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Royal Marines Armoured Support Group


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I'm working on a project at the moment to replicate the famous picture of Fox, the Royal Marines Armoured Support Group OP sherman from 2 Battery and one of the centaurs in convoy behind it in the Village of Tillyu sur Seulles in 1944

I'm about 90% done on the tanks, but I still have some weathering and the stowage to go, then the village to build (well, the bit in the photo anyway)

Here be piccies:

fox%20(131).jpg

fox%20(134).jpg

fox%20(139).jpg

fox%20(141).jpg

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Very nice, great looking tanks.

I´ve never seen a sherman with the navy gunners compass on it though??

i have some 72nd decal sheets that have that option too.

looks good. i know the Centaur wasnt done in SCC15 and always some debate what actual colours they were

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thanks guys :)

This is the photo I'm working from:

tillysherman.jpg

Paul, this is the OP Sherman from the 2nd Battery, Royal Marines Armoured Support Group.

The origins of the use of Naval gunner practice lie in the original planned role of the RMASG. They were orgininally intended to be parked on LCMs and used as turrets as a sort of Monitor. Their purpose was to proceed in with the landing troops and fire at strongpoints on the beaches to assist the troops landing. The commander would stand rear of the tank and use the azimuths on the turret to line up the guns on targets.

It was planned that the engines would be removed from the Centaurs and they would be permanently kept on the converted LCMs for the duration of the operation then be returned to Great Britain. However, it was decided (some claim at the suggestion of Montgomery) that they might as well have their engines and be driven ashore to engage targets away from the ashore line to help the advancing forces.

Once it was decided that they would be enabled to land, they were organised into troops and assigned a command/OP tank in the form of a Sherman. The Sherman's 75 had already been used on a number of occaisions to engage targets with long range indirect fire in what the army called 'shoots' in the Italian campaign, so the shermans too got their azimuths

In the event some RMASG vehicles penetrated a number of miles inland, but a few short weeks after D Day the RMASG was disbanded (not to be reformed until 2007 in Afghanistan!) and the crews returned to the UK for redeployment, and the Centaurs were handed over to commonwealth units.

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  • 3 weeks later...
great model m8! i only wish i knew how to post my photos on this site???. :jump_fire:

upload to photobucket and put the link on here

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