Greetings all, I've been heavily researching the Sherman Firefly as part of a battlefield tour presentation in Normandy and have frequently come across the assertion that Panzer crews (and by extension AT gunners) targeted fireflies first. There certainly was the belief amongst firefly crews even to the extent of an official camouflage scheme being issued for the longer 17pdr gun barrel; November 44 instructions on camouflage 21st AG, though also appeared on other long barreled tanks like comet and even tortoise. This appears in several reports, memoirs, and confidently started in histories from the allied side. However, my question is are there any German sources which corroborate this story? It wouldn't be the first time a crew belief is taken as gospel. The British loss data I've found to date which separated fireflies doesn't seem to show any higher likelihood of being knocked out, which you'd expect if they were a priority target; eg 23/06/44 states 7thAmd had lost 101 Cromwell's but only 6 firefly, 19% of fireflies against 29% of gun tanks. I'd be intrigued if anyone has suggestions or primary sources they've found themselves. I've only been able to access the Tiger & Panther Fibel on the off chance they had any direction on prioritisation of targets; as a current mbt gunner we're taught to prioritise threats to ourselves first, which for a '44 Panzer Crew a Firefly would qualify. Indeed, further questions raise their heads. How did Panzer crews get their afv recognition information, how proficient were they, and how were they kept abreast of allied technological developments (is there something similar to the US tech & trends publications)? Tanks in advance.
This may be of interest... 1944-06-14 - Die Deutsche Wochenschau Nr. 719 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive ...particularly around the 13min mark. The 8th Armoured Brigade used their Fireflies in Firefly troops - at least for the first couple of months in Normandy. After that they seemed to have switched to what was more common, i.e. one or two Fireflies per troop. I don't think I have really seen a picture of an 8th Armoured Brigade Firefly camouflaged to disguise the longer 17pdr gun barrel - though I have seen a contemporary WW2 document that showed the process in detail and suggested it. I imagine that most of the crews didn't think it was actually really worth the effort. On 9d6m1944... It is noted in the SRY War diary... "Lt. Howden had his tank knocked out – likewise Sgts Rush and Hudghton (*Hutchinson). It appears that the enemy is concentrating his fire on our 17 Pdrs." Here though (attached further below) ) are some 8th Armoured Brigade casualty figures... were one to argue that the Fireflies were purposefully the main targets of the Germans then they seem to have been aiming too at lots of the 75mm Sherman tanks and not really targeting on the Honeys - which of course is absurd. It might be interesting to find out if the Germans themselves saw every "Sherman" first and foremost as a "Firefly" and if whenever they struck a Sherman subsequently preferred to claim it was a "Firefly" tank. When the case is reversed i.e. if an allied tank crew had multiple options of Mark IV's , Panthers and Tigers which would they have claimed to have knocked out...
Hi Ramiles, The video confirms that the wider German nation were definitely aware of the Fireflies existence by the 13th; assuming they saw the film and were familiar enough with Allied armour to know what they were looking at. These were presumably Fireflies lost during the engagement between HitlerJugend and the Sherbrooke Fusiliers on the 7th; a still appears in 'Stopping the Panzers' by Marc Milner p174 attributed as ''''Chase'' a firefly of C Squadron...7th June...''. As an aside it's intriguing to see so much applique track link this early in the campaign. Thank you for the information on 8th Armoured. I daresay that the proliferation of camouflaged barrel images on-line may be down to availability bias; with modelers especially being attracted to an unusual and interesting camouflage scheme and more likely to collect and share these images. The war diary quote is also intriguing, having fewer of them their loss would be more noticeable, it probably relies on the individual engagements too, if a troop of Fireflies were engaged and several knocked out in quick succession you could be forgiven for assuming this is preferential targeting. Does the diary expand on whether this was in one engagement or over a longer space of time? I concur on the recognition hypothesis. Much like the allies claiming every tank is a Tiger, every gun an 88, and every lone rifleman a sniper; my AA gunner GDad certainly said they didn't care much about recognition, if it flew within range they shot at it! The World War 2 tv interview with Niels Henkemans touches on this; I'd like to track down the book he mentions (where a US infanteer identifies a Tiger then describes a PzIV) but unfortunately Dr Google draws a blank. < Thank you for the document. I'll keep digging for further cas splits for Fireflies as I wonder if this increased as they became more well known; although the quote in my original post came form the 7th with Cromwells where you'd expect the Fireflies to stand out even more. Cheers.
