Hi all! I am trying to find documentation on Sherman I and Sherman II tanks in service in various units. To that end I have found a rare Sherman I in service with the 29th Armoured Brigade’s HQ section from Osprey-Vanguard’s Sherman Tank in British Service (Pictured Below).
However, what intrigued me was that in the background it appears that there appears to be other Sherman variants. Doing a little more digging I found this image (below) which confirms that the 29th Armoured Brigade had either a Sherman II or Sherman I Hybrid, but from the image quality and angle I can’t really determine which it one it is. I have linked the original IWM archive of this image if it helps, though I doubt it.
I figure there are alot of sherman experts here who can narrow it down for me. My assumption is that it is a Sherman I Hybrid but I want to confirm. These are the only images right now I have been able to find of these vehicles. Any of your help will be appreciated!
Other than the photo captions stating that it’s 29th Armd Bde, is there any evidence that the Sherman IIs belong to 29th Armoured Brigade?
Wartime captions were notoriously inaccurate and it’s quite likely that the Sherman IIs actually belonged to 4th Independent Armd Bde (the only British armoured brigade in NW Europe to operate the ‘II’), operating alongside 11th Armd Div (or temporarily attached to them). The guys writing the captions (usually No.5 AFPU) were often in a rush or poorly briefed. Quite likely they would be told that it was an 11th AD operation and would not be privy to anything more detailed than that. Remember that many of the AFPU photographers were peacetime journalists given a uniform and a rank, rather than being fully trained soldiers. As such, their underlying military knowledge would have been limited and they would rely on using what they were told to caption the images.
The only way to be completely sure is to look at vehicle markings or distinctive features - in this case the sand shields welded onto the deck of the Sherman II in the foreground to hold extra stowage suggests 4th AB to me.
This is an early Sherman V with direct-vision (DV) drivers’ hoods. The gaps between the roadwheels are too large for a I or a III (compare to the tanks in your second photo), and the antenna mount on the glacis plate looks very much like the type Chrysler installed on M4A4s. It’s too early to have the little armour plates over the turret-ring drain holes, though, which would have been a good identifier as a Sherman V if it did have those.
As others mentioned, most of the tanks in the second photo are Sherman IIs. However, there is one with a welded hull in there:
You can tell it’s not a Sherman I (or I Hybrid) because the rear plate has a little step down in the centre. This is a feature of the M4A4, making this a Sherman V — the M4/Sherman I had a step up in the hull rear, just like on the IIs in the same photo.
Thank you all for the clarification! Learning about shermans has been so challenging because there always seems to be something I miss, this discussion has really helped me!
There are so many detail variations that you might never stop learning all the little nuances if it holds your interest. Here’s a good place to start reading
