Another good book for CM fans.

[Victor Semensi]

I found this to be a facinating look at how US tanks were maintained and repaired in the field. It also has the only picture and description of the Super Pershing I've ever seen in print:

Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II, Belton Y. Cooper, Presidio Press, Novato, California, 1998

As American tanks raced across France, one fact became immediately clear: One on one, the Sherman tank with its 75mm main gun was overmatched by the more heavily armored and heavily gunned German tanks that it faced across the battlefield. The resulting losses were staggering and America simply couldn't get new equipment to France fast enough to keep our armed forces up to strength.

As a young Ordnance lieutenant in the 3d Armored Division, it was Belton Cooper's job to travel with the combat units during the day and assist in coordinating the recovery, repair, and evacuation of the battle-damaged tanks. At night, Lieutenant Cooper and his jeep driver raced along dark country roads, often going through enemy territory, to deliver his combat loss reports to the Ordnance battalion headquarters, typically some thirty to sixty miles to the rear. This ensured that his units got their share of patched-up, resurrected Shermans the next day.

The German army did not have an armored recovery system at all: they simply abandoned their knocked out vehicles on the battlefield. Death Traps tells the amazing story of a previously unheralded aspect of the American victory. From D-day to the final thrust across Europe, Cooper and the men of his division's maintenance and supply system -- manned primarily by soldiers who had been farm machinery mechanics and industrial workers in civilian life -- put back into action hundreds of M4 Sherman tanks. This remarkable achievement is brought to life by a man who made more ordnance inspections and witnessed more battle damaged tanks than probably anyone else--in any war.