Info on 147th RA Regt photos requested

I've uploaded some of the photos from my grandfathers collection for the site (see albums). They raise a few questions which I'm hoping to have answered by those in the know.


1a. Who are the officers here? (The formation badges are clearer on my scans: far left is 8th armoured brigade, i.e. Red Fox; below that ... ??; officer (second left) has Second Army badge, I assume.)

b. Newbie alert: What is the rank of the soldier with the arm badge (third right)?


http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=437&pictureid=3458



2a. Why is my grandfather (left) atop a tank and not a sexton? (a tank is also used as part of commemorative group photography, see album).

b. Does anyone have any information about the kind of tank this is, its regiment etc.? 8th Armoured Brigade, perhaps?


http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=436&pictureid=3452



Thank you for your time.

 

Welcome

The officer on the left is of the Regiment, as you can see the Regimental badge Essex Yeomanry , underneath the Red Fox. I think he is the CO of the Regiment

the rank of the soldier is Bombardier, the tank was most probably used by the observation officer.

Can I used these photograph for my site?

 

Sure Philip, go ahead. I have some more, and they'll be posted soon enough. Check out the albums in a week or so.

 

147th (Essex Yeomanry) SP Field Regt RA
2nd Army Troops under Cmd 8th Armd Bde 44-45.
Commanding Officers;
V.S. Laurie
R.A. Phayre
H.R.L. Hodges
C.H. Gosling
E.C.B. Edwards

Best
Rob

 

excelent photo's

 

Thanks will do

 

Sherman OP'S
BRAMLEY B Troop 431 Battery
DOBB'S WEIR D Troop 431 Battery
T211978 DOODLE OAK D Troop 413 Battery
T261663

Sextons
S233813 ARDLEIGH A Troop 431 Battery
S233752 BRENTWOOD B Troop 431 Battery
DEBDEN D Troop 413 Battery
S234019 EXTERMINATOR E Troop 413 Battery
FAIRSTEAD F Troop 511 Battery
FALAISE F Troop 511 Battery
FONTENAY F Troop 511 Battery

I hope this is of some use. If anyone can add anything please let me know.

Cheers
Kevin

 

Thanks for that.

The closest I can get to the CO, Rob, is the fact that R.A. Phayre was succeded by H.R.L. Hodges in March-April 1945. (The parade took place in Hannover 1945, shortly after the war ended.) Perhaps its the latter - nothing doing on an image search, though.


Kevin, did you get this information from the war diaries? Such detail is rare, (welcome) and must have involved some serious digging.

 

Thanks for that.

Kevin, did you get this information from the war diaries? Such detail is rare, (welcome) and must have involved some serious digging.



I, for my sins collect, if that is the correct word, British WWII WD census numbers and names.

In this particular case the majority of names come from BT White’s “British Tank Names”, an excellent initial source. But often I have photos kindly sent to me showing names and numbers or sometimes it may be a reference from a book. However I have spent many an hour trawling through books or searching sites such as IWM, British Pathe, British Movietone. The object of this project is match WD census / name to a specific vehicle and then to the relevant regiment.

Photos such as the one you posted are welcome additions to my database. I have a few photos I could post, not necessarily relevant to RA, if only I knew how.

Cheers
Kevin

 

Hi Kevin,

These may be of some use to you.


http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=439&pictureid=3476

This could be your "Debden". Serial no. obsured, unfortunately: "S.....745"



http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=439&pictureid=3475


Above, the half-track has "Dage...n" on its side. (If you require better quality pics, I'll can send you the scans via e-mail.)



http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=437&pictureid=3455

Here, another sexton of the 147th, serial no. "CS30(4?)...."; "Dur..."

(The two sexton images together appear to tell us that both mark I and mark II sexton were in use during the war, and within the same regiment, too)


Steve


PS

Your best bet at posting images would be to load them as albums onto your user profile. This way you get the URL address you need to insert them into any subsequent messages. It's what happening here in this post. It's all been really new to me, too. If you need further assistence try typing "post/posting images" into the search engine.

 

Hello Steve,

Firstly thanks for posting those photos. There are some interesting ones there!
The use of the Canadian CS census ( CS204782 - CS204821 ). I thought that the "C" was dropped in British service, unless it was a replacement gun. Also the missing track pad on the same photo.
The change from 1177 to 76 on the AoS.

I would appreciate a scan of the photos if that is possible. Do I need to PM you with my email address?

Cheers
Kevin

 

It's perhaps better that you PM me the e-mail address, rather than have it posted on the forum. I'll also included the sherman, and anything else I have.

As to the questions these photos throw up, well, they could possibly drive me to distraction were it not for the fact that I'll be acquiring copies of the relevant war diaries in a matter of days I don't even know whether my grandfather was a WO in a gun crew, or WO in the troop OP vehicle (possibly. the sherman he's sitting on, above); he was present in the group photo labelled "troop and signals HQ" and, anecdotally my Dad (only today) speaks of chats, where he talks about "ranging for the guns", so things conspire towards the latter, but only circumstantially so. On the flip side, he was, the rank of gunner... what I want to know is this: Can you be the rank of "gunner", whilst being a member of "troop and signals HQ"? New thread is needed, perhaps.

