It must have been a first for McComb’s Edgewood neighborhood to see an Army tank being hauled on an 18-wheeler through the area’s narrow and winding streets on Wednesday morning.
The M113-A2 armored personnel carrier, rendered useless for combat but made cosmetically pristine by military mechanics, reached its final destination at the McComb’s American Legion hut, where it was parked on a concrete pad on the south side of the building for permanent display.
The donation didn’t cost the American Legion a dime. It just had to trade a super-rare, battle-captured German anti-aircraft gun from World War II that had sat out front of the building for decades.
“It’s called a PAC 40. It’s a 40mm German anti-tank gun,” said Mark Prine, Special Projects Officer with Camp Shelby and president of the base’s Armed Forces Museum foundation, who helped broker the trade. “They had one here. There’s not many of them left in the world and, strangely enough, the one that was here was not on the records of the ones being left in the world, so we added one. So, it’s extremely unusual.”
Prine said the Germans only made about 2,500 of the wheeled cannon-like guns during World War II.
“They were super-effective,” he said.
The one that had been at the American Legion hut was used in North Africa during World War II.
“Somehow it ended up in McComb after it was captured,” Prine said. It’s one of just a very few in the United States.”
The fact it was captured made the weapon even more sought after, Prine said.
“We think it is the only captured piece of German equipment from World War II — battle-captured piece of equipment — in this state,” he said. “The cool thing about that one is you know it was captured in combat because it had battle damage on it. There are bullet holes.”
The American Legion’s Jim Coleman said the group had no idea of the rarity of the war relic.
“None of us did,” he said.
Coleman said Phillip Parker, a colonel in the National Guard who lives in Summit, spoke to him about the anti-aircraft gun at a Veterans Day event a few years ago.
“He says, ‘How would y’all like to get rid of that cannon down there? We’ll give you a tank for it,’ and we said, ‘Bring it on,’ ” Coleman said.
Prine said the weapon was a target for pranksters.
“People kept doing stuff to it. It was still mobile, so it was real easy to roll around,” he said. “It kept getting rolled into the lake, so we said, ‘We’ll take care of it and swap you something for it.’ ”
Prine said Camp Shelby’s Armed Forces Museum picked up the German gun four years ago.
“It’s in the preservation process at Shelby. It will go on display in the World War II area in the near future,” he said.
The tank has a much more imposing footprint on the lawn of the Legion hut — and it’s not likely to get rolled into a lake. It’s got new paint, including new markings in honor of McComb’s local National Guard unit, the 155th infantry battalion.
It’s also been welded shut, and the interior was stripped clean and sealed tight to protect against water damage.
Coleman said he’d like to see two howitzers at the Legion hut moved to either side of the tank, but acknowledged “it would be too much” of a job for the group’s members to take on themselves.
Prine said the armored personnel carrier dates back to the mid-1960’s, and their versatile platform also made them suitable for use as ambulances and other purposes.
He sees plenty of them in use at Camp Shelby all the time, he said.
“We’re still using 113s right now. They’re very practical pieces of equipment,” he said. “While we were overlooking this one and looking to see if the paint jobs were where they were supposed to be, they were steadily running them back and forth.”
