Marder IIIM in Normandy

If you were expecting a Marder opus like one of my learned antipodean friends' Panther/Red Cross/Falaise gap epics, you're sadly wrong. There's not that many shots I could find, no real clues on unit ID's and the main reason for this post is to see if there are any more out there. I thought Ausf.M's photos were a struggle…want to try Ausf.H?!

Thanks to the work of ML visitors Martin Block and John Nelson we have the following data for units in Normandy equipped with the Marder. However, as Martin and John point out in the recent and excellent N&B Marder IIIM volume, the original documents rarely state if the vehicles are Ausf. H or Ausf. M. The unit listings were cross-referenced against Nikolas Zetterlings Normandy 1944: German Military Organization, Combat Power and Organizational Effectiveness as the operations area is not given in the N&B volume. Fingers crossed, as units and allocations are a weak point of mine, I hope this is right

243 I.D I./Pz.Jg.Abt 243 14 Marder
326 I.D I./Pz.Jg.Abt 326 14 Marder
331 I.D I./Pz.Jg.Abt 331 14 Marder
346 I.D I./Pz.Jg.Abt 346 14 Marder
352 I.D I./Pz.Jg.Abt 352 14 Marder
353 I.D I./Pz.Jg.Abt 353 14 Marder

12.SS Pz.Div HJ SS-Pz.Jg.Abt 12 (to Stab. SS Pz AA 12) 2 Marder
2.SS Pz.Div DR 3 Marder (*see below)

At this moment we should wait while Martin, John, Hans, Piet, Ron, Roger and the other experts in allocations and such like pick themselves off the floor, stop laughing and compose a message saying I've got this completely wrong….. any additions and corrections from the experts very welcome, as I'm not.

So to the photos;

The first shot comes from Lefevres Panzers In Normandy Then and Now (PINTAN). It is taken in Roncey, a small town to the west of St.Lo and south east of Coutances. These vehicle can be seen in several photos, others are in Heimdals Normandie Album Memorial and another belonging to KH Munch. However, to my knowledge this is the clearest shot. Lefevre captions this shot as 'most probably belonging to SS-Pz.Jg.Abt 2'. * Martin and John note in N&B 17 that though three were allocated on 1st February 1944, none are listed on the 'available strength' returns. Munchs shot in the N&B title is labelled as 'could have been photographed in Italy'. I see no DR markings in this or any other views of the other destroyed vehicles in Roncey but I wonder, as DR were active in this area if this photo answers a question? Then again it may not in all withdrawals following 'Cobra'.



This next shot is published in a couple of books and shows a severely wrecked vehicle. Mine?



The next three shots are from the British Pathe website and show different vehicles. The film ID is 1954-13. Does anyone recognise the vehicle behind the 'THE' in the Pathe in the bottom shot?




The next two shots are of two I./Pz.Jg.Abt 346 knocked out in the fighting at Breville.



Vehicle 102 passing the wing of a glider. I can't make out any markings on the rear plate of this vehicle, perhaps someone who has a better copy can see something. This vehicle also appear on some Wochenshau footage.

One other glimpse of a Marder IIIM was shown to us recently in a photo from a photo from Barry Crooks collection showing a scene at the crossroads at Moissy.

http://www.network54.com/Hide/Forum/thread?forumid=47207&messageid=1057075278


My good friend and senior bloodhound in the sad pack of dogs that we are, Barry Crook, was also kind enough to delve into his shelf warping book collection and sniff out these three shots from the Japanese magazine Ground Power for this post. These may not be in Normandie at all however but are included in case someone can stick a postive ID them (also note the Pz.I chassis).





These shots below show Ausf.M amongst the utter devastation at Rouen docks as the Germans tried to get over the Seine. More photos of the scenes can be viewed at http://ppognant.online.fr



Lastly one, again via Barry, from Michelucs Panzerwaffe at War published by Concord.


So that's it so far - any more shots?

