Strathconas? in Groningen?

[Joe Long]

Hi

Found this film on Groningen in WW2.

https://www.filmbankgroningen.nl/zoeken/bevrijding
Fragment 151 van 249 - AV0119 Groningen in oorlogstijd 1940-1945
J.W. van Dam,1940-1945
From 48:37 to 49:19 there are a number of Canadian tanks (AoS = 51, on with AoS = 50) rounding a corner in a city.

AoS = 51 so they could be 6 CAR 1st Hussars, or 21 CAR GGFG, or 2 CAR LdSH

Name of one tank STRATHCONA suggests they are LdSH.

at 48:40 tank SPARTAN with WD number T228955 suggests LdSH as a tank with this number was turned in at end of war, from the 2CAR (ref Cdn Heritage T-12742 p624)

at 49:12 tank ALDER II or III with WD number T288991 suggests LdSH as a tank with this number was turned in at end of war, from the 2CAR (ref Cdn Heritage T-12742 p592)

at 49:20 tank ALMOND IV with WD number T232577 suggests LdSH as a tank with this number was turned in at end of war, from the 2CAR (ref Cdn Heritage T-12742 p592)


I am trying to determine the city.

Here are some screenshots:
As the tanks turn the corner they pass some buildings, then a Bakkerij Automatiek, and next to it an Albino store.

My Dutch isn;t very good, but I was able to determine that Albino had about a hundred stores in the northern Netherlands provinces, but got bought out in the late 1940s.

Appreciate if anyone can identify the city, and even the street!

Thanks

Peter Williams

[Bob Carriere]

Although some of the films are very "grainy" by today's standard I was puzzled by the strange camouflage applied to some Sherman tanks....... seems like a soft "mossy" kind of material....... or am I fooled by the pictures quality.....any one knows what was applied as a covering?????....it is on the sides and turret but not the gun barrel.......

Willing to learn...

[Colin Alford]

Peter,

In case you haven’t yet accessed it, the Strathcona’s April ‘45 War Diary can be found here: https://heritage.canadiana.ca/view/o...eel_t12570/846

I haven’t read it enough to fully understand the movements of the regiment, but the 23 Apr entry seems to indicate the the tanks remained at the airfield in Eelde (South-West of Groningen) while the majority of the regiment deployed North of the Groningen in soft-skinned veh.

I haven’t been able to properly view your linked film as it keeps freezing up, then jumping ahead, on me.

Given your timings of 48:37 to 49:19, it seems that there is a description for “fragment 187” which includes the name Orangebuurt. Apparently, there is an Orangebuurt neighbourhood in Groningen, but a look at Google Maps street view doesn’t seem to provide any visual matches with your screenshots.

I haven’t looked at the May ‘45 diary to see if any of the movements of the regiment provides any clues as to where the footage was filmed.

Colin

[Jakko Westerbeke]

Originally Posted by Bob Carriere

I was puzzled by the strange camouflage applied to some Sherman tanks....... seems like a soft "mossy" kind of material.......

You mean this?

Sherman wooly camouflage.jpeg

That is fairly well-known camouflage added to tanks of some Canadian units, but I’m hazy on the details. IIRC off the top of my head, it’s some kind of coarse wire wool held down with netting.

[kevinT]

Some clips from the above mentioned film along with some others.
Note that there are 2 different ALDER II's
ANDY is from either Sicily or Italy

Cheers

Kevin

[kevinT]

A few of ASPEN and 1 of BADER

[kevinT]

BROADVIEW, BUFFALO, CHILLIWACK III and CHINA

[Joe Long]

Originally Posted by Bob Carriere

Although some of the films are very "grainy" by today's standard I was puzzled by the strange camouflage applied to some Sherman tanks....... seems like a soft "mossy" kind of material....... or am I fooled by the pictures quality.....any one knows what was applied as a covering?????....it is on the sides and turret but not the gun barrel.......

Willing to learn...

From a book by Steve Guthrie and Barry Beldham, Camouflage and Markings of Canadian rmoured Vehicles in WW2: "The tanks are covered in 'horse hair' a material used for packing ammunition and other delicate things. It appears like 3" bristles coated with glue and sprayed into a square mold, bristles at all angles to each other but compressible, springing back into shape after compression"

It was used extensively by the Fort Garry Horse

[Bob Carriere]

Horse hair....... learned something new.....

From my personal experience they stink like hell when burned unless they treated them with some non combustible chemical like boron.

I worked in an old wartime government building back in the 90s when a contractor was hired to redo the old steel one pane windows...... they used torches to remove the old insulation which was horse hair held in place with dabs of tar.....!!! smelled so bad we were sent home.

Looks good on hiding the details of the tank....fuzzy all over. Thank God they never used it on CMPs.....

Nice videos to watch when there is 12 inches + of fresh snow outside...

Bob C

[Jordan Baker]

Regards the "horse hair"

From a FB post by Anthony Sewards
"Mystery solved, the Fort Garry Horse (FGH) in Feb/March 1945, welded on steel mesh to the Shermans over the welded tank tracks, to add nets to hide/disguise the shape of the tanks and to hide the tanks shine. Once the steel mesh was added, shrimp net (cam net) was added as well as horsehair shipping material. Photos from that springtime and while on the advance in Holland."

[Colin Alford]

While I recognize the quoted sources as generally being reputable, I am very skeptical that the camouflage material used by the FGH was actually horse hair.

I searched through the FGH War Diary, and the only description that I could find to the material used is “wire garnish camouflage”.

See images 160 and 161: https://heritage.canadiana.ca/view/o...eel_t12699/160

In the images presented above, I do not see any shrimp nets (description in next post). I believe I can see “galvanized wire netting” which I would commonly call “chicken wire” being used to secure the camouflage material.

While I agree that horse hair was commonly used as padding in seats (CMP seat pads, Universal Carrier seat backs and Sherman turret seats definitely used horse hair) and as a packing material for delicate items, any salvaged material would already be cut to specific sizes and shapes, which would likely be somewhat visible once attached to the vehicle. I have never encountered any horse hair used in ammunition packaging. To camouflage all of A Sqn, FGH tanks in 15 days would require a massive amount of salvaged horse hair padding.

Military Training Pamplet 46: Camouflage, Part 1: General principles: Equipment and materials (all arms), details the standard camouflage materials that were available. I believe that the most likely material is Steel Wool (see attached image of description).