Earl Pampeyan
World War II
Tank Mechanic
I was drafted into the US Army on April 5, 1943 at age 18. Owing to
my brief after-school and summer work experience, I was classified as
an Automotive Mechanic and assigned to the 538th Ordnance, HM (Tank)
Company, headquartered in Fort Knox, KY. Upon completion of Basic
Training, the 538th was sequestered in a Special Training Area where
we were trained to understand and maintain a “secret” device*
that “would change the course of WW II.” From
Fort Knox the 538th went to western AZ for 6 months of Desert Training,
in support of several Armored Divisions, before shipping over to Wales
where we prepared mechanized equipment for the invasion of Europe. From
the time of completion of Special Training until our arrival in Great
Britain we were not allowed to go on Pass alone lest we “leak” sensitive
information about the “secret weapon.” (Initially we
could go off the base only in groups of 15, but over time the numbers
were gradually reduced until we were allowed to go on Pass with a buddy.)
The 538th left the U.S. on March 31, 1944. We crossed the Atlantic on
the SS Queen Elizabeth, accompanied by the famous heavyweight Joe Louis
and 5,000 other GI’s, then spent the following 21 months in the
ETO. Following D Day and our landing on Utah Beach, the 538th
stayed close to the action through northern France, Luxembourg, Belgium,
Holland, and Germany until cessation of European hostilities, ending
up in Stendal, on the west side of the Elbe River ( 60 miles from Berlin). En
route we saw V1 and V2 “rockets” pass overhead and saw the
damage they caused near our encampments. We had Luftwaffe pilots “eyeball” us
at close range and saw trenches filled with emaciated bodies at the Gardelegen “death
camp.” We saw our planes shot down, and at times had to scavenge
parts from armored vehicles. Some of the vehicles were “coated” with
the crew’s remains. In general, the civilian populace in
Germany was subdued and friendly and, to my knowledge, no threat to us.
Our company, at various times, was attached to the 1st, 3rd, 7th and
9th Armies, and various Armored Divisions (including the “Hell
on Wheels” 2nd Armored under Patton). We were credited for being
part of the campaigns and battles of Northern France, Ardennes, Rhineland,
and Central Europe. We were shifted around so frequently that I’ve
lost track of commands but I do remember Generals Bradley, Patton, and
Clark. (As an aside, I maintained Clark’s Opel Staff Car
while occupying Austria.) During a visit to Berchtesgaden, I saw
Gen. Eisenhower personally remove the “Officers Only” sign
from the elevator leading to the “Eagle’s Nest,” a
gesture that put him in very good standing with all the GI’s.
The 538th had the capability to retrieve, transport and repair everything
from wristwatches to heavy artillery and tanks. We moved around
frequently except during the winter of 1944 during Battle of the Bulge,
when we were based for three months in the small Dutch town of Simpelveld
(near Aachen). We seldom stayed in any one place for more than a week. My
specialties were the repair and maintenance of 500-HP Ford V-8 and GM “twin
6-71” engines used in Medium Tanks and Tank Destroyers. I had been
trained to work on the 400-HP 9-cyl Continental air-cooled radial and
the (impossible) 30-cylinder Chrysler engines. I don’t recall seeing
any of them in Europe – Oh well, that’s the army for you. We
were frequently called upon to prepare vehicles for assaults and major
river crossings—ahead of the infantry—armed only with our
assigned weapons and toolboxes!
On the lighter side, I once volunteered to drive a truckload of GI’s
to Liege on a one-day Pass, and that was easy duty -- going in. Coming
back in the wee hours of the morning, in blackout trim, was a different
story. The worst part of that duty was trying to round up my truckload
of GI’s from the bars and brothels! On another pass to Liege, my
buddy and I were approached by a nice looking woman who asked us to accompany
her to her apartment for lunch. Not wanting to impose on her, we
said no. She finally figured out that we thought that she was trying
to “proposition” us. With the help of my High School
French, we finally understood the she was so grateful for U.S. troops,
for freeing her people from the Germans, that she wanted to show her
appreciation. So we went with her and enjoyed a good meal consisting
of the first fresh eggs we had had for several months.
The 538th lost 3 men during the hostilities: one was backed over by a
heavy truck—accidentally; one was killed when a stray aerial 20mm,
HE shell, impacted on his work bench and eviscerated him; another soldier
accidentally shot himself in the head when he jumped out of a truck before
engaging the “safety” on his Thompson .45 submachine gun.
Following cessation of hostilities, the 538th was sent to Austria to “occupy” and
train Displaced Persons, mostly Eastern Europeans, to do our jobs. Subsequently
I was transferred to an Artillery Company in the 84th (Woodcutter) Division
encamped near Salzburg, before moving south through France to Marseilles
and shipping out on a Victory ship. We docked in Hampton Roads,
VA on December 25, 1945; some of us were then flown to Fort McArthur,
CA, and I became a civilian on January 6, 1946.
* Footnote:
The Secret Weapon was a carbon arc light mounted in a specially modified
turret on old M-3 Medium Tanks. Inside the turret behind the arc
mechanism was a parabolic-elliptical mirror that focused the arc light
through a narrow vertical slit into a wide horizontal beam. The
slit in the turret contained a mechanical shutter, whose speed could
be controlled, and yellow and blue filters that also could be controlled. The
idea behind this British contraption was that in nighttime assaults these
tanks would advance upon enemy positions, with arc lights flashing at
varying speeds and in various colors, and blind or confuse the enemy
while Allied troops advanced under cover of darkness. The combination
of flashing white, blue and yellow arc lights would confuse the enemy
trying to determine the distance to the lights’ source. To
my knowledge, this device was never used as intended in battle, but I
was later told that one or more of these M-3 tanks had been seen illuminating
a Rhine River bridge sometime after the river had been crossed and the
bridge secured.