I always thought that this was an interesting picture - given the date - and what type of tank that is... https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205509354 I think the AI here is still struggling... "published" and "publish" both giving quite different results, but still "only" in Normandy. Though there is an obvious difference between when a photograph was taken and when it was first "published" and when the German's first became aware of the existence of a 17pdr armed Sherman tank. In the "Newlarket Entrains" film - taken in April 1944 at Newmarket station the 24th Lancers 17pdr Sherman tanks are mostly covered with tarpaulins - for "security" - although anyone actually looking at those silhouettes could have seen that there was a longer gun. IWM film - Newmarket#1 - 7m46s. https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/1060008432 I assume that there were prior photos of them taken, but that they were censored to remain unpublished - until after the "weapon was revealed" - with a need to keep some secrecy intact. Almost all of the articles I have thus far found - from the British press - Results for 'firefly tank ' | Between 1st Jan 1944 and 31st Dec 1944 | British Newspaper Archive ...first start to mention the 17pdr armed Sherman and sing their praises in mid July 1944. Though it may well also be that earlier references didn't really focus on calling them "Fireflies" as there are lots of contemporary mentions of - the British 17pdr gun having been mounted in Sherman tanks - without calling this a "Firefly" coming out at around the same time as those mentioned that this had been nicknamed a "Firefly tank". I have seen "Mayfly" used by the 24L - for the Sherman 17pdr - but not that it seemed to stick and make it in to the newspaper press. Given that Mayfly was provably used though by at least the 24L - it ought not - perhaps - to be forgotten that it also had the "Mayfly" name. ~
As previously mentioned - re. was there a potential embargo on the allies publishing pictures on their early Firefly tanks... I am aware that the IWM etc. holds plenty of "early" pictures of Fireflies - but I don't think I have found these pre-"careful"-embargo Firefly pictures actually being published in the British newspapers as "early" as i.e. early June 1944 - as many might now (in hindsight) immediately suppose. Many of those that the IWM hold and which have perhaps become most familiar to any one interested in the Firefly tank would have been purposefully kept back, and might even have only appeared far later, and particularly became well known only in the post war books and accounts. Despite whatever the date they were taken on says. The Sphere - Saturday 22 July 1944 I half wonder if the German propaganda might have backfired on them and led them perhaps to think that Fireflies were far more common than they actually were. Reading that - Sherman Firefly Tank 1944-45 – Mike's Research "During the early fighting in Normandy, the Firefly tank crews did not make any attempts to conceal the 17-pounder’s long barrel. Later in the summer of 1944, tank crews began to apply various schemes to camouflage the long gun barrel as German gunners began to fire at all long barrel Shermans first." I wonder if this is "fine in theory" but if you far more often saw a 75mm Sherman it wouldn't have stopped you firing at it. Seeing a Firefly tank having applied to itself various schemes to camouflage the long gun barrel - might have made the Germans pause just to think "what new thing is that". But this logic doesn't mean that the Germans wouldn't have fired at it as quickly as possible anyhow. Could it have therefore delayed them firing on it, even for seconds, somehow? I guess if they routinely had multiple targets to choose from it might have spread out the load somewhat. The assumption seems to be that they would cleverly "take out the Firefly then leisurely proceed to take out the accompanying 75mm Shermans" like some sort of modern war game fantasy perhaps? All the while being fired on - presumably - by multiple Shermans both 75mm and Fireflies and taking AP and HE and smoke. Some of it perhaps stems still from some form of the "Tiger myth" and the importance in popular culture of the big-gunned "cats". Regular 75mm Shermans could and did disable and knockout Panthers and Tiger tanks nevertheless. There are plenty of modern examples of people just assuming that "AKILLA" must have been a Firefly tank - even despite the "crew of five" and that "AKILLA" self-evidently wasn't a Firefly tank. THE BRITISH ARMY IN THE NORMANDY CAMPAIGN 1944 | Imperial War Museums The crew of a Sherman tank named 'Akilla' of 1st Nottinghamshire Yeomanry, 8th Armoured Brigade, after having destroyed five German tanks in a day, Rauray, 30 June 1944. Left to right: Sgt J Dring; Tpr Hodkin, Tpr A Denton; Tpr E Bennett; L/Cpl S Gould. Perhaps the German Panzer crews (and by extension AT gunners) did target Fireflies first, and thereby "AKILLA" wasn't as quickly targetted and hence got better results ;-) . The 24L's Paddy Caulfield's 17-pdr Sherman doesn't seem to get mentioned much. The citation on his MM shows how the British Firefly could be used. The Germans were already engaging the 75mm Sherman tanks, and the Fireflies were called up to deal with the threat. It's at that point that the Germans could "switch" to prioritising the Firefly tank(s) but by then (for them) it was perhaps far too late...
