Red Ball Express: Transport System Helped Win WWII

The Red Ball Express was a desperately needed World War II truck transport system that came about six weeks after D-Day.

By late July of 1944, the Allies were progressing farther and faster than expected after the June 6 surprise landing on the beaches of Normandy. The military was struggling to keep the front lines supplied. 

The creation of a truck convoy system would provide a way to get ammunition, gas, and supplies to the men where it was needed. The unit was named the “Red Ball Express” after a railroad term. To “red ball” a train, or supplies on a train, was to designate it for express delivery. (The unit later took on a French motto: “tout de suite,” meaning immediately.)

During World War II, the military was still segregated. Few Blacks were in combat units; most were placed in service positions or the General Service Corps. This was the logical place for the Motor Corps to pull drivers. The men in combat needed to keep pushing forward, and with General Services providing the drivers, 75 percent of the men in the Red Ball Express were Black.

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Before the Red Ball Express: Preparing for D-Day

For weeks in advance of D-Day, the Allied planes bombed the railroads between Paris and the ports of western France. Allied leaders knew that if the beach invasions were to succeed, they needed to prevent the German armies from obtaining fresh supplies via the French railroads the Germans then controlled.

Destroying the railroads was vital, but after the invasion, it became problematic.  The Allies could not use trains to move their own men and supplies eastward.

For the first six weeks after D-Day, the Allies could not break out of a confined area along the coast of France. In early July 1944, the area under Allied command was about 50 miles wide and 20 miles deep, and they temporarily were locked in.

Operation Cobra

Lieutenant General Omar Bradley put Operation Cobra in place on July 25. While the British and Canadian military distracted the Germans with fighting around Caen, Bradley’s First Army began with carpet bombing followed by an infantry push into Brittany. This began to open a corridor into central France.

After an initially slow start, the U.S. military soon had the Germans on the run. The Allies were soon covering almost 80 miles a week. But with the destruction of the railroads, the supplies couldn’t keep up with the men.

Needed New System

To address the supply problem, the commanders pulled together a brainstorming session. The meeting lasted only a few hours, but it gave the Allies a workable plan. They would commandeer as many trucks as they could and use them to meet the incoming ships.  Soldiers, supplies, and equipment would be loaded onto the trucks. The vehicles would then drive hard to the front to deliver goods and gasoline to the military as the troops pushed east toward occupied Paris.

Getting the Trucks

General Motors, Dodge, and Ford had all been manufacturing trucks for the war effort. At this point, the Allies had a mixture of 2.5-ton cargo trucks, 5-ton cargo trucks, and 10-ton semitrailers.

The Motor Transport Brigade requisitioned trucks from all over the European Theater.  The larger semi-trailers were preferred, because the trailers could be left behind for unloading. The cabs of the trucks could turn around and drive back for more supplies.

However, the more readily available truck was what was known as the “Jimmy.”  It was a 2.5 ton, 6×6 truck that could travel off-road if necessary. (The trucks acquired their name as a phonetic shorthand for the GMC truck.) The G 508—the all-purpose Jimmy–became one of the favorites of World War II. (Many Americans still collect them.)

Standardized Design

The Jimmies were built in large numbers using a standardized design. When one truck broke down, parts could be taken from another truck or from a general supply station and used to fix the truck that needed to get underway.

Initially, the trucks were designed with a closed cab, but as more trucks were needed, the design morphed into an open cab covered with canvas. These were faster to build and easier to ship. Some of the trucks featured flat beds, others were closed, and still others were built to carry all-important gasoline in jerricans to the front.

Germany kept updating and producing more modern trucks, but it was a mistake. As their trucks broke down, the Germans had difficulty finding parts. As a result of their slower manufacturing process and difficulty with repairs, they still relied on horses and wagons for most supply deliveries—a slow process indeed.

Assigning Drivers

With the Allies on the move, all the men in combat units were needed for forward movement. Drivers came from any unit that had men not fully engaged and from the General Service Corps, which was formed in February of 1942. Many of the Black soldiers who joined the military were placed in the General Services unit. This put them in place to become Red Ball Express drivers.

