The director of Fury, David Ayer, chose to make the movie quite brutal to show the realities of war. Some of the elements of the film, such as the supposed massive losses taken by armored crewmen, are somewhat unsubstantiated, and taken from popular history such as Belton Y. Cooper's book Death Traps (in part what inspired Ayer and what Fury takes some of its material from) which is often criticized by historians for being unfairly biased and technically inaccurate. Related urban myths and simple misinterpretations of period documents have also cemented themselves in the minds of the public, being repeated often.

The US Army's Armored Force (at the time, it was not a separate "branch" like the Infantry, but simply a component that controlled all tank units) actually suffered relatively few losses during WWII. Until 1950, when it became a separate branch of its own, officers serving in the Armored Force transferred from other branches of the Army, keeping their original officer classification such as "Inf" for officers originally trained in the Infantry branch or "Cav" for officers originally trained in the Cavalry branch. As a result, the source (the final word on Army casualties for WWII which supersedes all previous reports made during or after the war) does not break down Armored Force casualties among officers, but only among enlisted men.

Out of 49,516 Armored Force enlisted men deployed overseas, there were 6,827 battle casualties, which distributed themselves as follows;

Battle casualties	Total deaths among battle casualties	Killed in action	Died of wounds	Died while captured	Missing and declared dead	Wounded in action	Missing in action	Prisoner of war
6,827	1,581	1,398	169	6	8	4,954 (4,785 returned to duty or discharged)	55 (47 returned to duty or discharged)	420 (414 returned to duty or discharged)

A significant percentage, perhaps as much as half, actually occurred when men were outside their vehicles, performing reconnaissance, maintenance, or other duties. Here's some context, provided by u/The_Chieftain_WG;

During the period of 6 June through 30 November, 1944, the US First Army suffered a total of 506 tanks knocked-out in combat (counting both those written-off and reparable). Of these 506 cases, in 104 cases there were no casualties associated with the loss of the tank. In 50 cases the casualties were not recorded. Out of the remaining 352 cases there were 129 KIA (0.37 per tank) and 280 WIA (0.80 per tank), for a total average rate of 1.16 casualty per tank lost in combat

Armored crewmen had a lower general risk of being wounded in combat when compared to infantrymen, but the wounds were often more severe; blunt trauma, burns, and traumatic amputations occurred at a higher rate.

During the battle with the Tiger tank (arguably the climax of the movie) the three tanks accompanying Fury are knocked out in spectacular fashion with no apparent survivors from any of them, something I found odd, but something the director presumably incorporated for dramatic effect to show the superiority of the Tiger. The first tank (representing a dry-stowage M4(75) Sherman) destroyed in the ambush violently exploding and shedding its turret almost immediately after being hit was especially odd; it was hit through the side of the turret, and by this point in the war, no ammunition, save from the four, six, or eight rounds in the ready rack, was stowed there. As a counter, crews often stuffed extra ammunition into their tanks wherever it would fit, against policy.

The large part of combat losses (KIA/WIA/MIA/POW) in armored divisions occurred in their armored infantry component, which was often ridden into the ground because they were more mobile.

The Central Europe campaign (22 March-11 May 1945) is often characterized in many accounts as an almost happy "pursuit", much like what happened in southern France the previous August and September. It, in reality, was just as bloody as previous campaigns, with casualties occurring right up until the end of the war;

Battle casualties	Total deaths among battle casualties	Killed in action	Died of wounds	Died while captured	Missing and declared dead	Wounded in action	Missing in action	Prisoner of war
62,704	15,009	13,016	1,907	8	78	44,475 (42,568 returned to duty or discharged)	1,491 (1,483 returned to duty or discharged)	3,722 (3,714 returned to duty or discharged)

Fury takes place in early April, 1945, during the race across Germany. As the German front lines (they really couldn't be called solid "front lines" at this point, just collections of defended towns) collapsed, Allied forces advanced as much as fifty miles a week, constantly on the move. As a result, divisions often moved on before a proper command post could be set up in a town; divisions often called two towns home in the same day! As a result, camps were often haphazard, a collection of tents (if that!) in an open area with vehicles parked nearby, waiting for the next set of orders. Sometimes, troops were billeted in houses, either abandoned or not; occupation forces had the authority to expel German civilians (but had to find accommodation for them) so that US troops could use their houses.

Boxed C and K rations were the troops' primary food source during this time, as field kitchens often could not be set up due to the speed of the advance. Boxed rations were not supposed to be used for subsistence for a period of more than about a week and a half in the case of C rations, and their nature, in relation to "actual food" sometimes caused serious intestinal distress (a previous draft of the script for Fury mentions Wardaddy telling Bible he's going to "the latrine to take a shit" because he "ain't shit in a week") Soldiers often supplemented their C and K rations with local German or French food, either acquired or thieved (the kitchen scene) In a brief glimpse in the beginning of the film, a soldier leads a small cow, and there are several goats in a pen.

The medical tent also seen in the beginning would have been part of one of the divisional medical battalion's collecting or clearing platoons, (it's unclear what type the overall encampment's unit is, which would determine what medical assets from the armored medical battalion were assigned to it) used in a process by which casualties are gathered and brought up from lower units, (collecting) treated and released, or if more severe (such as the man with the blown-off leg) evaluated and moved quickly on to higher echelons (clearing)

During these quick movements through Germany, hundreds of thousands of German soldiers surrendered to the Allies, either captured in battle or simply not wanting to fight anymore, wanting to return to what remained of their homes. The captured enemies were herded to the rear and placed in massive camps particularly along the fertile plains bordering the Rhine River. Some of the camps were only enclosed by a few strands of barbed wire, guarded by a few soldiers. The German soldiers behind barbed wire at the beginning of the movie were presumably soldiers who were captured immediately before, and waiting in the camp to be picked up and transferred further to the rear.

Conditions in these prisoner of war camps were often less than ideal due to the massive numbers of men in small spaces, and many hundreds of prisoners died from exposure and diseases. Author James Bacque's book Other Losses claims a figure of "hundreds of thousands" to "over one million", through a process of purposeful deprivation of food and shelter, but the methods and figures Bacque uses are unsubstantiated and very heavily criticized by historians.

It is understandable that the bodies of deceased soldiers, both American and German, were often treated roughly, much like logs, (the truck haphazardly loaded with corpses seen at the beginning of the movie) by Graves Registration units, but I have never seen or read an example of German dead being bulldozed haphazardly into mass graves. Quartermaster Graves Registration units were, by policy, to inter deceased combatants, both friendly and enemy, in marked (if possible) individual graves in proper cemeteries away from combat areas.

Sources:

Armored Thunderbolt: The US Army Sherman in World War II, by Steven J. Zaloga

G.I.: The American Soldier in World War II, by Lee B. Kennett

The U.S. Army in the Occupation of Germany 1944-1946, by Earl F. Ziemke

Army Battle Casualties and Nonbattle Deaths, Final Report (Statistics and Accounting Branch, Office of the Adjutant General, 1 June 1953)

Quartermaster Graves Registration

u/The_Chieftain_WG on selected tank losses

October 2014 script revision of Fury