Type: Light Tank
Nation: USA
Period: World War 2
Location: Dead Man‘s Corner Museum, Carentan les Marais, France
All in the family
The Light Tank M5 was an improved version of the M3 Stuart. It was developed from late 1941 to early 1942 to free up Continental W-670 engines which were needed for aircraft production. Instead of using the M3‘s radial engine the M5 series was powered by twin liquid-cooled Cadillac V8 automobile engines running into an automatic transmission. The M5‘s sloped glacis plate was then also implemented on the M3A3, from which the M5 can be distinguished by the raised engine deck to house the two engines. Otherwise, all these vehicles were very similar and they all carried the same 37 mm gun. The M5‘s chassis would also be chosen as the basis for the 75 mm Howitzer Motor Carriage M8, a light self-propelled artillery piece.
The British touch
In November 1942 the M5A1, the upgraded model of the M5, went into production. While the M5 had simply been equipped with the turret of the M3A1, the M5A1 received the turret of the M3A3, which can be identified by the overhanging bustle at the rear – a request by the British Army who liked having their tanks‘ radios in the turret. During development of the Medium Tank M3 Grant/Lee, they had already done the same, but on the light tanks it did not lead to two separate nation-specific versions. Both the M3 and M5 Stuart were extensively used by the Western Allies, but only the M3 was supplied to the Soviet Union via Lend-Lease.
The dead man in the tank
This particular vehicle is located at the road junction which has become widely known as „Dead Man‘s Corner“. On 7 June 1944 – D-Day + 1 – the leading tank in a column of M5A1 Stuarts of the American 70th Tank Battalion, coming from Utah Beach and advancing on the town of Carentan, was knocked out by a German Fallschirmjäger‘s Panzerfaust. Its crew was killed and the commander‘s dead body remained hanging from his hatch for several days before he could finally be removed. The building at what the passing American 101st Airborne paratroopers called the „corner with the dead man in the tank“ had been used as a German command post and aid station. Today it houses the Dead Man‘s Corner Museum which is located right next to the newer D-Day Experience.
Almost perfect
The vehicle on display is not a real wartime tank but a very faithful steel replica with tracks made from concrete. Although it resembles a later model than the original tank destroyed at Dead Man‘s Corner (which did not have the late-production curved armoured storage box on the turret side to store a .30 calibre machine gun), it was painted with the correct markings: First United States Army, 70th Tank Battalion, D-12 for the second tank in D company’s third platoon and „Joe Peckerwood“, the armoured turtle which was the battalion‘s symbol.
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