World War 1 US Medical PersonnelrnICM recently released a Ford Model T World War One ambulance and now they are working on some figures to really bring it to life.rn

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I like this, a must for the ambulance, great diorama potential.

I got the ambulance, and your right on Kevin, the diorama potential is outstanding. real nice poses as well.

It says "American", but the men's uniform look more appropriate for British troops. If I recall correctly, the US uniform featured flat, not pleated pockets and a stand-up collar.

Glad to see Great War stuff proliferating.

I guess the kneeling medic would be the driver? Awesome kits. I am working on the Model T and it is terrific.

Well there goes the "accurate details of uniform " blurb.

The driver could be from one of the various volunteer services so is not necessarily a military officers. The lace up linesman boots were not uncommon.

A lot of ambulances were operated by volunteers and serviced all of the combatants. The wounded actually look generic as those may be under shirts (no bottom pocket or flares and pleats in the back generally found in period tunics) If so they could be French, Italian, Serbian, Greek. Volunteer ambulance services were on other fronts so you're not stuck with US no matter what the label says.

Charby, you're right about the collars. They do look like British or Empire troops as the US tunic had a stand up collar. It would make more sense (to me anyway) to leave them as they are and just change the description and footwear on the writing figure to puttees as well as he's not wearing an officers tunic as he has a closed collar. NCO or even straightforward medic maybe? If they are left as they are they're a lot more versatile as they could be British, Canadian or ANZAC's with not wearing webbing and could cover the four years of the war rather than the last 18 months as the only real change to uniform in that time to British uniform was the issue of helmets in 1916. If they're left as they are I'd buy one of these as it would make a nice little dio for any period and could tie in with the other British figures on the market. If they were Doughboys however I probably wouldn't bother (no offence to our American cousins) as it limits the possibilities too much with the timeframe, nationality and battles. As British troops I'd buy one.

Early US troops wore items of British uniforms - so if the medics are volunteers, it would not be a stretch to say these guys were equipped with British uniforms while the US uniforms were supplied to US fighting troops.

Volunteer ambulance services often had their own unique uniforms similar but not identical serving military. As I said linesman boots were popular with drivers so the driver could a non-combatant or even civilian volunteer. And not a military officer. Officers don't do paperwork anyway and depicted writing down information from the casualty? Not an officer. That's enlisted work.

Lots of good accounts if the civilian volunteer ambulances in 1916:A Global History especially about British and American volunteers on the Italian, Russian, Serbian fronts and with the French army. World War I wasn't just the Western Front and the combatants weren't just UK and the Germans.