Customer Reviews

Tank Driver: With the 11th Armored from the Battle of the Bulge to VE Day

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Hartman was a PFC with the 41st Battalion, B Company of the 11th Armored Div and saw action from the end of the Bulge battle to the very end of the war. The book is significant by its mere existence. I know of very few books by American tankers. The book is well written and covers from his indoctrination through home coming and even his revisiting Belgium in later years.

Hartman was a M4 Sherman driver and tank commander (although he was initially given the choice of being a driver or a gunner). Unfortunately his details on his many combat actions are light. But he does give a few interesting glimpses into the life of a U.S. tanker.

-He was on the Sherman the whole time but he never details what variants along the way. One picture in the books shows him on a M4A3E8 at the end of the war. He does mention going from the 75mm Sherman to the 76mm during his Bulge actions. He also notes that his battalion got four Pershings (one per company) in April 1945, just before the end of the war. Because no one was familiar with them they were stuck in the back of the column. He said folks felt better knowing the limitations of the Sherman. Although, he does note they wish they had the Pershing during the Bulge fighting. Hartman comments on the great reliability of the Sherman throughout the book and notes the German tanks "lumbered along at a snail's pace compared to ours."

-Tanker losses were really appalling. In nine months of combat the 11th Armored Div suffered 48.1% casualties during the war with 614 killed (out of about 12,000 men in the Div). His 41st Battalion suffered 68 killed (about 11%) and his Company B suffered 23 killed (about 20%). What is amazing is the high loss of officers and tank commanders. His company commander was killed within minutes of their first action and in the nine months I think they went through three or four COs (one at least was wounded and returned later). He only seems to comment on a couple of bad platoon leaders. He lost numerous tank commanders either directly or as they left to fill other vacancies. In the Forward of the book, Spencer Tucker states that the 3rd Armored Div suffered 580% casualties of its tanks (either destroyed or 'knocked-out') and that the U.S. lost 6,000 tanks in Europe during the war.

-Hartman comments on the poor performance of the 75mm gun and that they had to get rear shots on the German tanks. "The German gun had fired an armor-piercing projectile that entered the turret, killed all three men, and then exited the other side. We knew the German 88 was extremely powerful, but this was devastating to see. We were later able to measure the distance from which it had been fired-1,700 yards, almost a mile!" What is most notable though is the low number of actual tank vs tank actions (at least that he describes). What seemed to cause the most tank loses were panzershreck attacks (the author always says panzershreck or even bazooka but who knows if this was strictly true or if he did not differentiate among panzerfaust, etc.). Snipers also killed a number of his comrades.

-The author describes working very frequently with armored infantry troops and how often a couple troops would ride on the back deck of the tank to spot enemy infantry and AT units. He also talks about how `Art' (a call sign), the Piper Cub spotter plane, would fly overhead and call down artillery on enemy positions and even help give them driving directions through towns. Art also called in tactical air cover and Hartman comments on P-47s firing rockets at the enemy. He mentions at least a couple of occasions when the tankers would act as or support infantry clearing houses.

Following a return visit to Belgium last summer and a fresh vision of the area around Bastogne, I was especially keen to read "Tank Driver". I was most decidedly not disappointed. Dr. Hartman's account can be followed without difficulty, aided by military explanations and maps, which the reader can easily fathom. What is unfathomable,however, is how he, at age 19, along with colleagues, many of whom were as young, could survive such a horribly emotional,physically excruciating ordeal, which included the losses of comrades. The intricacies of learning the mechanics of tank driving and maintenance, made learning to drive a manual shift car and changing a flat tire laughable. The author was able to keep this reader's attention with the, surprisingly for tanks, fast paced, scenarios, which are sophisticated enough for adult audiences without entirely losing the voice of a nineteen year old. "Tank Driver" is a book which can be read easily, in a day or so, particularly, by those who have an interest in these violent events near the close of the European war, but also for students who are studying this time period, most especially if they are close in age to what Ted Hartman was as that young soldier, who fought so bravely.

Indelible memories of 1942-45 linger from my pubescent period. Images are those heard and seen via an upright Philco and black and white news reels between feature Westerns at Saturday afternoon movies.

Reading Tank Driver offered faces, skin and muscles to a very real corpus of WWII action. A large trove of letters by the author to his parents in Ames, Iowa, informs his writing and reportorial prowess. From the Bulge to the mesas of Los Alamos there is a compelling need to begin with Tank Driver. Well done, J. Ted Hartman.

"Tank Driver" by J. Ted Hartman
Subtitled: With The 11th Armored From The Battle Of The Bulge To VE Day".
Indiana University Press, 2003.

In 1943, J. Ted Hartman graduated from high school and became a member of the United Stares Army. After training in Camp Roberts, California, he was assigned to the Army Specialized Training Program (ASTP) and he traded his hometown college town of Ames, Iowa for the college town of Eugene, Oregon, University of Oregon. In February, 1944, the Army Specialized Training Program was shut down and most the ASTPers at University of Oregon were assigned to the 11th Armored Division. Hartman states, "So much for the word of the army" and he places that comment in italics. Every now and then, the author will use the same statement, in italics, to point out the duplicity of the Army, in particular, and the government, in general.

