Looking for help from US WW2 armour experts -
I'm trying to work out what markings would be carried by a tank of C company, 555th tank battalion, I think in Italy in 1945. I have loads of references for Brit insignia but not on US!
I'm going to build an M4 17pounder as in the following link:
http://freespace.virgin.net/shermanic.firefly/usnew.html

Amazing, I never knew the US ever used 17 pounders. Make perfect sense, which is probably why I didn't think they'd do it.

Just briefly scanning that article I noticed how the 3rd Army didn't take any of them. Typical Patton pig headedness.

I'll check my resources at home on the markings. I know that armored divisions had their number, say 2, then a triangle shape to show armored, then their regimental number. I'll check on how independent battalions were done.

Here's the best info I've got.

The marking system was only semi-standardized. These would be on the bumpers, or upper hulls. The standard order is, from left to right, Division-regiment-company-vehicle. The company letter and vehicle number were usually separated from the unit numbers. Armies used A, artillery F or FA, infantry used I, airborne AB, headquarters HQ, TDs TD, and armored the white triangle I mentioned above.

So 75I-291I B6 would be 75th Infantry Division, 291st Infantry regiment, B company, vehicle 6.

Tank battalions could be either assigned to armored divisions, or they could be independent units. My guess is the 555th was independent. I would think this would be marked as 555, then the triangle, then a large space, then finally C and a number for the vehicle.

I got this from The US Army in World War II, from Osprey, by Mark R Henry.

Tanks wouldn't have regimental or battalion insignia like you're used to in the British army. They would wear various stars, and vehicle ID numbers, plus these unit numbers I mentioned.

I'm sure there are others here who can give you a lot more info.

Dave,

There was no US 555th tank battalion, but there was a 755th which served in Italy. The unit was pretty void of any distinctive markings.

Bob
http://www.752ndtank.com

Typical bumper numbers looked like this

parent - unit (star) subunit - number

Not remarking on 555 vs 755 but assuming it was an independent tank battalion, you'd need to know the parent -- could be division, corps or army.

The battalion number (555/755) would, as prev mentioned, have a delta or triangle symbol behind it.

If you have any better lineage, then we could get specific. Unfortunately, I don't know much about Italy & any local variations, etc.

Thanks for the help so far guys. If there wasn't a 555th TB, then two very knowledgable people have got their research wrong, so I'll wait and see what turns up on that score.
Thanks again.

The parent unit would appear to be 5th army, and perhaps 6th corps, but these are only from the document in the link on the first post, and from google searches. I won't put off building the model (once the parts arrive!), but will probably leave it unmarked until I can get a definitive answer from somewhere!

As I said, my refs are light on Italy.

I have looked around & cannot find any ref to a 555th Tank Battalion on the web except in a couple posts I assume you've seen discusing the Fireflys -- that is the only place the 555th shows up, so I doubt it really exists. I shall look more, I have other sources I can't remember/find right now.

I have looked at the 755th (as suggested above) and can track it all over Italy (att to 45th Div, then back to 5A, then later with 34th ID, etc) but there is no reference to it having Fireflys that I can see; although I haven't chased down every rabbit hole.

I note the discussions of the 555/FireFly imply various source documents, so it might be adviseable to find out exactly what they are so more than one set of eyes can back-track.

I am not an expert, but this is interesting.

John

I have seen this article before, and it still remain dubious with me.
I do not believe that there was ever a 555th TB anywhere. As the author states in the article, the 555th was part of the 5th Army. Well I have looked in every bit of info I have on the 5th Army, both in book and web form and have come up with nothing.

You can have a look HERE to see the most thorough lists I have seen of the 5th Army's units.

Gang,

Absolutely, positively bet the ranch on this one! Throw in your first born and grandma too. There was no 555th Tank Battalion anywhere, any time. It's just a careless typo that was carried throughout the text on the website. It should read the 755th. The proof is actually in the document reference that appears further down in the website text:

"755-3-Diary May 45"

The 755 in the document reference is the battalion designation on the May 1945 combat narrative (monthly report).

