Landships II

geod-LA · Sergeant

Hyacinth

PDA · Legend

I think the Zs don't signify anything. They are black paint used to confuse Germans firing at the tank. After the initial tank attacks the Germans were told to fire at the vision slits, so the tank crews would often paint black lines to try to hide the location of the slits, or paint dummy slits.

Gwyn Evans · Legend

Here's another tank, a Mark V in this case, with the camouflage in the form of a "Z".� Incidentally, I recently found a good quality close-up of the front of the cab of "Egbert", the touring tank, and that also has this type of false�vision slit painted on it.

Gwyn�

-- Edited by Gwyn Evans on Monday 13th of August 2012 08:47:52 PM

geod-LA · Sergeant

Thanks for this - I confess I'd never heard of, or noticed, this before but it makes sense. Having said that, it seems a bit odd that they would paint a Z on the sponson door.

MTorrent · Lieutenant-Colonel

Very interesting.�

�

By the way, this Mk V number 9034 ended to Russia and was named as "Field Marshall Potemkin".�

�

http://www.tankmuseum.ru/tank.html

-- Edited by MTorrent on Monday 13th of August 2012 11:34:53 PM

PDA · Legend

Possibly a bit odd, but stranger things have happened.

�

TinCanTadpole · Legend

If you look closely, you'll see that the top stroke of each "Z" is actually the vision slit - so in this case it seems that the paint is not so much to add fake vision slits as on some tanks, but to disguise the real ones as some form if ID markings.

James H · Legend

In Glyn's pic of 9034 is the gent standing at the rear black?

Rectalgia · Legend

Certainly might be biggrin � The backs of the hands are the most reliable gauge of relative skin tone in this shot I think - so yes.

James H · Legend

Rectalgia wrote:
Certainly might be� The backs of the hands are the most reliable gauge of relative skin tone in this shot I think - so yes.

That has the makings of an interesting aside. I had long assumed that British West Indies troops were non-combatants (on the Western Front, anyway), but recent reading suggests that that wasn't the case. Wonder what this chap is doing in the photo.

Rectalgia · Legend

Looks like a regular member of the section. Where there's a will, there's a way. Some think there were no Aboriginal troops in the AIF (enlistment at that time was, after all, restricted to "persons of European origin") but they were there right enough, hundreds of them.

TinCanTadpole · Legend

I was going to say that he may just have been a white man more weatherbeaten than the others, or had a muddy face and hands (with the variation in exposure/lighting across the photo giving a darker appearance), but now I'm not so sure; it would be interesting to find out.
Certainly, as Steve says, where there's a will, there's a way; I remember in the UK BBC4 had a dramatisation on last year about Walter Tull. Unfortunately I missed the programme, but the Wikipedia article on Tull says that he became an officer despite the rules of the day forbidding it.

Rob · Legend

In the main photograph at the top of the thread, does anyone know the unit of men with Hyacinth? I'd seen it described as Leicestershire Regiment

Date: Mar 19, 2013

I think this photo was taken on the Somme, since in these photos my grandfather is leaning on the back of the trench. I cannot tell you which unit he was from however..

to my knowledge he wasnt at Cambrai