Is there any evidence that the M4A2 (either with Commonwealth forces in Italy, or with US Marines in the Pacific theatre) were ever fitted with sandbag armour? No doubt sandbags would have been used to increase frontal protection, but were they ever applied extensively (in steel frames) along the length of the hull?
Paul
Marines in the Pacific used wood and concrete for the hull sides. On Iwo Jima can’t recall the A2’s, but A3’s had a wire frame on the rear deck with sandbags laid on top of them.
I have a few books on Marine Corps. tanks in WW2 in the PTO and when I get a chance I’ll check them, I don’t recall off the top of my head very many USMC tanks with extensive rack systems built to hold sandbags like the ones in Europe. Actually, the caption for the first pic says it’s an M4A2 of the US Army’s 711 Tank Battalion on Okinawa, i didn’t know the Army used them. The second pic is a Marine tank of the 5th Battalion on Iwo. When I get a chance I’ll do some more looking.
I just read a caption in a book on the M4, Gen Patton is walking away from a tank crew after chewing them out over sand bags, he did not like it, I hope the crew told him where to go since they are in the brew tin, also in the picture above, did Sherman crews suffer Pidgeon’s, what are all the spikes for, never seen it before?
AFAIK, these spikes were to keep explosives from being placed directly on weak spots, like the periscopes, and the hatches themselves.
H.P.
Yes they were to prevent mines or satchel charges from being placed directly against the surface of the hatch.
I’m not sure what the spacing of the nails was but it’s conceivable that a grenade could get caught in between the nails or a satchel charge could get snagged on them, so I think they were of limited value. They were also dangerous for the crew as well but i guess they worked well enough.
I suspect it was more for shaped charges, that need direct contact to work properly. (They are designed with a base that provides just the right stand-off distance for the plasma jet to form and lance its way through the target - add a few inches of extra space and the jet expends its energy before it gets through the armour.)
Also it deters enemy infantry from standing on the hatch while trying to pry it (or a periscope visor) open to allow grenades or bullets in…
I don’t think it’s an M4A2 but an M4A3, though it’s very hard to tell from this side. I suspect the caption writer saw the plates welded to the hull side and figured: “75 mm Sherman with a large-hatch, welded hull and appliqué plates: M4A2” (because the only large-hatch, all-welded Shermans with appliqué armour are M4A2s). Except the appliqué armour here is improvised and not a factory fit, which means this could be an M4A2 but doesn’t need to be.
If you look at the sandbags on the rear deck, there’s one that seems to be raised up off the sponson roof a little. I suspect this is because the sandbag is resting on the little vertical plate that keeps the engine deck hatch horizontal when open. And those plates were only on M4A3s.
Today, yes. In the Second World War, their functioning wasn’t really understood so they generally had far too little standoff distance to work at their full potential. Spikes like this would probably have helped their penetration 
But, of course, if the charge’s effects are poorly understood, then so are countermeasures against it.
Shaped charges are not hot. The liner (which is what does the penetrating) doesn’t even melt, let alone turn into plasma. Yes, there’s an explosion that releases a ton of energy, but experiments with shaped charge liners sawn into sections have shown that the slug recovered after detonation is in those same sections — meaning it wasn’t hot enough to weld itself back together.
People think shaped charges penetrate armour by melting through it, and popular-science explanations of them keep repeating this, but what actually happens is that the extreme relative velocity between penetrator and armour (in the order of 8 km/s) causes the materials to flow as if they were liquid, when in fact both are solid the whole time.
Yes I was wondering about that, I didn’t think it was possible to tell which specific version it was from the front.
Although I read an article on line about 351 or so British M4A2s being transferred to American forces (7th Armored??) after the Battle of the Bulge to replace those lost in the battle. I have never heard this before and can’t corroborate this which any other reference although I haven’t spent much time on it.
Is that the same as what happens with RPGs?
That was pretty much a US 7th Army fitting during 1945. Patton forbade such fittings in his 3rd Army, preferring to add armor plate salvaged from knocked out tanks, while the 1st and 9th Armies mostly stayed with improvised armor on the glacis plate area using sandbags, track links, or concrete.