The 755th was one of just 9 independent tank battalions in Italy (191, 751,752,753,755, 756, 757, 758, and 760). Of these, the 191, 753, and 756 left Italy for France shortly after Rome was taken, and they did not participate in the Northern Apennines or Po Valley Campaigns.

The 755 was an independent battalion under the direct control of the 5th Army. Direct parentage would not have been at the Corps level (II or IV), except perhaps for a day or two in between divisional attachments. While attached to various infantry divisions, it was never organic to them so the parentage would not be divisional. Technically, the unit marking would have been 5A 755(Triangle). See the first photo on the following web page for an example from the 752nd Tank Battalion, which was also a 5th Army independent. Also note that the vehicle number (B14 in the photo above) was indicated separately from the unit number on the other side of the tank. This photo is from my dad's collection - he commanded B14.

http://www.752ndtank.com/specialdgpage2.html

To complicate things, the independents did not always follow "official" marking protocol. Many photos show no unit or vehicle markings at all, sometimes not even the Allied star. This was often because the independents tended to draw more than their fair share of repaired tanks from 5th Army motor pools to replace the units they lost in combat. Until late in the war, most of the newer, better equipment went to the 1st Armored Division, and often they swapped out their old equipment to the independents.

Hope this helps clarify the confusion. Stuff on the web needs to be viewed with a critical eye, and cross-checked for accuracy. See how a simple typo can create such a buzz?

Bob
http://www.752ndtank.com

Bob, thanks for clearing that up! Had I done the complete-reading thing on that site, I may have saved some time today ripping through so many pages looking for the ill-fated 555th of the 5th. LOL

Dohh!

Ken,

Hey, it was buried pretty deeply in the text. I figured it was just a one-off typo so I did a "find" looking for the string "755" and it popped right up. Ok, I cheated....

So here's my question about the Fireflies in US service. What about ammunition logistics? The US tank battalions had a hard enough time securing 4.5 inch rockets from the US Army Air Corps to supply their rocket tanks. How could the 755th or any other unit have efficiently handled the supply of enough 17 pounder ammunition from the British logistics people to gurantee a steady enough flow of ammunition for the Firefly to be dependable and effective? The US tankers in Italy later in the war were firing most of their missions as indirect fire, not against armor. A lot of rounds were going out -- for example the 752nd TB's firing orders for 14 April 1945 called for a rate of fire of 2 rounds per tank per minute for 2 hours. Seems like whatever limited supply of 17 pounder ammo was available would be exhausted pretty quickly....

This seems to indicate that right from the start, the Fireflies at best were experimental and never intended for serious or sustained combat missions. Officers in the 752nd have mentioned that they received a fair number of oddball variants to "try out for a while," so maybe this is the story with the 755 Fireflies?

Any info or ideas out there?

Bob
http://www.752ndtank.com

From what I understand, the tanks were allocated to just one independant unit within Gnrl. Mark Clarks army, which also contained British (or Commonwealth) armoured units. Shared logistics perhaps ? They were certainly in use only for a short time, and I certainly wouldn't have used the 17-pounder as a sustained fire artillery weapon so perhaps it was used as a 'protection' for other tanks that were used in that role?

Dave,

Thanks for the info. Regarding the protection role theory, I think it's unlikely that the Fireflies played that specific role. When the Shermans were used primarily as indirect fire, it was at a time when both sides were stalemated in the wintery Northern Italian mountains. There was little, if any, tank movement on either side, so the only real risk to the tanks was artillery fire or mines. By the time they broke out of the mountains, there were few remaining German tanks to protect against.

Later in the war, the biggest Sherman losses other than artillery fire or mines were from Panzerfausts or snipers. These were a real danger to the tanks once the ground war started moving into the flatlands of the Po Valley. However, the best protection against Panzerfausts or snipers was recognized to be the infantry.

Bob