SS-Hauptsturmführer Michael Wittmann

Michael Wittmann enlisted in the German Army in 1934. He joined the SS in October 1936 and was assigned to the regiment, later division, Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler on 5 April 1937. A year later, he participated in the annexation of Austria, the occupation of Sudetenland, and joined the Nazi Party.

Wittmann's unit was transferred to the Eastern Front in the spring of 1941 for Operation Barbarossa, the planned invasion of the Soviet Union. He was assigned to SS Panzer Regiment 1, a tank unit, where he commanded a StuG III assault gun/tank destroyer as well as a Panzer III medium tank. By 1943, he commanded a Tiger I tank, and had become a platoon leader in the heavy company by the time Operation Citadel and the Battle of Kursk took place. On their first day in battle at Kursk, Wittmann and his crew scored eight tanks and seven anti-tank guns destroyed.

In November 1943, Wittmann, still serving in Leibstandarte’s heavy company, was involved in armored counterattacks against the Russians around Zhitomir. On their first day in action against the Soviets, Wittman’s crew destroyed ten T-34s and five anti-tank guns. “By early January 1944 his combined total of destroyed tanks would rise to sixty-six.

In April 1944, Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler’s Tiger Company was transferred to SS Heavy Panzer Battalion 101. Wittmann was appointed commander of the battalion's second company, and held the rank of SS-Obersturmführer. On 7 June, the day after the Allied Invasion of Normandy began, the battalion was ordered to move from Beauvais to Normandy. The move, covering 165 km , took five days to complete. On June 12th., anticipating the importance the British would assign to the high ground near Villers-Bocage, Wittmann's company was positioned near the town. Nominally composed of 12 tanks, his company was 50 per cent under-strength due to losses and mechanical failures.
The next morning, lead elements of the British 7th Armoured Division entered Villers-Bocage. Their objective was to exploit a gap in the front line, seize Villers-Bocage, and capture the nearby ridge in an attempt to force a German withdrawal.Wittman had not expected them to arrive so soon and had no time to assemble his company. Having ordered the rest of the company to hold its ground, he set off with one tank.

Wittmann's Tiger emerged from cover onto the main road and engaged the rearmost British tanks, destroying them. Wittmann then moved towards Villers-Bocage, shooting several unarmed transport vehicles parked along the roadside. Moving into the eastern end of the town, he engaged several light tanks, followed by medium tanks.
In less than 15 minutes, 13 or 14 tanks, two anti-tank guns, and 13 to 15 transport vehicles had been destroyed by Heavy SS-Panzer Battalion 101, some attributed to Wittmann. For his actions during the battle, Wittmann was promoted to SS-Hauptsturmführer, and awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords.

On 8 August Wittmann himself was ambushed, this time in an apple orchard south of Caen, when his Tiger was destroyed by a timely hit from the 17-pounder anti-tank cannon of a British Sherman Firefly. The legendary Panzer Ace was dead.