Transferred from the east, the company was re-equipped with Tiger IIs and fought around Caen and in the retreat from Normandy. Knispel saw further action during the relief attack on the Korsun-Cherkassy Pocket, Vinnitsa, Jampol, and Kamenets-Podolsk. This group, led by Oberfeldwebel Fedensack, was to become the 1st Company of the 503rd Heavy Panzer Battalion which fought at Kursk as flank cover for the 7th Panzer Division ( Armee Abteilung Kempf). At this time, Knispel was credited with 12 kills.įrom Putlos, a group of men was sent to the 500th Panzer Battalion at Paderborn. Knispel returned to Putlos at the end of January 1943 and became familiar with the new Tiger I tanks. Knispel saw action from Yarzevo to the gates of Stalingrad, in the north around the Leningrad-Tikhvin area and also in the Caucasus under Eberhard von Mackensen. Hellman at the time of Operation Barbarossa, where he participated in the initial assault as part of Panzergruppe 3, LVII Army Corps (later LVII Panzer Corps), commanded by General Adolf-Friedrich Kuntzen. Knispel was the gunner of a Panzer IV under Lt. Training lasted until 11 June 1941 and consisted of courses at Sagan and Putlos. Knispel completed his training as a loader and gunner in a Panzer IV. On 1 October 1940, he was transferred to the 3rd Company of the 29th Panzer Regiment, 12th Panzer Division. There he received basic infantry training before tank training on the Panzer I, Panzer II, and Panzer IV. After completing his apprenticeship in an automobile factory in 1940, Knispel applied to join the armoured branch of the German Army.įor his basic training, Knispel went to the Panzer Replacement Training Battalion at Sagan in Lower Silesia. He spent most of his childhood in nearby Niklasdorf. Knispel was born in Salisfeld (Salisov), a small settlement near the town of Zuckmantel in Sudetenland, Czechoslovakia.
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