickup.
The MP’s would report us to division and we would get chewed out for it. Near the end of the war the truckers decided to get even with the MP, so after I drove by the shanty the MP was outside with a phone in his hand shaking his fist at the truckers, they drove right over the shanty and made it flat. The poor MP was standing there with the phone and a cord attached to nothing. We really got chewed out for that.
We would have several tons on the trucks when loaded but empty they would really move. I hope this gives you a feeling for what a Service Company of a tank BN did.
By Milton Long
Published U.S. Legacies March 2006
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