I learned that machine gunnery is about suppressive fire, not necessarily point of aim. Putting MGs on a carrier might seem exciting to contribute to the fight, but their effect would have been mostly salutary.

The carrier platoons in an Infantry Battalion were for carrying things and not for fighting. There are accounts of carrier charges in the early days after DDay, but most of them seemed to have fizzled with heavy losses. That said, getting a ride into battle is much less tiring than trudging ahead on foot.

Photo I have of an RCR MMG detachment mounted in a carrier from 1954. Post-war, after the MG battalions were converted back to rifle infantry, Vickers MG's were allocated to the rifle battalions and mounted on the carriers in the carrier platoon. The designation 'carrier platoon' and 'MG platoon' were used interchangeably in documents, I've found.

MG Armed Universal Carriers
 

Here is a photo of a M1917A1 .30 cal MG mounted on a Canadian Universal Carrier.

Attachment 120287

Rifle Brigade Ghent
 

Carriers of 7th Armoured Division's Rifle Brigade had 0.5" fitted - photographed in Ghent (See p56 of Autumn Gale).

Don't forget that Suppressive fire also is no good unless it's in the right place. A Carrier would have been a great tool for getting your heavy machine guns quickly onto ground where they could have the best effect. In that respect the Carrier is not a great deal different to modern Infantry Fighting Vehicles, just not as capable and doesn't carry infantry, but it does fulfill the mobile fire support role.

Please post photo on carrier page it will answer a few questions
 

Ted Harvey wrote:

Here are some documents from CMHQ file “1/BROWNING/1” which gives a timeline for Canadian policy regarding the mounting of .30 and .50 cal MGs on Carriers, Cars Lt Recce, and Halftracks.

The documents can be found at this link: https://heritage.canadiana.ca/view/o...eel_t17481/310

Some additional documents:

Colin, thanks a lot for finding and sharing these documents! They show that the use of the .30 and .50 was much less of an improvised nature that often assumed.

Good work !

Thank you Colin.

File: 1/Carriers/1/2 may be of interest ?

:drunk:

Hanno,

My pleasure.

Michael R,

1/Carriers/1/2 can be found here: https://heritage.canadiana.ca/view/o...eel_t17483/178