The battalion would play a major role in the infamous Battle of the Bulge as they successfully countered the German's last-ditch offensive. From the time they entered combat until the end of the war in Europe, the men of the 761 st received seven Silver Stars, 246 Purple Hearts and 1 Congressional Medal of Honor. As they fought their way into Germany, the 761 st would participate in four major campaigns through six countries, all the while earning several battlefield commendations and honors. Patton, himself a skeptic of African American tankers in combat, would wind up welcoming the 761 st into his Third Army and motivated them with a rousing speech right before they set out to engage German forces. Upon arriving in Normandy, France in late 1944, the 761 st was assigned to Patton's Third Army. In the initial attack the Germans had an almost two-to-one advantage in manpower and for the first time on the Western Front outnumbered the Allies in terms of tanks and other armored vehicles.A tank crew from the 761st sit in their M24 Chaffee tank in a snowy field around Bastogne, waiting to engage German forces during the Battle of the Bulge. It was a good time to take a break, and then you had a huge blizzard."īy contrast, the Germans were very prepared and had amassed more than 400,000 men, and just over 1,400 armored vehicles including tanks, tank destroyers and assault guns. They (the Americans) were out of food, ammunition and gasoline. But from the American perspective, the Germans were going to be defeated – it was just that the Allies' supply lines couldn't keep up. "It was in many ways a colossal failure of intelligence, and the Allies misread the tea leaves. "There was a certain amount of hubris involved," Ulbrich added. Ulbrich, program director and associate professor in the Master of Arts in History and in Military History at Norwich University in Vermont, told Fox News. "If you look at where the Allies were – after fighting through the hedgerows of Normandy and racing across France, to them the Germans looked bloodied and beaten," David J. 6, 1945 file photo, American tanks wait on the snowy slopes in Bastogne, Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge.
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