On November 30th, 1944 the 20th Armored Infantry Battalion was attached to Combat Command B of the 10th AD. Company A was assigned to Task Force Cherry; the remainder of the battalion was assigned to Task Force Wiener, which had been renamed Hustead earlier in the month after Lt. Col. Wiener was wounded. Both of these task forces are named for their commanding officer. CCB was in the process of a two week drive to secure a bridge over the Saar River at Merzig; they had spent November 29th battling through several German roadblocks astride the roads leading to Merzig and had settled in outside the built-up area of Hilbringen, one mile west of the bridge. The next morning as engineers approached the bridge the Germans destroyed it; on December 1st CCB cleared Hilbringen and worked to straighten its lines.

The above is gleaned from a research report entitled The 10th US Armored Division in the Saar-Moselle Triangle, completed in May 1949 by students in the Officer’s Advanced Course at the Armored School in Fort Knox. It can be found at http://cgsc.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p4013coll8/id/3196rec/3. The online version of the 10th Armored Division’s “official history” was also useful in corroborating some of the information and providing some context. That can be found at https://archive.org/details/Impact1967. If you take a look at these you’ll be able to trace the division’s actions during this time period as well as those of the two subordinate Combat Commands, CCA and CCB. They’ll also offer a thorough explanation as to what the objectives of each combat command was.

As far as knowing the exact details surrounding your family friend’s death, unless you know what company he was assigned to within the battalion (or other information such as where he’s buried if he’s buried in Europe, which may be able to lead you to more clues as to where he was killed) it’s going to be tough. Because the balance of the battalion was assigned to Task Force Wiener it’s potentially more likely he was killed south of Hilbringen, near Schwerdorf. TF Wiener and TF Cherry had parted ways on the 17th of November, with the former swinging south toward Halstroff and ultimately continuing on to Schwerdorf later that day while two parallel columns of TF Cherry continued toward Merzig. A map on page 32 of the division history shows TF Wiener in Schwerdorf on 1 December; unfortunately there is no mention of what TF Wiener did between 17 November and November 30th in either of the two sources I mentioned above. The lack of information lends itself to suggest that all was quiet for TF Wiener, but a lack of evidence doesn’t constitute evidence. If he was in A Company, however, and operating as part of TF Cherry, then he would have been killed around or in Hilbringen. I looked unsuccessfully online for copies of both CCB’s and the 20th Armored Infantry Battalion’s after action reports but I couldn’t find them. They would likely have the details that you need to find the answer or at least make an informed guess, as they are basically a daily diary of that unit’s actions and experiences.

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