Andrew

Have you noticed that the vehicle pictured in the 3. Ground Power photo is actually a Grille Ausf. M with a Pak 40 mounted in place of the 15 cm howitzer? The differences in the armour shape are rather clear.
How could this be explained? An emergency conversion?
Stefano Di Giusto
www.panzer-ozak.it

Thanx Andrew

346.ID had 14 Marder with Artillerie-Pak-Abteilung 1053 unit ( LXXXVI.Korps for Goodwood )

Find here others pictures

Marder Ko'ed in Carentan june 1944


Marder completly destroyed in Bretteville near this HJ Panther wreck



Marder destroyed near or in Cherbourg 26 26 1944


Marder abandonned Carentan-Cherbourg road june 1944

What a coincidence! Yesterday I was looking at the "Marder completly destroyed in Bretteville near this HJ Panther wreck" in The Panzers and the battle of Normandy and I noticed they claimed it was a halftrack. That's obviously a mistake but I'm not sure if it was a marder or flakpanzer, and wanted to ask it today. Are those two pictures the same vehicle, or not? They seem to be quite different. In each case the second is a flakpanzer38. Did you post it to show the differences between a marder and a flkpz38?

Thnx!

Great topic BTW!!!

I compared the houses, especially the window and door frames.
And I'd say that one street is "natural" and the other one is made of comble stone.

Regards,
Lukas

Niels' suspicion is correct Lukas, both photos were taken at the same location in Bretteville and show the same vehicle. The first shot shows how far back the superstructure has been dislodged, but you can see it has the folding upper plates of a Flakpanzer. In the second shot, the drive sprocket and first road wheel are obscured by a soldier, but in every respect the details match up.

As for the road, the dust and crud and tank tracks make judging this difficult from these angles. Some were bitumen covered by this time, which is waht I assume is shown here.

Baz

It's still difficult because of the different angles but I took a better look:
Sorry about the quality but just take another look at the originals if you want to be sure.

This shot shows the Sd.Kfz 140 before its demise into junk. From "Les Canadiens face à la Hitlerjugend", Historica Magazine No.23, Editions Heimdal. Thanks to Gray Creager.

Andrew

From the Oct 1944 Field Artillery Journal:
- john
http://www.lonesentry.com/

I am not an expert at German armour, but there appears to be a gunshield from a 30mm flak ontop of that 'Marder', anyone else spot that? Anyone offer an informed opinion?

Paul

you mean the same vehicle I mentioned in my earlier post? The first picture shows a "38" chassis but I'm not able to identify it as either marder or flakpz. The second picture is without boubt a flakpz38. But let's go back to the first one. I'm not an expert but it might be possible to identify it with the "bolted" plates on its leftrear. For now I presume it is another flakpz38. The unit might be 12ss (as is the PantherG) because they had 12 of those vehicles available. I'm not sure if the 12ss had any marders (I believe I've seen some movieshots). I'll have to check it. If they hadn't and the vehicle in picture number 1 is a marder, I wander from wich unit it would have been. For now the question remains: marder or flakpz38

n/t

Hi Niels,
12th SS Pz.Div. Hitlerjugent had Marders III ausf.M in its service during Normandy operation. You can see more of them in Nuts and Bolts book Marder III ausf.M vol.17 on page 52.

Cheers
MS

Very good collection of marders. Thanks

Andrew and a nice follow up Fred. The grabs who follows are from Gladiators of war - the Waffen SS and its said to be from Normandy, bigger pictures with the link under each picture.

Cheers, Janse



http://foto.vg.no/show_image_stream.php?bid=8221496&dx=1250&dy=937


http://foto.vg.no/show_image_stream.php?bid=8221498&dx=1250&dy=937


http://foto.vg.no/show_image_stream.php?bid=8221500&dx=1250&dy=937


http://foto.vg.no/show_image_stream.php?bid=8221504&dx=1250&dy=937

Maybe another one? Scan from SS Steel Rain, Tim Ripley.


http://foto.vg.no/show_image_stream.php?bid=8221836&dx=1250&dy=604

Nice collection Andrew, and thank you for the friendly words about the N & B 'Marder III' issue.

