Ford jeep from the UK
 

Hi,
I have this Jeep GPW205644 that the previous owner had brought with him when he migrated from the UK to Australia. It has been restored but the previous owner said that he repainted the original numbers back on the jeep. He claims that he bought the jeep from a farmer who bought it from "army auctions that was held on a RAF airfield". The numbers on the bonnet 20343230 are earlier than the jeep so I don't have much confidence in those. Does anyone now what the numbers and the symbols on the bumper mean? The numbers on the right are the UK registration.

Thanks
Darren

The bumper markings mean 1st US armoured div, 13th US armoured regiment. I strongly suspect them to be made up too! It looks like it might be an ex-British Army Jeep, though that does not mean it was not previously US Army.

In collecting circles the expression is, buy the not the story. Bruce Canfield is a prolific gun writer and collector. http://www.brucecanfield.com/cc-article.html

I remember skimming an article about a very ordinary WWII Jeep that was sold with a pedigree that suggested it had been Eisenhower's personal vehicle that he rode into Paris two days ahead of the Liberation. The bullet holes were German when Ike had had a shootout with his .45 and two Tigers under the Eiffel Tower. Absolutely silly for a smart collector or student of history. The trouble was as each buyer became a seller, every transaction added a bit more, until that Jeep ended in a French museum where it was the piece de resistance (pun intended) and virtually worshiped as a national treasure.

The number is correct for the US Army, in that a standard US Army Jeep rego number does start with the "2". It denotes the 1/4 ton.

.....so are you guys trying to tell me the this jeep wasn't alocated to the Memphis Bell crew then???

Only after Eisenhower had finished with it in North Africa, and then France. :D

Jeep
 

But guys... you forgot to mention that it was also used by General Clark when he broke out of Anzio ! Eisenhower had lent him his Jeep for a short while ...as he was conferring with Stalin on the next phase of the Allied offensive !