With all due respect, I disagree. It is not a correct battle drill to sit in a disabled tank waiting to die.
Sherman crews were trained religiously to "abandon" a NS (non-serviceable) tank. NS was clarified to mean turret blockage or master weapon failure in either the advance or defense, or being rendered immobile if in the advance only. If one was in a defensive position, being immobilized but still being able to provide effective fire support, meant staying with the vehicle. If the vehicle could be driven out of the enemy's line of fire to the "fitter" group, than that was deemed appropriate, unless the crew had an immediate combat replacement. In that case, they would abandon the tank in-place and mount the new vehicle. The only cardinal sin ever drummed into me was NOT to abandon a fully serviceable tank
A lot of people think the analogy should be like the Captain going down with his ship, which is rubbish. Trained crews are hard to replace, whereas equipment can be ferried up from the rear by the echelon squadron.
By the way, my old friend Gunner Harry, 1st Hussars (6th Cdn Armored Regt) 1941-68, actually did abandon a Sherman in-place with no damage whatsoever. He was driving along a road in France shortly after June 11th, 1944 (the Black Day of the 1st Hussars), where they lost most of the Regiment to an SS Panzer division counter attack, therefore he had no wingman. It was a narrow, barely two lane type thing and all of a sudden, a Tiger (he says) pulled across in front of them broadside at about 600 yards. His Crew Commander hollered "shot action" (meaning load AP), "shell action" was HE and screamed into the intercom "no traverse - 600 Tank- front" (meaning select the tank target at 600 yards to your front). The Loader/Op shoved an AP round up the breach and hollered "loaded". Gunner Harry bore sighted (it filled the sighting scope) with a response "600 Tank - ON !! (meaning he was ready). At this point, the Panzer begin to traverse its turret around 90 degrees towards them. The CC yelled "Fire" and Gunner Harry yelled back "Firing Now" (don't want the Loader/Op to lose his hand behind breach, so the gunner always indicates he's firing) and he hammered his foot down on the electrical solenoid switch for the master weapon. He said the round hit mid turret on the Panzer and angled off straight up in the air. The CC repeated the fire order drill once again. A second round deflected straight up in the air also. The Panzer continued what appeared to be a manual slow traverse. A third Sherman AP round was let loose and this one hit near rear deck, deflecting into the woods, but still no damage and the Panzer's turret was almost on them. So, Gunner Harry's CC hollered, that's enough for us and told them to "bail". Gunner Harry went out through the CC's cupola, following the CC as they dove off the Sherman and ran into the woods, falling into the grass. He said that maybe 15 seconds later there was a bang and when he lifted his head out of the grass, his Sherman was "brewing up". They ran through the woods and walked back to squadron HQ where they were issued a new Sherman that had come off the boats from England. They never got into trouble for ditching that tank, but he did say he was some "p*&&%$" because he lost all his kit in the tank they abandoned, including his brandy snifter.
Personally, I bail in AH without any guilt under all of the conditions I described. The only time I haven't was at Field 30 last night. I lost the master weapon, but still had MG. "Thunder" was in another Panzer attacking two Panzers and three M16's. I was 90 degrees to him, so I stayed in turret and fired MG in front of them. HT told me MG fire was effective for simulating SMOKE rounds which we don't have, being loaded with only AP and HE. I tried it and sure enough, he was right. It created one heck of a great smoke screen in front of "Thunder" and I hope helped him "jockey" so he could get a clear shot at them. I also laid smoke in front of the bad guys with MG as "Thunder" maintained "fire and movement". I assume that they see on their FE what I see on mine (at least I hope so), as it does work very well. Unfortunately, an F4Uc came along, probably saw my neon icon at 6k and decided he wanted an easy kill, so I was toast.
Regards,
Badger
[This message has been edited by Badger (edited 05-01-2000).]
[This message has been edited by Badger (edited 05-01-2000).]