Thought that this had time until the publication of part two of the N & B Marder III volumes (due Feb/March 2004 if everything works out), but I better try to kill this 'white elephant' I myself might have helped to create here and now:
While I prepared my part of the current N & B issue, I had available the strength reports of 2. SS-Pz.Div. from March 1944 onwards only. And indeed no Pak-Sf. of any kind appear in those strength reports.
So I wrongly assumed that the division probably never received those shipped from a HZA on 1.2.1944. But not long afterwards I was able to complete my collection of 2. SS-Pz.Div. strength reports with fresh material from the Bundesarchiv and that showed me my assumption had only been partially correct.
As you may know, elements of the division continued fighting on the Eastern Front until late April 1944 while large parts of the division had already been sent to France for refit. As I have learned now the 3 Marder III shipped from a HZA to 'Das Reich' on 1.2.1944 went to that so called SS-Pz.Kampfgruppe 'Das Reich' remaining on the Eastern Front and NOT to those parts refitting in France.
SS-Pz.Kgr. 'Das Reich' fielded a few Marders III each in the heavy company of III./'DR' under Hstuf. Lex and a mixed Gren./Pak/Flak company directly attached to the Kampfgruppenstab. When finally leaving Russia in late April/early May 1944 to join up with the bulk of the division in France the remaining heavy equipment including any surviving Marder III were left behind!
So the photo taken in Roncey/France definitely does not show Marder III of 'Das Reich' but rather of 1./Pz.Jg.Abt. 243 or 1./Pz.Jg.Abt. 353. The caption used in the current N & B issue was provided by K.H. Münch and unfortunately adds a little to the confusion. In this case I would have liked to see repeated the location ID provided by the 'After the Battle - Then and Now' and 'Heimdal' teams which I think to be the correct one.

There are a few more minor corrections necessary to the current N & B 'Marder III' issue due to layout mishaps in some of the tables as well as new information found in the archives. I have already supplied a list of 'Errata' to the publishers that will hopefully be included in part 2 early next year.

Martin Block

Thanks for all the responses and to the guys who've posted more, sorry for the delay in coming back but I got dragged into going Xmas shopping by the C.O. Of course, the Wespe was posted in just to make sure everyone was awake at the end... Good pick up on the Grille, I hadn't immediately noticed this one. The 38t chassis knocked out just down the road from that HJ Panther G was been one I thought of posting but couldn't ID the variant.

Gray Creager and John Boyton kindly sent some more shots in which add some details and thoughts on another vehicle.

Vehicle 102 shown passing the wing of a Horsa glider. This one may possibly be during the Market Garden operations and not Normandy at all. The BA file number on another shot taken moments before the one I posted above is 493/3364/7.

The second from last photo in my original post was filed or captioned on 8th July '44 and is definitely Normandy.

This shot is a clearer view of the two Pz.Jg.Abt 346 vehicles knocked out in Breville.
Another vehicle, location?

Lastly, a view of the two in Roncey. Again these Marders were captioned in the publication it was taken from as DR vehicles, so a big thanks to Martin Block for taking the time out and clearing this one up.


Maybe some time we can do Marder III Ausf.H. I can only recall three shots definitely in Normandy. Two are in Auerbachs The Last of the Panzers and the one Fred posted above.

Regards - Andrew

Hi Andy, nice collection and some interesting additions and info too guys. I agree a Wespe and a Flakpanzer 38(t) has snuck in amongst this lot. Interesting observation by Stefano about the Grille converted to a Marder. like Andy said, that photo may be taken elsewhere, like in a dump in northern Italy, Germany or Bohemia.

I think the second shot you just posted above Andy, the one with the wrecked SiG 33 and RSO, is taken in Italy, going by the type of uniform worn by the Commonwealth soldier.

This previously posted eg, seen in The Corridor of Death, is probably a Marder III Ausf M, rather than a Grille, because its missing the plate over the LH ammo rack normally seen on Grillen:





I can only recall one Marder III Ausf H in Bill Auerbach's book (There is a Marder II though). There is another Marder III Ausf H, said to be in Normandie, published in a Panzer Voran though

Baz

Barry,

Yes that one is Italy confirmed I believe by this shot. Taken near Cori, SE of Rome and ENE of Anzio.

Andrew

Not sure of these following from PSL Photo Album 5

Note star antenna real or photo touch-up??

Different crop from inside book. May belong to a series taken during an exercise in Belguim or The Netherlands

Diferent angle from first post.

Where who knows?
Pictures will EXPIRE on or before 03 Dec 2003
Shady One
Bill

Hi Andrew,
some of listed Inf. Div. equiped with Marders ausf.M were under 15th Armee command alocated in France and Belgium (spring 1944). Under 15th Armee command belonged also another units with Marders:
- 19th Lw. Field Div. - Belgium
- 326th Inf. Div. - Boulogne Sur Mer (France)
- 344th Inf. Div. - Somme (France)
- 348th Inf. Div. - Abbeville (France)
- 346th Inf. Div. - Le Havre (France)
Here are another two Marders ausf.M/Pak 40 from 326th or 344 Inf.Div. The first shot was taken in Pas-De-Calais in spring (March) 1944.





Cheers
MS