Americans reasoned that the enemy had probably placed guns there. Company CO Capt Gilbert Ellmann sent two TD platoons to cover the trees. The men of the reconnaissance platoon continued down the road, manning the .30-caliber machine guns mounted on pedestals in their jeeps, and Edson and 2d Platoon followed. Generally, reconnaissance men depended on their wits to avoid ever having to use their machine guns because practically everything else on the battlefield was better protected than they were.68
Recon found ten Italian M13/40 tanks rather suddenly after cresting a small hill.69 The lead jeep was lost as fire struck the American column, but the crew dashed to safety. Several Italian tanks advanced on the American column. The first M3 in Edson’s platoon smashed the lead tank as it clanked over a rise, but then its gun jammed. The second TD pulled by just in time to destroy the next enemy tank.
The Italians decided to withdraw. Edson’s crews spotted another tank in the distance and opened fire, but they could not hit the vehicle. Just before the tank disappeared from view, Edson climbed aboard one of the gun halftracks, straddled the 75mm, and dead-reckoned a last shot. The shell pierced the engine compartment at a distance later measured at 3,500 yards. Nightfall ended the battle, but the enemy column had been routed.70
After giving his men a few hours rest, Raff dashed back north to deal with the reported threat beyond Feriana. The task force arrived in Kasserine on 23 November and, having encountered no enemy troops, advanced east toward Sbeitla. Recon once again took the point, followed by Edson’s platoon. Edson by now had figured out that because he was the most junior officer in the company, his platoon would almost always be in the lead. Once again, recon’s jeeps ran into the enemy—a mixed group of German and Italian units—just short of Sbeitla. This time, the jeep drivers slammed into reverse and backed out as fast as they could, almost colliding, while the men on the machine guns fired at the enemy.71
A sharp fight ensued. Edson was riding in one of the gun halftracks instead of his command vehicle. When the firing started, he simply reacted rather than call the company CO on the radio. Edson led his platoon to the left, while Capt Robert Whitsit’s platoon, directly behind, deployed to the right. Edson’s M3 was struck by a 47mm round and disabled. The vehicle coasted to a stop in a dip with an excellent field of fire on the Italian and German tanks below. The lieutenant took over as gunner and opened fire, accounting for three light tanks. The remainder of the company destroyed five more light tanks—most from a range of only nine hundred yards—and captured seventy Italian soldiers and considerable equipment. Few Germans were taken because they withdrew when it became clear that the battle would go against the Axis forces. The tank killers suffered only one casualty, a man hit by mortar fragments.72
After clearing Sbeitla, the task force withdrew to Kasserine and then Feriana. Having raced one thousand miles and fought two decisive engagements that stopped the Axis push westward in southern Tunisia, the tank destroyer men were able to rest and enjoyed pancakes prepared by the kitchen crew. Raff received the French Legion of Honor for Company B’s destruction of enemy armor at Sbeitla and a promotion to full colonel (the tank killers claimed that he had not even been present at the Sbeitla fire fight). Captain Gilbert Ellmann and the company received the Croix de Guerre with palm, and Arthur Edson a promotion to first lieutenant. The tank killers recorded in their operations report, “Although we had been attached to Colonel Raff and a few of his paratroops, we had done all the fighting in the recent engagements and had won the victories. Ours was a proud company.”
On 1 December, during fitful action in the sector, Company B was strafed by American P-38s. Three men were killed and two wounded, a tragedy that demoralized the outfit.
Shadow Boxing
By early December, the Allied advance had come to a halt. An angry Eisenhower wrote Chief of Staff General George Marshall that American and British operations had thus far managed to violate every accepted tactical principle of warfare and would be condemned in the military school system for decades to come.73 Be that as it may, the buildup of Axis forces assured near parity on the ground at the front by mid-December, a factor that had much to do with the Allies’ difficulties. So, too, did the weather. Anderson launched a new offensive toward Tunis on 24 December, but Eisenhower realized the futility of the effort after examining the crippling mud at the front. He took the bitter decision to postpone the attack indefinitely.74
The men of the 701st Tank Destroyer Battalion considered the next month to have been perhaps the most miserable of their lives. Incessant cold rains turned the theater into a sea of mud. When the weather was clear, the air raids returned. Bivouacked near Sidi bou Zid, the men of Company B suffered German air attacks every day for a week beginning 3 December. The men spent Christmas Eve sitting around fires, singing songs and thinking of home until driven to bed by cold. It would be another week before they would see the first letters from home since the landings.
The 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion arrived in Tunisia on 21 December. In its first few hours at Souk el Khemis, in the heart of what by then had been dubbed “Stuka Alley,” the men experienced their first German air attack. The strafing left soldier Michael Syrko dead on the sand. Ten minutes later, the enraged outfit shot down its first Spitfire.
During the last week of 1942 and the first six of 1943, the Allies and Axis sparred to gain any advantage in central Tunisia.75 As ground was lost and gained and then lost again, some of the veteran tank killers wondered whether the generals in charge knew what they were doing.
In early January, the TDs of Company B of the 701st acted as artillery for French troops fighting to capture Hill 354 near Sidi bou Zid. Lieutenant Arthur Edson was awarded the Croix de Guerre with star for the effectiveness of his platoon’s fire.
As had happened to the 701st, the companies of the 601st were widely dispersed. Company A was assigned to train and support troops belonging to the French XIX Corps near Ousseltia and engaged in its first fighting on Christmas Day. Company B deployed to support Colonel Raff’s paratroopers around Feriana, and Company C was shuttled to the British and thence to the French at Fondouk Pass.76
The Germans struck at the juncture of the French and British sectors on 18 January, and the hard-pressed French appealed to Eisenhower for help. Eisenhower instructed the II Corps commanding general MajGen Lloyd Fredendall to send a suitable force, and the latter—bypassing the chain of command—told BrigGen Paul Robinett by phone that his Combat Command B, 1st Armored Division, had the job.77 On 20 January, CCB— with the 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion (less two companies) attached—was assigned to the French XIX Corps in the Ousseltia Valley. Company A’s TDs took up positions overlooking a valley dotted with small buildings and haystacks. Just as the sun was setting, the huts and haystacks transformed into camouflaged German tanks that assaulted the Americans. The tank killers pulled back gradually and then battled the panzers at a crossroads until it was too dark to fight. Only five TDs remained in action. The next day, CCB and the rest of the 601st arrived and drove the Germans off.78
Allied troops over the next week pushed the Germans back into high ground and captured a pass leading to Kairouan. For several days during the action, Company A of the 601st was reduced to a single officer because a captain had been killed and another captain and two lieutenants had become temporarily trapped behind enemy lines.79 On 28 January, Combat Command B moved to rejoin the rest of the 1st Armored Division.80
The rest of the 1st Armored Division, meanwhile, was dealing with a German attack toward Sidi bou Zid, launched against French defenses in Faid Pass on 30 January. Combat commands C and D of the 1st Armored Division that day moved to intercept the German thrust. The 701st Tank Destroyer Battalion (less two companies) was attached to Combat Command D. The next day, the combat command launched an attack on Station de Sened and captured the town, which was lightly held by Italian troops. Assaults by Combat commands A and C on Faid and Maizila Passes ran into determined resistance, however, and both attacks were abandoned. American troops withdrew to Sidi bou Zid.81
On 2 February, Combat Command B was detached yet again and sent north to join the First British Army. It