 For the solders, no truck-driving experience was necessary, and men were given only a few hours of instruction on how to operate what was actually a complicated machine. The trucks had ten different gears, and the four rear dual tires were powered by two drive shafts. The dual drive shafts were helpful driving through mud or up a hill, but it required double use of the clutch. This was counter-intuitive for most drivers, and it resulted in a lot of first-timers stripping the gears.

Drivers were given helmets and rifles, but both the rifles and the helmets generally stayed on the floor of the trucks. It was unusual to see a helmet-clad driver, and even if fired upon, the men were too busy driving or loading and unloading to hold on to their rifles.

Delivering Trucks to Europe

In August of 1944 when the Allies were working to implement the plan, they needed more trucks than the numbers available in the European Theater. The Allies had not yet captured any ports. The only way to bring the trucks ashore was using the original landing beaches where Higgins boats delivered the military for the initial invasion.

Prolonged water exposure to truck engines was not going to be good for the trucks, so each vehicle had to be waterproofed. This involved packing spark plugs, distributors, and the electrical system connections with a putty-like substance, well described in The Road to Victory by David P. Colley.

The air cleaner was replaced with a flexible hose attached to the carburetor and exiting the engine compartment so that it could be fastened to the windshield.  Hosing also was attached to the exhaust pipe and extended up the side of the truck to a point well above any water line.

Once the trucks were delivered, the putty and extra hoses all needed to be removed so that the trucks could function again.

The Red Ball Express Route

Roads in France were narrower than American roadways, and the bombing that had been ongoing had been very hard on the surfaces. Because of this, Brigadier General Ewart G. Plank created safeguards. There was no time to repair the roads, so the Brigadier General’s solution was to select the best roads for going and coming and establish a loop system.

Trucks left the coast, traveling on one route. After arriving and delivering the supplies to the Chartres-La Loupe-Dreux triangle, they returned by another road. The roundtrip travel was generally 54 hours.

These roads were to be fully dedicated to the Red Ball Express. If other military or civilian vehicles got into the roads, it was a guaranteed traffic jam. 

Intended Safeguards for Travel

The plan was for military police to be stationed at any major crossroads and at any place where there might be a confusing turn. Trucks were to drive 25 miles per hour at 60-yard intervals. 

The trucks rumbled along day and night, and the specter of night travel was something many commented on. When the trucks traveled at night, they needed some lighting to see where they were going, but they needed the convoys to remain as hidden as possible.

On the front (usually toward the side), slits of white lights provided some guidance for the driver. These lights were the size of a small headlight but hooded by a tin plate. In the rear, the tail lights were red slits and were often referred to as “cat eyes.” They were designed to be seen by the trucks following them in the convoy.

Before Cell Phones

Communication then was not what exists today. However, Colonel John B. Medaris, an American ordnance officer for the First Army, set up a radio network system while the First Army was in England.

As the military units made their way to Europe, this communication system provided a means for the men on the ground to report what they needed to the supply officers. The officers in charge of the convoys then distributed the  supplies and got the trucks running.

Traveling by Convoy

The initial plan was for trucks to travel by convoy, but the loading of each truck took a long time. Soon the drivers simply left on their own as soon as their truck was loaded. 

When the Red Ball Express first began, the military police had not yet been informed of the dedicated routes the trucks were to follow nor had maps been created.  The early drivers were at the mercy of townspeople and military who could at least point them toward “the front.”

However, over time, the men, the military police, and the towns they drove through came to an understanding of where the trucks were to go, and the pace became faster and faster.

Speeding Up

The truckers, most of whom were between the ages of 18 and 24, felt constrained by the speed limit. They soon learned to remove the “governors” on the trucks that kept down their speed down. Without the governor they could travel up to 60 miles per hour. (If they sensed they were entering an area where the trucks might be inspected, they also learned how to re-install the governors.)

