Customer Reviews

Another River, Another Town: A Teenage Tank Gunner Comes of Age in Combat--1945

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This brief story of a teen's experience in combat in the final months of WWII in Europe gives the reader a nice perspective of the war from the armor branch of the US Army. It kept my interest as the unit advanced across Germany toward Berlin. The
author writes a running narrative as they move from town to town in pursuit of the retreating Wehrmacht trying to prevent the final collapse of the Reich. The story is well written. I highly recommend it for your consideration.

"Another River, Another Town" by John P. Irwin, sub-titled "A Teenage Tank gunner Come of Age in Combat-1945." Random House, New York, 2002.

With the Battle of the Bulge, December 1944, there was a great demand on the United States Army for replacements in the European Theater of Operations. Pennsylvanian John P. Irwin had just completed tank gunner training in Fort Knox and was shipped to France. He was immediately put in charge, as ranking soldier, of a Sherman tank, and, after completing repairs, instructed to join up with the 3rd Armored Division. Running as a single tank, trying to catch the main column, Irwin and his crew promptly get lost. They end up in a German occupied town, and, happily for them, the Germans want to surrender. Corporal Irwin leads the German column back to American lines, where he is chewed out by Captain Harker for delivering unwanted prisoners! Thus begins Irwin's tour of duty in the closing period of World War II in Europe.

His book describes the relations among the five-man crew, the agony of having a tank shot out from underneath them, and the daily drudgery in going from town to town, river to river, bridge to bridge. Their replacement tank is one of the new Pershing Tanks, and Irwin describes how the Pershing's extra armor, its ability to fire while still moving and the Pershing's rapid gun turret movement saved them in many situations. (For a complete comparison of Sherman and Pershing, see, "Death Traps" by Belton Y. Cooper.) This book is well written and easy to read.

This is an especially interesting memoir because it describes the experiences of an ordinary eighteen-year who serves as a tank gunner towards the end of WWII in Europe. I thought the book was well written and the author does an excellent job of presenting the war from the perspective someone who was neither privileged nor publicly known. Irwin does a good job of describing combat as well as other aspects such as the relationships with other soldiers and how they dealt with fear.

Mr. John P. Irwin is a fantastic writer, despite the fact that he flunked eleventh grade. I never thought I'd catch myself reading a memoir, let alone liking it, and yet this book caught my attention from page one. Mr. Irwin utilizes excellent diction and displays clarity of thought in this book, as he tells the reader of his part in WWII. I loved reading this book as I believe many others will too.

Beautifully written and powerful account of a young man coming of age during the closing days of American combat in Germany during WWII. A very simple and straightforward narrative on the surface, this memoir of the author's personal experiences as a tank gunner offers deep insights into the psychological and moral questions of war itself. It is interesting that John Irwin went on to earn doctorate in philosophy and spent many years exploring that subject as a teacher at the university level following the war. This is reflected in his book and adds it a richness that is somewhat unique among personal accounts of this era. Highly recommended as a description of what it was like to be fighting for one's life in a Sherman tank as well as the inner turmoil of a young ciitzen soldier.

I read this great little book over a week during my lunch hour. It was written from memory and doesn't look like it had a lot of fact-checking. The remarks about it being written by a high-school drop-out are absurd: the man has a Ph.D. in Philosophy! That is what adds luster to Irwin's account- he sees the small details of the short, violent, and often horribly sad existence of soldiers (Allied and German) and German civilians at the very end of the battle for Germany proper.
One note is the fact that John Irwin was a crew member of a very rare type of American tank at that time- the M-26 Pershing (a Super Pershing in his case). As a history major, I found that informative. I have never read anything by someone who actually fought in any of the few Pershings in Europe during the Second World War. So Irwin gives a very positive evaluation of the future of American tank design; almost all American tank designs up until the M-1 Abrams are essentially variations of the Pershing. It was certainly a different Army than the one we know today- in some ways it was better; less mercenary. We would do well to heed that.

I'm giving this book 4 stars instead of 5 because it isn't long enough to fully develop the story. Nevertheless, I recommend it because it feels authentic. The soldiers Irwin writes about feel real. You will learn details here about the Sherman tank that you won't find elsewhere. For instance, Irwin describes tank warfare against the German Tiger and explains how they beat that tank in combat. I had been under the impression that the Tiger was almost impossible to beat.

In places, the book is humorous. I laughed where Irwin describes how he is temporarily captured before even entering combat.

