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This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Sylvia Perry from ´óÏó´«Ã½ Essex on behalf of Charles Carter with his permission. He fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

A few days after D Day we were located in the Villers Bocage area, a village south of Bayeaux, point 213. It was a treacherous network of narrow sunken lanes, impenetrable with high banked hedgerows and small fields which had been defended by German tanks, machine guns and Nebelwerfer multi-barrelled mortars. We had heard rumours of Lt. Michael Wittman of the SS tank unit which had recently been in the area of the Villers Bocage.

Rumours abounded but we did in fact see the outcome of his expert gunner and the havoc he had caused. We were in the Tank Recovery Unit attached to the 6th Guards Armoured, moving through the Bocage. We only dealt with the recovery of tanks which could be repaired and put back into action again.

Moving along the Caen road network we saw the many tanks and armoured vehicles of the London Yeomanry and Rifle Brigade which had fallen foul of his gunner during the period from the 13th June 1944 when, in command of a single Tiger tank of the 1st SS Panzer Corps, he had destroyed four Cromwell tanks in the village then moved off towards the Caen road destroying 12 tanks in total, 13 troop carriers and 2 anti tank guns. 100 soldiers were killed or taken prisoner, including several veterans of the Desert War, the ‘Desert Rats’.

The major problem with Allied tanks was their lightly armoured underside when they attempted to bridge the high banked hedgerows of the bocage. This time, however, it had been a one on one confrontation. His gunner must have been ‘pretty good’.

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