 

... what I want to know is this: Can you be the rank of "gunner", whilst being a member of "troop and signals HQ"?


Yes indeed you can!
Best
Rob

 

Hello Steve,

Will do later today.

My late Father was a WOII in a Light Air Defence regiment. He always used to say "Once a Gunner, always a Gunner".

Cheers
Kevin

 

There are a couple of books you may be interested in namely the history of the Essex Yeomanary published just after the war and quite hard to find and one published recently about a gunner in the Regiment.

I haven't got their exact names to hand at the moment, but will post them when I can get to the books (currently laid up following an operation).

Phil

 

Hello Phil,

One of the books wouldn't be "One Man's War - An Essex Soldier in WWII" by any chance?

Cheers
Kevin

 

Hi Kevin,

These may be of some use to you.


http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=439&pictureid=3476

This could be your "Debden". Serial no. obsured, unfortunately: "S.....745"



http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=439&pictureid=3475


Above, the half-track has "Dage...n" on its side. (If you require better quality pics, I'll can send you the scans via e-mail.)



http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=437&pictureid=3455

Here, another sexton of the 147th, serial no. "CS30(4?)...."; "Dur..."

(The two sexton images together appear to tell us that both mark I and mark II sexton were in use during the war, and within the same regiment, too)


Steve


PS

Your best bet at posting images would be to load them as albums onto your user profile. This way you get the URL address you need to insert them into any subsequent messages. It's what happening here in this post. It's all been really new to me, too. If you need further assistence try typing "post/posting images" into the search engine.

If that is DEBDEN then it can only be 1 of 2 serial numbers either S172745 a Mk I or S233745 a Mk II. I am guessing at the latter as if this was the former following the same pattern as CS204??? it have started CS.
As far as I know Sextons used the following numbers:-
MK I
S159377 - S159400, CS172726 - CS172785 and CS204782 - CS204281
MK II
S223626 - S235061, S286849 - S287438

Cheers
Kevin

 

Thanks all, for your responses, and book suggestions. I checked out the "one man's war" - it looks to be exactly the sort of thing I'm after. My grandad mentioned Belson often, but I found nothing in the war diaries or literature to suggest the 147th were there, only the happening upon Sandbostel, so I presumed the camp was actually the latter. Now, I know that the 147th were at Belsen, absolutely... ordering book soon.



Kevin,

I was actually going to mention this in my email with the scans.

Just to make sure we are on the same page here, by mark I (one) I mean Ram-based 25 pdr SP, and by mark II, Sherman-based, the latter presumably chose over the Ram-based due to availability of spare parts etc. (Yet, all this can be, and is, disputed by others.)
The actual war diaries state "23-4 Rams, 13 Sherman (tanks), and consistently too. There is, however, further anecedotal and independent testimony, from veterans which came to light through the EYA. Apparently, one carried its own fuel the other not (or to further complicate things they also trained for a time in Priest). I would really like to know your take on this and the relevant source you draw from.

Cheers

Steve


ps Scans on the way

 

Thanks all, for your responses, and book suggestions. I checked out the "one man's war" - it looks to be exactly the sort of thing I'm after. My grandad mentioned Belson often, but I found nothing in the war diaries or literature to suggest the 147th were there, only the happening upon Sandbostel, so I presumed the camp was actually the latter. Now, I know that the 147th were at Belsen, absolutely... ordering book soon.



Kevin,

I was actually going to mention this in my email with the scans.

Just to make sure we are on the same page here, by mark I (one) I mean Ram-based 25 pdr SP, and by mark II, Sherman-based, the latter presumably chose over the Ram-based due to availability of spare parts etc. (Yet, all this can be, and is, disputed by others.)
The actual war diaries state "23-4 Rams, 13 Sherman (tanks), and consistently too. There is, however, further anecedotal and independent testimony, from veterans which came to light through the EYA. Apparently, one carried its own fuel the other not (or to further complicate things they also trained for a time in Priest). I would really like to know your take on this and the relevant source you draw from.

Cheers

Steve


ps Scans on the way

Hello Steve,

Scans arrived thank you. I can add a little more.

The half - track is "Dagenham" and the Sexton begining CS 204... is "Dunmow". This is a bit of a guess but looking at the letter spacing and a list of Essex towns "Dunmow" seemed to fit in nicely.

The intial Sextons were based on the Ram chassis, then later with the US supplying Britain additional tank needs the Canadian Grizzly ( M4A1 ) with the 13 tooth drive sprocket was switched to the Sexton Mk II line. The late Mk II had the single piece cast nose as possed to the bolted three piece.

Cheers
Kevin

As to 147th training on M7 Priets I suppose that was quite possible. Perhaps they were waiting for sufficient vehicles to become available to equip the Regiment.

24 Sextons sounds right 3 batteries, each with 2 troops of 4 guns each. I couldn't work out the 13 Shermans ( OP? ) though. Perhaps someone can help me out here.

 

Hi Kevin, good to see you on here. 86 Field did their initial assault training with Bishops before swapping to M7 Priest and then finally Sexton for D Day so no reason why 147 didn't do likewise.

13 Shermans were probably distributed as follows:

1 x CO
3 x Bty Comd's
6 x OP's
3 x GPO's

Derek