Staff Sergeant Lafayette G. Pool 

A True Knight of the Armor Force

The following is an excerpt from the article titled, Exploding a few myths about World War II Armor.

By Stephen 'Cookie' Sewell
Museum Ordnance Magazine
September 1993

Myth: Michael Wittmann was the Greatest Tank Commander of the Second World War.

This is a subject of even more speculation. Wittmann was no doubt brave and skillful, and he is given credit for a great deal of prowess on the battlefield. His score is listed as 138 tanks and 132 anti-tank guns destroyed in a career stretching from June 1941 to August 1944. While awarded every major German combat award up to the Swords for the Knight's Cross (Germany's second highest combat decoration), it should be pointed out that he was an unrepentant Nazi who had joined the Party in 1937 and was posted to SS units.

Lacking good Information on Soviet tanks aces (which do not appear to be many due to a very short life in many units), my personal counterclaim to the title of greatest tanker of the war would be an American staff sergeant named Lafayette G. Pool who, while operating a 76mm Sherman, managed to destroy 258 enemy vehicles between 27 June 1944 and 15 September 1944. This is a far greater achievement than Wittmann's, and given the relative merits of each man's case puts him in a better position to be the supreme "over-achiever" of the war.

To compare them, they have many things in common and many things that differentiate them. Both chose armor as a branch. Wittmann joining the SS Llebstandarte Adolph Hitler Division in 1939 and Pool the 40th Armored Regiment in 1941. Both men had taken punishment and it showed - Wittmann, a shell explosion that sliced up his face and body, and Pool, a few "souvenirs" as a Golden Gloves champ in Texas. Both were skilled in tactics and use of their respective tanks, and both were excellent at small unit leadership.

Wittmann is best associated as a company commander from the 2nd Company of SS Panzer Abteilung 501. Pool was only associated in combat with the 3rd Platoon, "I" Company, 3rd Battalion, 32nd Armored Regiment, 3rd US Armored Division. Wittmann is best known in his Tiger I number 805 from the 501st. Pool's tank (he went through three in his short career) was always named IN THE MOOD; it was a 76mm M4A1 WSS Sherman. Both men had a personal hold on their crew members and remained close where possible. Wittmann kept the same gunner, SS Oberscharfuehrer Balthasar Woll, through the war. Pool also kept the same crew: CPL Wilbert "Red" Richards, driver; PFC Bert Close, assistant driver/bow gunner; CPL Willis Oiler, gunner; and T/5 Del Boggs, loader.

Both men fought their tanks to their best advantage. For Wittmann, this was using either ambush or a slow advance with the heavy firepower of the Tiger's 88mm gun and its massive frontal armor limiting enemy responses. Pool, on the other hand, was noted for moving right into the enemy and mixing it up. When one considers that his favorite foe appears to have been the Panther - never a good choice to take on with any Sherman at any range - the fact that he only lost three tanks in combat, while racking up the score that he did, seems all the more remarkable.

However, the two men ended their combat careers in different ways. Wittmann with a whimper and Pool with a bang. Wittmann appears to have been killed in a series of Allied air raids called Operation Totalize; he never had a chance to fight back, and his company and his tank were destroyed in the bombing. Pool found out the hard way that "three's the charm" and, while functioning as the "spearhead" of the Spearhead Division south of Aachen, Germany, tried to shoot it out with more Panthers. This time Pool lost and the Sherman backed into a ditch and rolled over after two 75mm shells hit the tank. The four crew members survived with minor wounds, but Pool was blown out of the turret and wounded badly enough to require being medivaced; he was sent home to convalesce and survived the war.

Wittmann was undoubtedly the best that the Germans had, but his time in combat (as a tank commander) was something in excess of 25 months. Pool was only in combat for 80 days (21 engagements). Based on time, equipment, and accomplishment, Lafayette Pool is a better call for the best tanker of the war.

“We Forge the Thunderbolt”

KNIGHTS OF THE ARMOR FORCE