Hobart's funnies
The Hobart's Funnies were unusually modified armored vehicles used by the British 79th Armored Division and operated by the Royal Engineers during World War II . Its development continued after the disastrous failure of Operation Jubilee : During this operation on August 19, 1942, 237 ships and more than 6000 soldiers tried in vain to take the occupied port of Dieppe by means of a landing operation .
The aim was to use the modified vehicles for Operation Neptune (June 1944) on the beaches of Normandy . They are widely regarded as the forerunners of modern pioneer vehicles.
history
In 1943, Field Marshal Sir Alan Brooke decided to develop them, considering the need for some new experimental vehicles to help advance the French invasion beaches . It was necessary to remove the obstacles on the British landing beaches as quickly as possible, as the relatively flat hinterland made an early German counter-attack possible. The development contract and the training of the crews for these were placed in the hands of the weapons expert Sir Percy Cleghorn Stanley Hobart , after whom the entire series was named. The name "Funnies" comes from the fact that some of the vehicles looked very unusual.
Some of the ideas were a bit older, had been tested and had already been used, such as the Scorpion Flail Tank , a converted Matilda tank that had paved the way for the British through German minefields in North Africa .
At the beginning of 1944, Hobart Eisenhower and Montgomery was able to demonstrate a brigade of buoyant DD tanks , Crab mining vehicles and AVRE tanks, as well as a regiment of Crocodile Flamethrower tanks . Montgomery believed that they should be made available to the U.S. armed forces as well and offered them half of the vehicles available. The response to this offer was relatively weak. Eisenhower liked the swimming tanks, but left the decision to other leaders, such as General Bradley , who referred them to his officers. The Americans did not accept any of the other drafts.
The vehicles
Most of the designs were based on the Churchill and Sherman tanks . The Churchill performed well on difficult terrain and the Sherman was available in large numbers.
Among the many different special vehicles and their accessories were the following converted tanks.
Crocodile
The Churchill Crocodile (feared by Germans as the Churchill crocodile) was a tank of the Churchill type with a built-in flame thrower instead of the machine gun otherwise available in the front . An armored trailer on the vehicle held about 1,800 liters of flammable liquid for the flame thrower, which had a range of over 110 meters.
AVRE (Armored Vehicle, Royal Engineers)
Also a Churchill tank that was specially designed to combat the German defense lines. The crew consisted of two men from the Royal Engineers who could quickly exit the tank through side hatches. The main cannon of AVRE had been removed and replaced with a special mortar , the explosive shells ( petard was could fire) replaced. The projectile weighed 18 kg and was nicknamed the Flying Dustbin ( flying garbage can ). It was filled with highly explosive material and could destroy concrete obstacles such as road blocks and bunkers. AVREs were also used for the deployment or transport of the following accessories:
- Winding drum : on this a 3 meter wide strip of canvas was wound, which was reinforced with steel rods. The drum was placed in front of the vehicle. The unwound canvas track made it possible for you to make good progress on the beach floor and also served as a "track" for subsequent vehicles.
- Fascine : A bundle of wooden poles held together by wires lay on the front of the armor and could be used to fill recesses in the ground or to build a staircase on a slope.
- Steel Girder Bridge: A small folded steel bridge that was ready to use in 30 seconds. It could span an area of around 9 meters and was installed above the front of the vehicle.
- Mine plow : A mine plow that was mounted in front of the tank and that was used to clear this area of mines by causing them to explode.
- Double charge: Two large explosive charges mounted on a metal frame, which could be placed in front of a concrete wall and then detonated from a safe distance.
- The ARC ( A rmoured R amp C arrier), so that other vehicles could away cross obstacles over him A Churchill tank without turret, which was equipped at both ends with ramps.
Crab
A Sherman tank equipped with a miner's flail . For this purpose, steel chains were mounted on an axle, which, when rotating, churned up the ground in front of the tank and caused the mines there to explode.