Film A70 288-9 and photo BU3151. Two methods to camouflage the barrel. Firefly belonged to 4th/7th Dragoon Guards. Ruurlo, April 1945 Photo BU4676 - Rocket-armed Firefly from the Coldstream Guards. Westertimke, April 1945. Photo B8507 - Achilles at Cahagnes, August 1944.
I was thinking about it myself and all of the other camouflage and added on kit and foliage, tracks and boxes etc... Someone that had done a really good job of camouflaging the long gun on the Firefly - precisely as in the advisory documents - vs. a large number of others there that just looked at it and thought - yep the Germans won't bother to target that tank now - since it looks ever so slightly like it might be a 75mm Sherman and nothing like a Firefly now. At one stage they were painting their whole tanks white, because of snow etc. Anything that might work and perhaps give them an edge. By April 1945 they were mostly at risk of anti tank mines and Panzerfausts and had many more Fireflies than they had initially in Normandy. Presumably for the disguise to make sense there would have to be a feeling that a perceived German preference for targeting of Fireflies persisted. The German propaganda and perceived good tactics might have aided this if the German troops there were being taught to target Fireflies in preference to the more regular 75mm Shermans. It's certainly interesting whether it was there for "the pictures" and because it made for a good story - I wondered did they continue to "disguise the long gun" on long gunned Shermans in the same particular way after the war? Or was it more like a "glimpse of a moment" and of a particular idea.
As an aside - I've certainly heard stories that the Germans disguised their Mark IV's and even their Panthers to look more like their Mark VI's / Tiger tanks. Whether this was particularly true, or whether the allies themselves were just seeing "every tank as a Tiger" it's an interesting switch in psychology. By that logic had the Germans had regular 75mm Shermans routinely in their tank ranks - they would have presumably been camouflaging the 75mm Sherman gun to look as close as possible to the silhouette of a 17pdr as they feasibly could. Rather than the other way around. I wonder if they would have Tigers disguised to look like Panthers or Mark IV's, similarly in order to protect them from being singled out.
The wavy gun camouflage really works. Mildly astonished when we first saw it on a real vehicle in countryside as it'd always seemed a bit optimistic. If I recall correctly, German crews were trained to use muzzle brakes as an identifier, more looking for the distinctive blast than actual shape, with the intention mostly being avoiding friendly fire. Must've thrown them somewhat when brakes became more common on allied gear. Conversely, I do know that allied crews received specific training, films etc. not to use brakes as an identifier. Rusty memory, but have a feeling it became a thing when 76s began deployment, and a few were shot up as soon as friendly gun crews saw their brake. It all sort of makes me wonder how much wavy patterns were about protecting from the twitchy on one's own side... Then there's M18s & the old red brake discussion. One photograph. So many words. Anyway. Sorry not documented Firefly stuff, Peregrine. I'm off to dig out the allied film about brakes and ID, if I can. Might have to flick through 'Panzeknacker' too. (I can only recall brakes mentioned in the fibels regarding maintenance and importance re. recoil.)
Interesting, I would have thought making the 75mm gun look longer would have been easier and attemptable in a variety of ways. Even actually installing a longer gun - at the same 75mm calibre - could have been feasible, though the long gunned 17pdr caused all sorts of problems - including some crews facing it backwards when moving as it stuck out the front so much. I wonder too whether merely making the 17pdr gun actually shorter by cutting it down was considered - and immediately ruled out since it would have had all sorts of drawbacks also. Lots of later pictures of Fireflies don't show the camouflage so it wasn't ubiquitous and perhaps the more it might have been used the less effective it might have been. Seeing something worked is often the best way to achieve its acceptance. Hearing it worked a good way to get it to be applied. Seeing it stick around would suggest it was more than a stop-gap. I wonder if there was ever a picture of a knocked out Firefly on a tank that had been made to look like a 75mm Sherman?
