U.S. Third Army

The U.S. Third Army gained fame during World War II while under the command of Lt. Gen. George S. Patton, Jr.  Deployed to the Western Front in the summer of 1944, Third Army executed an impressive offensive drive across France, and during the Battle of the Bulge that winter elements of Third Army disengaged from an existing fight, pivoted northward, and relieved the besieged garrison at the Belgian crossroads town of Bastogne.

U.S. Third Army

Patton in Lorraine: Breaking the Moselle Line

By William E. Welsh

By mid-September 1944, the U.S. Third Army was poised to strike at the soft underbelly of Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich along a fabled corridor in northeastern France used for centuries by armies tramping across Europe. Read more

U.S. Third Army

M4 Sherman: “Blunder” or “Wonder” Weapon?

By Blaine Taylor

For the Allied tankers and infantrymen of the American, British, Canadian, and Free French armies battling German Panther and Tiger tanks in Normandy in the summer of 1944, the Sherman tank’s failures were glaringly evident as their own shells bounced off the hulls of the Nazi armor and they were themselves destroyed at a far greater range by the powerful German tanks. Read more

The Red Ball Express kept the Allies rolling during the arduous campaign in Western Europe.

U.S. Third Army

Red Ball Express: The Legendary Lifeline

 

By Michael D. Hull

August 1944 saw a rosy mood of optimism and self-deception sweep through the Allied high command in France as a result of the sudden, dramatic end to the campaign in Normandy. Read more

U.S. Third Army

Leclerc and Liberation

By Michael D. Hull

After the humiliating fall of France in June 1940, two impassioned patriots—a general and an infantry captain—refused to accept defeat and determined, against all odds, to exact retribution from the German invaders. Read more

U.S. Third Army

The Magnificent Jeep

By Michael D. Hull

General of the Army George C. Marshall called it America’s greatest contribution to modern warfare. General Dwight D. Read more

U.S. Third Army

Patton’s Last Command

By Alexander Lovelace

The October light was beginning to fade as the U.S. Army limousine sped along the autobahn in the American Zone of Occupied Germany. Read more

U.S. Third Army

Smokescreens: Fighting for Metz

By Jon Latimer

With the defeat of the German Seventh Army and the closing of the Falaise Gap in the summer of 1944, the Allies pursued the retreating enemy across France. Read more