There were traffic control points for refueling and for minor repairs. The men could grab sandwiches and get hot coffee, but it took time for these way stations to be established at the most helpful places.

“Without it [Red Ball] the advance across France could not have been made.”
 

From The Bitter Woods, written by Colonel John S.D. Eisenhower, son of supreme Allied commander.

Hazards of the Red Ball Express

As with anything during wartime, there were many hazards facing the Red Ball Express. Bad roads, tired men, and snipers were at the top of the list.  

The bombed-out roads made it hard to keep the trucks in acceptable repair. Because truck maintenance units were few and far between, drivers needed to know the basics of how the truck operated and how to do minor repairs. If a Jimmy stalled on the road, the first hope was the driving team could fix it. It took time for maintenance crews to locate the stalled rigs.

If a truck needed to be towed that presented a whole new problem. There weren’t many tow trucks, and it was hard to get one to the right place at the right time.  According to military reports, on a random check on Sept 10, 1944, 81 loaded but broken-down trucks sat on road outside Versailles.

More Hazards

In addition, soldier fatigue was a serious issue. Drivers traveled in teams, trading off on the driving. But there were also a few rest stops where they could take a break and get something to eat.

Particularly if part of a convoy, the truckers disliked stopping as it slowed the whole line. In Road to Victory, David Colley writes: “Drivers perfected the art of switching seats while their trucks were in motion on the road…The assistant driver slid across the seat and under the driver as the two exchanged positions and continued driving. If the exchange was carried out with precision, a foot was always on the gas pedal.”

German snipers and enemy airplanes strafing at the traveling convoys added to the very real danger of war. As enemy aircraft became familiar with the routes taken by the Red Ball Express, it was not unusual to have German planes fly low and take aim at the truckers.

Trucking During War: Not a “Rear Action Job”

Sometimes making a successful delivery meant that the Jimmies needed to drive directly to the front. Because of the speed of the advance, not many supply depots were established (and those that existed weren’t always easy to find). The Red Ball Express drove wherever the trucks were needed.

Sherman tanks were powerful weapons, but they guzzled gasoline. In combat, one tank could go through a gallon of gas every 1-2 miles. It was easy for them to hit “empty.” If a Jimmy arrived with gasoline, they simply drove toward the frontline so someone could hop out and deliver the jerricans to the combat team in the tanks. (A jerrican held 5 gallons of gas.)

Kept Supply Lines Rolling

A stalled truck was a temptation for an errant soldier (or even an officer) to lighten his load by selling some of the items he carried on the black market. While these incidents did occur, for the most part, the men remained committed to the mission.

At any given time, an average of 900 vehicles were on the road.  They delivered an estimated 12,000 tons of supplies per day for 82 days.

When the Allies were able to get the railroads back online, the generals felt that there was less need for the Red Ball and phased it out in late November (after starting on August 25, 1944). 

The Red Ball Express far exceeded expectations. When the express service was discontinued after 82 days, its drivers had transported more than 412,000 tons of fuel, ammunition and equipment to 28 different divisions.

The military newspaper, the Stars and Stripes wrote: “Our Negro outfits delivered gas under constant fire. Damned if I’d want their job. They have what it takes.”  (Aug 31 1944).

Created System for Other Trucking Companies

Many more truck convoy systems followed, as there were more times where trucks were the only way to bring in supplies. Most of them borrowed lessons learned through the Red Ball Express, one of the first units to keep the supplies rolling as the Allies began to shift the tide of the war.  

“The spectacular nature of the advance through France] was due in great measure to the men who drove the Red Ball trucks as to those who drove the tanks,” wrote Colonel John S.D. Eisenhower, son of supreme Allied commander.

In 1952, a movie was made about the Red Ball Express, starring Jeff Chandler and Sidney Poitier.

For other important stories about Blacks in World War II, see Charles David, Selfless Coast Guard Hero World War II or Dorie Miller, Hero of World War II.

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