One time Irwin is reprimanded for killed a German squad that had just surrendered. When you read the book you will find out why his action was justified.

"Another River, Another Town" by John Irwin is one of the few memoirs of WWII that provides an in depth description of the last days of the war on the Western Front. In many stories about the ETO, the campaigns in France, Holland and Belgium are focused upon, leaving the final drive into Germany to be quickly summarized. This would give the impression that once into the German heartland, the Allies faced minimal resistance. I was somewhat under that impression before reading this book; Irwin's combat diary is entirely based on the first days over the Rhine and ends with the capture of the Elbe River's west bank. In that month period, there is an extensive amount of combat, as the title suggests around specific towns and river crossings. I was truly surprised at the constant nature of the advance and although the Germans could not hold the American onslaught in a fixed position, they really contested certain places with a determination as great as the previous campaigns in North West Europe. Grant it, most of the troops were not the best produced by Germany, but their willingness to fight in a seemingly hopeless situation should not be underestimated

According to Irwin, the fighting for the spearhead divisions in April of 1945 was comparable (in intensity if not mobility) to any other campaign fought in the west. Irwin's 3rd Armored Division had been in combat since the early days of Normandy, yet its veterans (such as Irwin's tank commander Joe) believed that "combat was combat" and did not differ all that much throughout the different campaigns. Though Irwin only sees a month of fighting, it is a month he could never forget, full of enough death and destruction to last a lifetime.

I found Irwin's story to not only fill in a void concerning American combat in the interior of Germany, but also gave the reader a good picture of the temperament of the hordes of teenage replacements that filled the ranks in the latter stages of the ETO. He is definitely changed by his experiences in combat and this comes across in his writing. There is a clear pattern of maturation as the days drag on and Irwin learns what must be done in order to fulfill his duty and survive as a tank gunner. There is also a touch of adolescent army humor, complete with colorful vulgarities and typical concerns of a tank crew.

Though Irwin learns very quickly, his first venture to the front nearly ends in disaster as he gets lost and his tank stumbles across Germans, who luckily want to surrender. Irwin's luck holds out through his time at war he's fortunate enough to have a good tank crew. I found his writing to be excellent concerning the personalities that made up his crew; he gives a great example of the camaraderie that exists when men share a tank that becomes like home. From a no nonsense commander to a drunken yet reliable driver, Irwin not only gives a good report of combat actions, but how different men react to the stress of war. His memoir goes into depth concerning his comrades, with a level of detail that is not seen in most stories from the infantry. I would assume that this illustrates the physical and mental closeness that tanks crews shared with each other. Their survival was truly a team effort as every man needed to pull through for the tank to operate successfully.

Though Irwin's book is definitely on the short side, it is entirely devoted to his month in combat, and therefore surpasses others when dealing with the challenges of war. His level of detail is fairly elaborate, though not every action is told with 100 percent clarity and recall. Like most veterans, Irwin could not forget his combat experience even if he wanted to, and the fact that it occurred with a short period of time possibly helped him remember a little bit more than the average soldier.

The author writes an interesting, informative and detailed account of what it was like to be a tank gunner in the second world war. It was filled with personal accounts and not bogged down with "big picture " strategic large unit history. It was what it should be, which was a personal memoir of an individual American soldier.

This is a small book. Given this, it's good that the author doesn't waste time and he starts off his account promptly with joining up with his unit, Company `I', 33rd Armd Regt, 3rd Armd Div. This is a `tankers' view of war and it seems to have a different feel to it. I'm not quite sure why this is, maybe it's because the author's experiences are restricted by the limited numbers in his tank crew or the vision of his gunner's sight.

The author does go into detail but not to the extent that I would've liked. This said, he writes about fighting Tiger 2's, JagdTigers and the panzerfaust troopers lying in wait for him. He is the gunner and he scores a good number of `hits', though he doesn't give a face to those he fought and this has made his account seem less vivid. He is more forthcoming giving voice to his own fears and those he shares his tank with though. Again, interesting but without giving me the feel of being in that smelly tank with him. The other thing I suppose, is that his time in the ETO is in the few months before VE Day, there is no Bulge for instance. His experiences do include liberating the V weapon slave camp at Nordhausen and fighting those Tigers near the training facility at Paderborn. He also found himself to be the lucky recipient of one of the first Pershings. There's also some interesting street fighting, in support of infantry.

Overall, a solid read, with some different perspectives and experiences to those of the infantry. However compared to most of those, I feel it lacks depth, probably due to being a bit on the short side.