I’ve recently become fascinated with the British Army’s Sherman/Firefly tanks. As you can see, I’ve just completed the basic assembly of three Sherman/Firefly tanks. One of them is an M4A4/Sherman Mk.V, which I plan to customize to look like the "Red 10” featured on the box art of Dragon Models. However, I haven’t been able to find any historical photos of it and would like to ask for your help. Thank you very much!
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This tank belonged to the 13th/18th Hussars, a regiment that was part of 27th Armoured Brigade during the Normandy invasion; if you start using these details when, say, Googling, you might find a little bit more about it.
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The tank in action in 1944. The tank’s name is “Balaclava”.
13/18th Hussars on their way across the Channel into Normandy. You can clearly see BALACLAVA on the right corner.
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‘Balaclava’ (turret number 10) was Lt-Col Harrup’s command tank. It was a Sherman III.
27th Armoured Brigade was officially equipped with the Sherman III (M4A2).
The two Squadrons of Sherman V DD tanks in 13/18 Hussars were steadily handed in after D-Day and replaced with Sherman IIIs. The only other Sherman V (M4A4) operated by 13/18 Hussars and the rest of 27th Armoured Brigade were Vc Fireflies and the two Sherman V ARV allocated to 27th Armd Bde REME Workshops.
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Jim99 appears to be working in 1/72.
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Yeah; noticed that after I posted it…
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Great models Jim.I was very lucky and found the Douglas Kay VC at Telford Ipms show for a great price.Interesting subject as im a big Sherman fan.
Richard
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Thanks for your help, BootsDMS.
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Ah, from the picture, it does indeed appear to be a late-production Sherman III (M4A2) tank. It seems that Dragon Models, or rather its box art painter, misidentified the tank model and depicted it as a Sherman V.
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Thank you for your detailed explanation. However, I have a question: during the period when the 13th/18th Royal Hussars were using the Sherman V before transitioning to the Sherman III, could Lt-Col Harrup’s command vehicle have also featured the markings of the number “Red 10” on the turret side and the name “Balaclava” on the hull side?
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Thanks for your help,SableLiger. I will use them when working on 1/35 scale model kits in the future. However, this time I’m building a 1/72 scale model.
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You are so lucky, Richard50. Congratulations! My “Douglas Kay” kit, on the other hand, was not easy to come by. Although it’s a local model brand, because the Dragon Sherman Firefly series is so highly sought-after, the three Firefly kits produced by Dragon (7300, 7303, 7322) are almost extinct in the domestic Chinese market. This year, I spent almost 400 RMB to buy this “Douglas Kay” kit from a collector. The other two kits, IC and VC, are even harder to find, with prices but no availability. Recently, I’ve browsed foreign model websites and shops but found nothing new.
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13/18 Hussars converted from Sherman V to Sherman III in late 1943/early 1944 whilst stationed in Britain. Their War Diary records the gradual arrival of new tanks and the old ones being handed in as they prepared for D-Day. It’s possible that Harrup’s tank in 1943 was a Sherman V and carried ‘10’ on the turret, but prior to D-Day it was definitely a Sherman III.
For D-Day, A and B Squadrons had been issued with Sherman DD tanks based on the Sherman V, but this was just a temporary measure for D-Day itself. The DD tanks were steadily handed back during June 1944 and replaced with standard Sherman III tanks.
C Squadron and the RHQ Squadron were equipped with the Sherman III. The three regimental armoured recovery vehicles were Sherman III ARV.
C Squadron had four Sherman Vc Fireflies on D-Day,
Two more Vc Fireflies were also available (turret numbers unknown), one allocated to support A Squadron and one to B Squadron. These two were possibly the first Fireflies to land on D-Day as they arrived with the Royal Engineer assault teams during the initial beach assault. The C Squadron Fireflies did not land until much later in the morning. That allocation of six Fireflies stayed much the same for June 1944, with the Fireflies being loaned to different Troops as necessary.
The numbering sequence for 13/18 Hussars started at ‘10’ - 11 and 12 were the other two RHQ tanks. 12 is known to have been named Twelfth Night but the name for ‘11’ hasn’t been confirmed with certainty.
A Sqn was numbered 20-39; B Sqn from 40-59 and C Sqn from 60-79. In C Sqn, the Fireflies were always the highest number in each Troop (the fourth tank - 67, 71, 75 and 79).
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JohnTapsell, Thank you for your professional and detailed response. I have a question: after D-Day, the vast majority of the 13th/18th Royal Hussars used the Sherman III equipped with diesel engines, while each squadron was also equipped with the Sherman Firefly VC, which used gasoline engines. Wouldn’t this increase the pressure on logistical supply? Why didn’t they exclusively use the Sherman V series? Personally, I think there isn’t much difference in their combat effectiveness aside from the engines.
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To pre-empt John’s possible response: the logistic issue you refer to is very real, however, given the mix of fuels in an armoured regiment at the time, reflecting the vehicle types - and don’t forget the soft-skinned vehicles in support ie trucks - the mix of diesel and petrol wouldn’t be unfamiliar to the respective unit Quartermasters charged with providing the many aspects of logistical support.
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That explanation definitely holds up. 
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Because the British were dependent on what the Americans supplied. They had gotten M4A2s and M4A4s mainly because the US Army didn’t want either for use in Europe themselves. For the M4A2 that was exactly because of the logistic issue of supplying diesel when almost every other vehicle in the US Army had a petrol (gasoline) engine. For the M4A4, they thought its multibank engine was too complex.
The British never converted M4A2s into Sherman IIIC tanks, which is why units with Sherman IIIs got VCs. However, I’m not sure why they didn’t. I suspect it’s because one of the most important considerations was that the tank had to have hydraulic traverse gear, not electric. It could well be that few or no Sherman IIIs had that?
Mark Hayward, in his book Sherman Firefly Medium Tank[1], instead speculates that Sherman IIIs were reserved for conversion to other vehicle types, like ARVs and DD tanks, which would leave few to spare to convert to IIICs. He also thinks that the number of IIIs available in general was too low, since only a few units still used them by 1944.
Tiptree: Barbarossa Books, 2001; ISBN 0-9538777-2-8 ↩︎
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