Introduction
The 607th Tank Destroyer Battalion was activated on the 15th day of the December 1941 at Fort Ord,
California.
Personnel for the new unit was obtained from the 7th Infantry Division Provisional Anti-tank Battalion
which, in turn, had received its personnel of sixteen officers and two hundred nineteen enlisted men
from the following units: Battery “D”, 31st FA Battalion, HQ and HQ Battery, 31st FA Battalion, 74th,
75th, 76th FA Battalions, and the 17th, 32nd, and 53rd Infantry Regiments. Later, personnel were
received from the 47th, 48th, and 57th, FA Battalions.
Approximately six hundred selectees from the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana were
assigned in March 1942, bringing the Battalion above its authorized strength. In December 1942 and
January 1943, three hundred and sixty selectees from Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia
replaced the losses of the preceding nine months.
On the 15th day of the December 1943 the Battalion was reorganized, changing it from a self propelled
battalion, to a towed battalion, Reconnaissance Company being inactivated. The Battalion continued as
a towed unit until November 1944, when, shortly before the battle for Metz, France, it was converted, in
combat, to a self propelled battalion equipped with M-36 destroyers. The Reconnaissance Company
was again activated.
With the exception of four and one half months training at the Tank Destroyer Center, at Camp Hood
Texas, the Battalion received all of its precombat training in California at Sunnyvale, Hunter Liggett
Military Reservation, Camp San Luis Obisbo, Lost Hills Desert Training Center, and Camp Cook.
On the 2nd of April 1944 the Battalion departed from Camp Cooke, California for Camp Miles Standish,
Taunton, Massachusetts, and on 13th of April, 1944 embarked on the SS Wakefield, the United States
Troop Transport for overseas duty.
Arriving in England on the 21st of April, the unit was stationed in Macclesfield, Cheshire for one month
and then proceeded to Camp Barton Stacy in southern England where it made its final preparations for
the invasion, arriving on the beaches of Normandy, France on 16th June 1944.
This is the background to eleven months of combat in France, Belgium and Germany for which the
Battalion won battle participation credit for the following campaigns more fully described in the text:
* 17 June 1944 to 24 July 1944
...................................Normandy
* 25 July 1944 to 14 September 1944
........................Northern France
* 15 September 1944 to 21 March 1945
.....................Rhineland
* 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945
....................Ardennes
* 22 March 1945 to 11 May 1945...............................Central Europe
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