General Samuel Rockenbach  

Chief of the Tank Corps

 

Samuel Dickerson Rockenbach was born on 27 January 1869 in Lynchburg, Virginia. He graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1889 and in 1891 was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant. He married Emma Baldwin on 19 October 1898. Prior to World War I he saw tours of duty in Cuba, the Philippines, various U.S. Army posts, and served as a military observer in Germany in 1914. After his arrival in France in June 1917 with the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) he served as the quartermaster in charge of port operations at the port of St. Nazaire France. There he had caught the eye of General Pershing, who needed someone with experience in supply operations and logistics to get the newly developed Tank Corps operational. He was subsequently appointed as the Chief of the Tank Corps on 22 December 1917. His role in the establishment of the Tank Corps and for his work in the development of tank warfare is notable in the history of Armor. General Rockenbach said regarding the Tank Corps that “probably no other enterprise of such size was ever undertaken with so few instructions and so little staff [War Department] assistance.”

General Rockenbach at Camp Meade, Maryland

At the end of the war, General Rockenbach continued his work with tanks as the Army's Chief of the Tank Corps and as Commander of the Tank School at Camp Meade, Maryland.

General Rockenbach retired and moved to Brownsville, Texas in 1933. This early Knight of the Armor Force died in 1952 at the Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington, DC.

 

 

Virginia Historical Marker

Marker Location: 8th and Court Streets in Lynchburg Virginia. The markers sponsors are the Virginia Military Institute Alumni Chapter and Lynchburg Historical Foundation – erected in 1978.

 

Grave Site

 

The final resting place of the First Chief of the Tank Corps is located at Arlington National Cemetery. 

 

“We Forge the Thunderbolt”

KNIGHTS OF THE ARMOR FORCE