Camp Cooke, California. On page 24, the author recounts that a "...lieutenant at the microphone was trying to be funny at 2 A.M. When we weren't responsive, he began making nasty remarks about college kids and ASTP. It was all downhill from there". As you go through life, the sad thing is that the nasty remarks and the hurtful looks are more easily remembered. Here, an unnamed lieutenant has been remembered with a subliminal curse in this book. J. Ted Hartman brings this same attention to personal remembrances throughout the book, as the 11th Armored Division trains in the U.S., crosses the ocean and begins its combat career in Europe.

The author traces the path of his division from the Battle of The Bulge, in Belgium, through Luxemburg, across the Siegfried Line and into Germany. They cross the Mosel River and travel south across Germany, with a side trip into Worms. All of these engagements are documented in a personal way, but they are also accompanied by maps and photos. The maps have been simplified to remove unnecessary details and then the maps are annotated to accompany the text. For example, on page 84, the map has a note, "Fulda. Defended bitterly. Armor bypasses to north", which is further explained in the surrounding pages. His personal comments are quiet and unassuming: "...a sniper hit Zaher, one of our most capable tank commanders. While we provided cover, the medics evacuated him". (Page 102).

This is a very uplifting personal memoir. The shock of battle, having a tank shot out from under them, the discovery of the horrors of the concentration camps, all generally reflecting the history of the 11th Armored Division, are covered in this excellent book. The book ends with two concluding chapters. "Waiting To Go Home" tells about the occupation forces in Europe, while the chapter, "Belgium Remembers" recounts a visit to various battlefields in 1994, the fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge.

Before reading "Tank driver", I believed I knew all about 41st Tk Bn. It was a mistake ! Ted Hartman tought more to me. And it is written in very pleasant way, not too hard to understand for a Frenchspeaking Belgian like me.
What I appreciated the most is being "plunged" in the atmosphere of the time of the war. And of course, I was able to recognize some friends of mine in the story told by the writer.
A very good job made by Ted Hartman. I would commend this book to all the foreigners who speaks just a little bit English.

This book is a very straightforward account of one soldier's experiences during World War II. Hartman tells his story in a rather matter-of-fact way without much in the way of dramatization or dialogue. At times the book can be a bit boring or repetitive, but that seems like a pretty accurate reflection of what war was like for Hartman. If you're expecting grand historical perspective, in-depth analysis, or heavily dramatized battle scenes, you might want to stay away from this book. If you are looking for a plain-spoken narrative from the point-of-view of a soldier at the leading edge of the Allied assault into Germany, this would probably be a good book to read.

Tank Driver is a very enjoyable general account of one private's war in Europe. The book is a fast read but doesn't leave the reader bogged down with cumbersome statistics of difficult to follow passages.

In fact, I get the feeling this book was really an expansion on an earlier work made mostly for friends and family and later expanded into something for others to enjoy.

One of the things I liked most about this book is it is a little unusual. I've not read many accounts of American tank driers in Europe. The author does a nice job of describing the American Sherman tank and some of its draw backs as well as good aspects. I also enjoyed reading about his path through Europe and especially his time at the battle at Bastogne.

However, the book remains somewhat limited by the fact it lacks specific details. I would have liked to know more about what it was like to face battle in the tank and more about the engagements the author fought in. There is very little direct action in this book.

This book would make an excellent companion to several first person accounts of Bastogne, such as Donald Burgett's Seven Roads to Hell, or David Webster's Parachute Infantry: An American Paratrooper's Memoir of D-Day and the Fall of the Third Reich , which go into much more detail regarding the events the author was involved in supporting.

The author offers first hand accounts of what it was like to be in combat. You can almost feel the fatique and range of emotions comes through loud and clear as the tankers are taken from boring lulls in action to, the tiresome routine of mantaining equipment to deadly encounters that the enemy. As the battles drag on one after another the author clearly conveys the changes in the attitude of the men as some grow so weary they no longer care if the live or die. I really enjoyed the book and recommend you buy an atlas of WW2 so that you can keep track of the movements of the division.

Booklets like this are often overlooked as being too sensational or on the other hand too bland. This book portrays the experience of a young boy who was thrust into a position of key responsibility as a tank driver during World WarII in the European Theatre. Yes at the beginning of this harrowing experience the author was a young inexperienced kid, and by the end of the story the reader can know that the author survived the experience and became a man. The author's experiences are if anything understated.. from the initial thrust through the Battle of the Bulge to his observation of the devastation of human life at Auswitz. It is a read again to remind us of the human agony associated with war.

Indelible memories of 1942-45 linger from my pubescent period. Images are those heard and seen via an upright Philco and black and white news reels between feature Westerns at Saturday afternoon movies.

Reading Tank Driver offered faces, skin and muscles to a very real corpus of WWII action. A large trove of letters by the author to his parents in Ames, Iowa, informs his writing and reportorial prowess. From the Bulge to the mesas of Los Alamos there is a compelling need to begin with Tank Driver. Well done, J. Ted Hartman.