Company C mounted up at dawn on 17 February and moved out for the flank attack. The reconnaissance platoon at about 0830 reported that there were approximately fifty Italian tanks supported by 88s advancing along the highway from Gafsa. As the TDs pulled into sight of the highway, platoon commander SSgt John Spence saw German and Italian tanks and other vehicles driving bumper-to-bumper toward Feriana. There was no main American attack from the north in sight. Spence realized something had gone awry almost immediately. A few crews opened fire, but the order came almost at once in the face of such overwhelming odds: Pull back!42
Zierdt still had no radio contact with higher command. The battalion operations officer, who was still with the company, raced to the Stark Force outpost to use the field telephone. The outpost—and its phone—were gone.
Stark had changed his mind and ordered that Feriana be abandoned. The outpost pulled out per orders, but nobody thought to tell the men of Company C. Battalion headquarters, which had had received its movement orders at 0300 hours, was unable to raise Company C by radio, so it sent a recon platoon to inform Zierdt. By the time the platoon tracked the company down, the tank killers appeared to have been surrounded.
Shortly after noon, Zierdt realized that he was almost completely encircled, so he ordered a withdrawal toward Kasserine. Gas and oil supplies were low, so he instructed vehicle commanders to destroy all faulty machines. As the halftracks, M6s, and jeeps pulled out, the enemy spotted the movement and machine-gun fire lashed the column. Recon took the lead, followed by Staff Sergeant Spence’s M3s. Soon, tank fire howled in from the west.
The recon men and Spence’s platoon returned fire to cover the rest of the column. One TD was knocked out, and several crewmembers were wounded. Almost immediately, heavy gunfire came crashing in from the east, and the other two platoons were committed. Company C had circled the wagons. The tanks to the west pulled back, evidently intending a flanking maneuver to the north.
Just as things looked hopeless, a flight of sixteen friendly aircraft strafed the enemy lines. The Germans were caught by surprise, and the fire slackened. The planes flew over the company, and each airplane waggled its wings as the flight swooped away to the north. “Look!” someone shouted, “They’re trying to show us the way!” Indeed, along the line indicated by the fighters’ flight Spence saw a cow path over a mountain that blocked the way. (The official operations report says that the planes did not attack the enemy, but Spence remembers that the air strike saved the company.)43
The Germans had recovered, so the two platoons facing east had to disengage separately under cannon fire. They were last seen heading northeast. The remainder of Company C traversed the rough high ground into the next valley. On the way across, the lead jeep tipped over and blocked the escape route; men grabbed the vehicle and righted it.
After coming under fire again near Thelepte airfield, the column turned toward Kasserine Pass. About 1515 hours, Zierdt finally reestablished radio contact with battalion headquarters, which ordered the company into positions at the foot of the pass. Company C had to borrow 75mm ammo from Sherman tank crews for its last two M3s.44 Patrols were sent out to find the missing platoons, but to no avail.
By the end of the day, Company C had lost one officer killed, seventy-four men captured or missing, and most of its vehicles.
The Allies enjoyed a bit of a respite on 18 February as German commanders argued over how to exploit their initial successes. Rommel wanted to continue his thrust deep into the Allied rear, an idea von Arnim strongly opposed. Comando Supremo late in the day split the difference and authorized a less sweeping envelopment—a maneuver that would unknowingly send the Germans into the strong Allied defenses building up in the Thala area. The immediate consequences were in many ways the same for American troops at Kasserine Pass: Rommel ordered the Afrika Korps strike force to break through and then swing north toward Le Kef.45
Clobbered at Kasserine
The headquarters group of the 1st Infantry Division’s 26th RCT arrived in Kasserine Pass about 0730 hours on 19 February to take charge of defenses that were already under attack. Fredendall had called Colonel Stark late on 18 February and told him to move to Kasserine Pass immediately and “pull a Stonewall Jackson.” Stark took command from Colonel Moore and found four companies of the 19th Engineer Combat Regiment deployed on the right side of the line while his own 1st Battalion held the left. About 1705 hours, the 3d Battalion, 39th Infantry Regiment, 9th Infantry Division, along with an antitank company, began to move into the left sector in a more-or-less piecemeal fashion. Stark deployed a few tanks from Company I, 13th Armored Regiment, and what was left of the 805th Tank Destroyer Battalion after the Feriana engagement near the entrance to the pass on the right (Company A had rejoined the battalion minus four TDs lost near Sbeitla).46
Kampfgruppe Deutsches Afrika Korps launched a strong frontal attack during the day; casualties were heavy on both sides. Under heavy artillery fire and attacked by an estimated tank battalion, the 805th Tank Destroyer Battalion wildly reported that it had destroyed between twenty-five and thirty armored vehicles while losing eight of its own TDs. The official U.S. Army history’s account suggests that the battalion destroyed no tanks, but Stars and Stripes credited the tank killers with sixteen panzers in the action.47 The tank destroyers had to pull back at about 1600 hours because German infantry had infiltrated its positions. During the night, the battalion’s last ten guns shifted to the left flank.
The following day, at about 0400 hours, a small British task force of eleven tanks, a company of motorized infantry, one battery of artillery, and some antitank guns arrived courtesy of the British 26th Armoured Brigade at Thala. During the afternoon, the 894th Tank Destroyer Battalion pulled into the pass. Stark deployed two companies to strengthen the right flank and one company to help the men of the 805th on the left.48
Rommel, however, was pressing his attack with reinforcements of his own—the 10th and 21st Panzer divisions—and his usual determination. By noon, German tanks had penetrated the line held by the engineers. As the afternoon progressed, the American line crumbled. Men fled, abandoning prodigious quantities of equipment. Lieutenant Colonel A. C. Gore, who commanded the British detachment, fought on valiantly until his last tank was destroyed. He then withdrew, accompanied by the five remaining TDs of the 805th.49
On 20 February, BrigGen Paul Robinett, commanding general of Combat Command B, was ordered to take charge of all troops defending Kasserine Pass. He, in turn, would report to the commander of the British 26th Armored Brigade, which was operating just to the north. The command spent that night rounding up and feeding stragglers from retreating units, including the 805th and 894th Tank Destroyer battalions. Both were initially incorporated into the command, but the 805th was in such a poor state—it had over the course of seven days lost eleven men killed, fifty-five wounded, and one hundred and sixty-eight missing or captured—that it could not be made combat-ready for at least a day and was sent north to Thala.50
At 0335 hours on 21 February, II Corps reported that the Germans had taken the heights on both sides of Kasserine Pass. Tanks were beginning to probe the plain on which sat Tebessa, II Corps headquarters, many of the largest American supply dumps, and the critical airfield at Youks-les-Bains.51 Combat Command B advanced during the wee hours of 21 February to Djebel el Hamra in the Bahiret Foussana Valley to block the projected German advance. The Germans attacked the new line at about 1400 with forty tanks backed by motorized infantry and artillery. The tanks of CCB would not be budged and stayed in hull-defilade positions rather than charge into waiting antitank fire. Artillery fire poured into the German ranks. The 894th Tank Destroyer Battalion maneuvered its halftracks to the enemy’s south flank and pounded the advancing Germans. The Americans held. Combat Command B’s Brigadier General Robinett reported that he believed the Germans had begun to retreat back into Kasserine Pass.52