Incidentally, in reference to some of the dates on the earliest pictures of Fireflies in Normandy... Re. https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205087330 B5546 : The object description says, for some reason - Object description A Sherman Firefly tank alongside a hedge, 16 June 1944. ----- x ----- x ----- Whereas the other data, including the caption card says 13d6m1944.
Re. https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205204595 I sometimes think that this was purposefully to show the difference in gun size between the 75mm Sherman and the Panther. It appeared in contemporary newspapers and the German tank often got described there as a "Tiger" B6226 - A Sherman tank of 24th Lancers, 8th Armoured Brigade, passing a knocked-out German PzKpfw V Panther tank near Rauray, 30 June 1944. ----- x ----- It also appears here - https://film.iwmcollections.org.uk/record/29648 ...at around the 3m50s mark. --- x ---- In... Battlefield Tours: The Battle of Caen & Normandy - YouTube At around 24m20s - it gets described as a 2nd Canadian Armoured brigade Sherman. (Perhaps the picture itself appears in a current Canadian archive and is described as such - or alternatively it was used by contemporary Canadian newspapers published in 1944 - and their captions described it as this). The contemporary newspapers were sometimes quite lax in using whatever pictures that they had to hand and describing them as something "apt" to match their associated text. ---- x ----
Strange assumption on this thread that only panzers were firing at 17 pounder Shermans. The classic wavy line barrel camouflage was only standardised by 1945, at which time anti-tank guns were a much bigger issue. There were complaints from Normandy that the 17 pounder tanks were being targeted first, but as far as I can tell this became a bigger problem in the Netherlands, when the tanks were driving on polder roads bordered by flat bare fields that meant their silhouettes were framed against the sky. Note that Challengers also got the wavy line.
I have wondered about the same point raised by the OP. I can't find any German reference that says "Hit the Firefly first". The guidance from HQ Panzer Troops in August 1944 included a reminder that the Tiger is not invincible and is vulnerable to Heavy AA guns (90mm and 94mm/3.7 inch). This is in one of the Jentz books. It may be that the Germans had not picked up the penetration of the 17 pounder, which the Germans may have equated to the 7.5 cm Pak 40 or 7.62cm Russian Pak. Painting a fake short barrel may have been one of the RAC myths/ superstitions, along with putting appliqué armour or sandbags on their tanks.
I have attempted to tally, myself, the numbers of Stuarts, 75mm Shermans and Fireflies that the 8th Armoured Brigade had in Normandy in June and July 1944... As has been mentioned there certainly was some anecdotal evidence that the crews themselves wondered if the Germans might have been targeting the Fireflies specifically, however in practice where there might have been 75mm losses the Fireflies might have been called up to deal with the Germans in specific anti-tank roles and then the Germans would have thought "right, something new on the table that we now have to deal with". We had better try to knock out these "new long gunned tanks". The allied Regiments that landed with DD Shermans had fewer Fireflies than those that landed with waders and dry-shod. However this was - in plan - rectified as time went on, as more and more was landed in Normandy. When a Firefly was lost, it tended to get replaced. Far from being "depleted by losses" the 24L - for example - was pretty much - I think? - at - or almost at "full strength" when it was disbanded, largely to provide reinforcements to other Regiments that had been depleted in the fighting - further east - around Caen. One question that I have asked was "How many Fireflies did the 8th Armoured Brigade have at the Battle of Rauray" - since from the perspective of "Firefly" enthusiasts it might be interesting to feature how the Fireflies/Mayflies fared there. Though what worked in defence would necessarily differ from what worked in attack. Which I think is often what is forgotten a lot about how these things worked out. Also a lot of the efforts of propagandists and what features in the more modern "clickbait" and war game scenarios. I imagine it's a tactic that features in modern war gaming to "target the Firefly" etc. and perhaps those that do so could assess too - there - how their battle plans fare.