The crab was originally the development of a South African motor mechanic named Abraham SJ du Toit who served in the local artillery . In 1941 he constructed a simple vehicle with a rotating drum on which chains were attached. The vehicle was able to prove its suitability in a demonstration film that was shot in Pretoria . The mines exploded in rows beneath the chains lashing against the ground. General Claude Auchinleck saw this film and sent du Toit to Great Britain to further refine his invention in secret. Auchinleck wanted to surprise the Axis powers in the Middle East and North Africa . But it was impossible to keep anything secret in this area. The whip frame was intended for assembly in front of a battle tank. Du Toit was promoted to major and worked on the development of the Matilda Baron , which was never used.
Before leaving for Britain, du Toit had given his notes to Captain Norman Berry , the South African chief engineer of the 8th Army. Berry , who did not want to wait for results from Great Britain, continued to construct on his own initiative in the spring of 1942, while the 8th Army had holed up in the coastal strip of Palestine . Such a complex machine had never before been developed by troops on the front lines . Some other soldiers and officers worked with Berry the overall approach and on August 6 they presented the first prototype, which they Durban Mark I had baptized. A Ford V8 engine with 108 hp was mounted in an armored box on the outside of a Matilda tank . This drove the drum with the steel chains, which was suspended from steel girders in front of the tank , via a toothed chain . The distance between the drum and the tank front was about two meters and the distance from the ground was one meter. It turned at about 100 revolutions per minute and was equipped with 24 steel chains. These hit the ground with a contact length of about 20 centimeters. After the second battle of El Alamein , the drum rotor was modified somewhat so that it could also be raised and lowered using hydraulic cylinders so that the tank could move better.
A demonstration was held on September 12 in front of Generals Harold RL Alexander , Bernard Montgomery and Leslie Morshead . Everyone was very impressed and Montgomery named the tank the Scorpion . In addition, he ordered twelve pieces for the following attack against the Axis powers. In response to the objection that such a large number would require approval from headquarters, Montgomery replied: "Don't worry, order two dozen."
Armored bulldozer
A normal Caterpillar D8 bulldozer that was armored to protect the driver and engine. Their task was to remove obstacles on the beach, as well as to ensure the passability of the roads by clearing rubble and backfilling bomb craters .
Centaur
A Cromwell tank with a leveling shovel attached to the front.
DD tank
( D uplex D rive tank , English for tanks with two drive modes ) A buoyant Sherman tank, that of a landing craft was left at a distance of approximately 1.5 kilometers from shore into the water and then reached the shore under its own power. They had been developed to support the landing infantry with tanks.
BARV (Beach Armored Recovery Vehicle)
A waterproof Sherman M4A2 tank whose turret had been replaced by a long armored structure. It was able to operate in a water depth of around 2.7 meters and was intended to clear vehicles that had broken down on the beach so that vehicles behind were not obstructed. Furthermore, the BARVs made it possible to get smaller landing craft that ran aground on the bank afloat again. Strictly speaking, the BARVs did not belong to the "Funnies" because they were not developed by the 79th British Armored Division, but by the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers and were also driven by them.
LVT Buffalo
The British version of the US armored landing craft LVT-4 .
After the end of the war
A small number of the Churchill AVREs and a few Sherman BARVs were operated by the British Army until the 1960s. Then they were replaced by similar vehicles based on the Centurion tank . Even today, the army uses converted Centurions and Chieftain tanks for pioneer work.
literature
- Patrick Delaforce: Churchill's secret weapons: The Story of Hobart's Funnies , Pen and Sword; New edition, 2006, ISBN 1-84415-344-4 .
- Kenneth Macksey: Armored Crusader: The Biography of Major-General Sir Percy 'Hobo' Hobart, One of the Most Influential Military Commanders of the Second World War , Grub Street, 2004, ISBN 1-904010-64-4 .
- David Fletcher: Vanguard of victory: the 79th Armored Division , Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London, 1984.
- Geoffrey W. Futter: The Funnies: the 79th Armored Division and its specialized equipment , Model and Allied Publications Ltd., 1974, ISBN 0-85242-405-1 .
- NW Duncan: 79th Armored Division (Hobo's Funnies) , Profile Publications, Windsor, 1972.
- Diverse: The story of 79th Armored Division, October 1942 - June 1945.
Web links
- Information at edwardwillett.com ( Memento from August 27, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) (English)
- Information at geocities.com ( Memento from August 12, 2005 in the Internet Archive )
- Information on the 79th Armed Div. (English)