Photo Captions

The montage on the Super Sixth home page is constructed mostly from photos scanned from George Hofmann's "Super Sixth".

Of particular interest are the photos at the lower-left and upper-left corners. These were taken by combat photographer Charles Sumners, who is having a book published of his experiences.

Furthermore, the upper-left photo was taken in the German town of Oberdorla, which a few years ago erected a memorial to the dead GI visible in the lower part of the photo. See German documentary film maker Ulrich Koch's website for more information

Here is a summary of the photo captions, clockwise from the upper-left. Except where noted, the photos were scanned from Hofmann's "Super Sixth", and page numbers refer to that book. The originals generally were found in the National Archives during research for the book.

1. "Doughboys of the 44th Armd. Inf. Bn. dash across open space to escape sniper fire in Oberdorla, Germany." (Page 387) Note: Charles Sumners photo, "Best 100 Photos of the European Theater". Mr. Sumners had been in front of that soldier, and then stopped to reload his camera. The soldier stepped into the street and was shot dead. Mr. Sumners believes that if he hadn't stopped to reload his film, it would have been him that got killed.

2. "Tech. Sgt. Wilmer Jones, with map. holds conference with unit leaders in Brittany before moving out a 9th Armd. Inf. patrol to locate a munitions dump. Note the "6" deleted from shoulder patches." (Page 58)

3. "Link-up of Americans of Third Army with French troops of Seventh Army. The 86th Recon Troopers in the scout car on the right: Sgt Louis Basil shaking hands with the Frenchman, Cpl. Edgar Ellis, Lt. Vernon Hill, and Cpl. Carl Newman. (Page 118)

4. "General Patton presented battle streamers to the 25th Armd. Engr. Bn. at Aschaffensburg, Germany, 8 August 1945." (Page 433)

5. "German prisoners are marched to the rear on the center island of Autobahn highway near Giessen, Germany, as 6th Armored vehicles roll past them to the front. (Page 367) Note: This was used as the basis of a memorable scene in HBO's "Band of Brothers". No mention of the 6th in the TV show though, of course.

6. "General Karl Uckerman after his capture rides to the POW cage with Maj. Robert DeMers of the 603rd Tank Destroyer Bn." (Page 403)

7. "6th Armored soldiers firing on enemy snipers near Altenburg, Germany." (Page 416) Note: Another Charles Sumners photo. His original caption read, "6th Armored's infantry firing at enemy positions at Windischleuba, Germany, 1945"

8. No caption. This photo was scanned from the "Combat History of the Super Sixth" by William Rutledge, much of which is reproduced on this web site. The photo accompanied a tribute to the Division's 76th Armored Medical Battalion, which evacuated well over 10,000 battle and non-battle casualties, including several Germans.

9. (Center) "This one sign was probably photographed by more Super Sixers than anything else in the entire ETO." (Page 331).

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