56^th Armored Infantry Regiment

The 56th Armored Infantry Regiment was activated at Camp Campbell, Kentucky, on September 15, 1942, and assigned to the 12th Armored Division. It moved to the Tennessee Maneuver Area on September 6, 1943, during the period when armored divisions were being reorganized for overseas service.

The regiment did not enter combat as a regiment. On November 11, 1943, it was reorganized into armored infantry battalions. The regiment, less the 1st and 2nd Battalions, became the 56th Armored Infantry Battalion; the 1st Battalion became the 66th Armored Infantry Battalion, and the 2nd Battalion became the 17th Armored Infantry Battalion. The 12th Armored Division later fought in Alsace, at Herrlisheim, in the Colmar Pocket, across the Saar-Palatinate and Rhine, and through Bavaria toward Austria, but that service belonged to the division's battalion-era organization. At the regiment level, the 56th's World War II record is a concise history of activation, training, and conversion before combat.