Генерал Чарльз Хантер Герхардт: Путь воина и командира

United States Army general

Major General Charles Hunter Gerhardt (June 6, 1895 – October 9, 1976) was a senior United States Army officer who fought in both World War I and World War II. During the latter, he commanded the 29th Infantry Division from 1943 until the end of the war and during part of the occupation of Germany. The division's most famous combat operations were the Omaha Beach landings of June 6, 1944 (his 49th birthday), otherwise known as D Day, and the taking of the French crossroads town of Saint Lô in July 1944.

Gerhardt grew up in the army as the son of Charles Gerhardt, a career officer who retired as a brigadier general. The younger Gerhardt attended the United States Military Academy (USMA) at West Point, New York, in 1913, where he earned a reputation as a skilled football, baseball and polo player. In 1916, Gerhardt quarterbacked for West Point to a 30 10 upset win over Notre Dame, which was led by the famed freshman George Gipp. It was Notre Dame's only loss that year. Gerhardt's West Point class graduated on April 6, 1917, the day America officially declared war. Graduation was six weeks earlier than intended because of the U. S. entry into the war. Subsequently, Gerhardt was commissioned as a second lieutenant into the Cavalry Branch of the United States Army. Among those he graduated alongside were men such as Matthew Ridgway, Mark W. Clark, J. Lawton Collins, Ernest N. Harmon, Norman Cota, William W. Eagles, Laurence B. Keiser, Frederick Augustus Irving, John T. Cole, Augustus M. Gurney, Elbert L. Ford, John M. Devine, Charles S. Kilburn, Harold R. Jackson, Basil H. Perry, Albert C. Smith, Clare Hibbs Armstrong, Daniel Noce, Aaron Bradshaw Jr. Harris M. Melasky, William C. McMahon and William Kelly Harrison, Jr., all of whom would, like Gerhardt, later become general officers, with Ridgway and Collins in particular becoming U. S. Army Chief of Staff. his first posting upon his graduation was with a cavalry unit in Texas. However, he later served as a staff officer with the headquarters of the 89th Division on the Western Front as part of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF). He ended the war as aide de camp to Major General William M. Wright, commander of the 89th Division.

Remaining in the army during the interwar period, in 1932, Gerhardt was selected as a judge in the equestrian events for the 1932 Olympic Games held in Los Angeles. At some point, he attended the United States Army Command and General Staff College. On July 1, 1940, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel.

By the time of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the subsequent American entry into World War II, Gerhardt was in command of the 56th Cavalry Brigade, having been in command since September 13 after receiving a promotion to the temporary rank of brigadier general on July 10, 1941. Major General Gerhardt was a hard taskmaster, a strict disciplinarian and considered by many of his men to be a martinet, who often became upset at small things such as a soldier not having the chinstrap of his helmet buckled. One famous story has him admonishing a soldier on the day after D Day for dropping peels from the orange he was eating on the ground. He was intolerant of any dirt or mud being on the trucks, and would make soldiers stop and clean a truck under almost any circumstance. Major General Gerhardt was, however, a superb and driven trainer of soldiers and expected the same from his subordinates. He led the 29th Infantry Division throughout the fighting in Western Europe, from D Day (June 6, 1944) until the end of World War II in Europe on Victory in Europe Day (May 8, 1945).