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The Captain’s Tank - Chris Sarno Memoir |
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| When the peace talks broke down, the 1st Tank Battalion moved out of Reserve and back up into the Punchbowl’s
combat zone. In October, Able Company went on line for a month, going on daily direct fire missions. With Rendoza
out of action and shipped out to recuperate in the Naval Hospital at Yokosuka, Japan, Chris Sarno volunteered to
be the assistant driver on A-41 tank, which was the captain’s tank. Sarno first served as the tank’s assistant
driver and loader, depending on the mission for the day. "I was the low man on the pole, but that’s how tank crews
are broken in," he explained. "You either started as a loader—most of the time as loaders—and you ran the radio."
When Sarno came aboard Captain Snell’s tank A-41, Pfc. Lionel Durk was the driver; Sergeant Carr was gunner; and
Pfc. Ray Kapinski was loader.
Beneath the drivers were escape hatches that (theoretically) could be used to get out of the tank in case something went wrong with the turret hatch. "But," said Sarno, "we found out that when we hit mines, they were so powerful the force would drive the whole hatch in under the driver’s or assistant driver’s legs." He said that the driver’s legs could be crushed against the top of his compartment. Able Company personnel discovered this when Red Wheeler’s tank hit a mine back in July. "After that," explained Sarno, "they started welding sprockets below both escape hatches so we couldn’t come out underneath. We had to come out of the top of the turret. It was a problem, but it did save the driver’s legs if the tank hit a mine in the future." Sarno saw several tanks hit mines, but he said that Tank 41 was never hit. "We had shrapnel from artillery hitting us, and sometimes there was shrapnel from small arms such as machine guns," he said. "But that couldn’t penetrate the tank unless the artillery round was a direct hit on the turret or the engine doors. That could disable us. We had a couple of tanks that took direct hits from artillery—one on the eastern front and two on the western front. They were hit on top of their engines and they were totaled." |
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A tank crew consisted of five
Marines, including a driver and assistant driver. In the turret, there was a loader for the 90 and the coaxial
turret .30 caliber turret machine gun. There was also a gunner who was sitting down even lower than the loader.
"He was really jammed in there with a telescope and a periscope and the trigger mechanism to fire the 90," Sarno
said. Above the gunner was the tank commander seat. He had a cupola with prisms so that he could have a 360 degree
view of the terrain around the tank. Inside the driver’s compartment, there were dual controls. Using a "joy
stick" with his right hand, the driver controlled reverse, neutral, first and second gears. "The same prevailed on
the assistant driver’s side," Sarno explained. "Only he had to use his left hand if the driver got incapacitated.
But I never saw that - most of the time I was the driver."