Grizzly Firefly

[Hanno Spoelstra]

David,

Are any notes of the conference available?

Today's common understanding ist that this is a one-off Firefly, assembled in Canada by fitting a converted turret + 17-pdr gun shipped over from the UK to a locally manufactured Grizzly hull.

IIRC, the Grizzly was surely a likely source of 75-mm gun Shermans, which could be converted with 17-pdr guns. The supply of Sherman tanks with 75-mm gun, needed as the basis for the Firefly conversion, dried up after US production switched over to 76- and 105-mm guns fitted to modified turrets on large hatch wet stowage hulls with HVSS. In the end the need for Fireflies could be met by the supply of available, converted 75-mm gun Shermans, and there was no longer a need to convert Grizzlies. In fact the assembly of Grizzlies stopped after 188 examples because of the need for 75-mm gun Shermans could be met by US production.

Yes, while Sherman tanks seem to be common, they are a fascinating subject to study!

Hanno