It’s not easy, and it depends on what details you can see Had the sponson upper been better visible so that the little plate was clear (or its absence), it would have been simple:
Yes. It happens with every shaped-charge (or hollow-charge) weapon, whether an RPG, a TOW, a Panzerfaust or a Hohlhaftladung.
Not very likely. M4A2s were primarily intended for lend lease use. The Marine Corps received some, but the vast majority went to the Soviets. The Army wanted to standardize with the M4A3 wet stowage tanks, and they were rolling off the assembly lines in more than adequate numbers. Once the stock of late hull A2s ran out, the Marines also began to receive the late hull A3s.
Some bits on the large hatch M4A2s from the Sherman Minutiae site
The Third Russian Lend Lease Protocol ran from July 1943 through June 1944, and called for the delivery of 2000 M4A2(75)s. As mentioned earlier, Fisher’s entire output of large hatch models was intended for the Soviets. However, the protocol was reduced by about 200, and these appear to have been diverted to the US Marines. This included a dozen units that were pulled off the line at Fisher and converted to M32B2 retrievers. There is no evidence that the British received any large hatch M4A2(75)s as Lend Lease.
It is thought that the large hatch M4A2(75) made its combat debut with the Marine Corps in June, 1944 at Saipan. Photos show them serving there alongside small hatch M4A2s with both the 2nd and 4th Marine Tank Battalions. After Tarawa, the USMC “got religion” when it came to waterproofing their tanks. In some cases, the Marines fashioned their own wading trunk designs, but the unit shown above appears to have been equipped with the “official” version, made available in kit form in early 1944. Preparing a Sherman for deep water fording was a laborious undertaking. According to the Technical Manual, if the job was done properly, the tank would be able to operate in water up to 6 feet for all of 8 minutes. Marine large hatch M4A2s and M4A3s can be difficult to distinguish, but a bit of the side applique (circled in red) can be seen here. The M4A3s were not equipped with the applique plates, since they were “Wet Stowage” tanks in which the ammunition bins had been repositioned to the floor of the vehicle.
According to author Romain Cansiere, the US Marine Corps’ original decision to use the M4A2(75) as its Main Battle Tank had nothing to do with diesel fuel. Rather, the type was “the first one the Corps could obtain quickly in large numbers” from the limited supply of Medium Tanks available in late 1942, early 1943. Furthermore, we suspect that requisitions may have stipulated Fisher built M4A2(75)s exclusively, as we have yet to see a photo of a USMC M4A2 produced by another manufacturer. They are stated to have received a total of 493 units. Since no official distinction was made between the small and large hatch models, it has not been possible to determine the exact number of large hatch M4A2(75)s they received. At present, our guess is around 200. Priority for the limited supply of all-round vision cupolas was given to the 76mm Shermans which began to roll off the production lines in January 1944. The new cupolas did not become available for use on the M4A3(75)W until August 1944.
The US Army wanted to terminate production of 75mm Shermans at the end of 1943. However, it was recorded that the British and the USMC did not desire the 76mm Sherman, and would require 75mm models into 1945. Thus, the Government decided to continue production of a single model - the M4A3(75)W. One bit of intrigue in this matter, not for “foreign” consumption, was that Ford engined Shermans were to be reserved exclusively for use by US troops. Despite some objections, the policy more or less forced the USMC to accept gasoline powered Shermans after the middle of 1944. Thus, the new 6th Marine Tank Battalion was equipped with the M4A3(75)W for the Okinawa Campaign, while the veteran 1st Tank Battalion came ashore with 47 M4A2s, most or all of which appear to have been large hatch models.
Okinawa was “the last battle,” and tank casualties were fearsome. The 1st Tank Battalion had to draw some M4A3s from the replacement pool when its reserves of M4A2s ran out.
Hi, thanks for the info, never seen that before on any tank,
It’s something that was only done in the Pacific, because the Japanese had a habit of rushing up to tanks to place explosive charges on them. Some tanks had spikes, others used cages made by cutting wire mesh to shape.
