Those men who fought that conflict were some dedicated and tough individuals. Truly the greatest generation.
Indeed, but I dunno that there were ANY Sherman crews that went in in North Africa and then to Europe who were still alive in April of '45.
Interesting to see a Sherman, that is not restored and not in very good shape... frontal "armor" on the one I saw up in Canada at a Canadian Legion, had metal over concrete in the front for armor...
They made those things with all sorts of engine combinations...
from a Chrysler "motor" that consisted of five 6 cylinder Chrysler motors, side by side, and hooked into one transmission..
They also made them with Diesel engines in them, but since the Army wanted everything running on 'one fuel' and picked gasoline, the Diesel Shermans were still made and just given to the Russians...
They were also made with Air Cooled Radial Aircraft engines, designs that were superceded by bigger and more powerful engines before the war started... but they worked fine for a tank..
for Sherman's, the focus was on shear numbers, not high quality....the high attrition was an acceptable fact by military planners....
recently getting Bill O'Reilly's book "Killing Patton", I remember a comment made by his driver, that replaced his war time driver, when it was all over...He commented about being shocked of all the Sherman tanks 'littering' the roads of Germany 'all over' in 1945....
always seems history portrays Germany was pretty much beaten by January 1945.. but in reality, a lot of Americans lost their lives in Germany between January and the end of April 1945...
PS: those pics and that story by Local Dirt, was fantastic..
thanks for posting them...
