So here's an interesting picture....
I don't recognise the machine gun, and are they Free French? Picture was allegedly taken post D Day...
I don't recognise the machine gun, and are they Free French? Picture was allegedly taken post D Day...
Think its a Hotchkiss model 1914. Looks like a posed photo as the photographer is more exposed than the gunners.
ReplyDeleteDont look like French helmets I've seen, there seem to be at least 2 different types here. Perhaps Belgian or east European - Czech or Polish either way fighting on the Allied side. The shoulder patches/gaiters might help others more knowledgable to tie it down a bit...
Mervyn - good spot on the helmets - I thought they looked "foreign" too.. before the other comments arrived I was thinking maybe Poles...
DeleteI can't help with identifying the soldiers, but it does look to be an M1914 Hotchkiss Machine Gun.
ReplyDeleteWiki here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotchkiss_M1914_machine_gun
A couple of better photos here: http://world.guns.ru/machine/fr/hotchkiss-m1914-e.html
Peter - definitely - well done.....
DeleteIt appears that all the crew (except the chap actually operating the Hotchkiss who is wearing the older MKII) are wearing Mk III helmet British helmet. Primarily issued to British and Canadian assault troops for the Normandy invasion and refereed to as the 'turtle' helmet - for obvious reasons,
ReplyDeleteMatt - I think you get the virtual pint as prize.. I had no idea there was a Mk III helmet so I did some googling and lo and behold what should I find on the Wiki page for that helmet but this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_British_Army_in_Normandy_1944_B6918.jpg
DeleteThe men are indeed wearing British helmets - possibly the Hotchkiss MG was used by a German unit and has just seen another change of management?
ReplyDeleteTim - think your right... should have known myself really as when the 1914 model was mentioned I remembered this post... http://steve-the-wargamer.blogspot.sk/2013/06/more-interesting-pictures-and-some.html
DeleteI think Young Master Gow has it. I would imagine it was one of the plethora of captured kit Jerry deployed on the Atlantic Wall.
ReplyDeleteCK - absolutely...
DeleteI've seen that picture before and the caption said they were the King's Own Scottish Borderers. That insignia looks like 3rd Infantry Division. Definitely posed though. - that bright insignia looks like a bullet magnet.
ReplyDeleteI think the insignia has been censored - whited out.
DeleteChris - you pipped me to the post... Gary - poor copy of the photo I think, have a look at this one:
Deletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_British_Army_in_Normandy_1944_B6918.jpg
Here's the story: Kings Own Scottish with captured Hotchkiss 1914, triangular unit flashes suggesting 3rd British Infantry. The picture was taken as Caen, after the battle, with a captured gun : http://www.jcs-group.com/military/war1941normandy/guns2.html
ReplyDeleteH van K - you get the second virtual pint!
DeleteThe picture definitely appears in Peter Darman's "Uniforms of WW2", just cannot find my copy but I recall definitely British troops using the Hotchkiss. I tried to recreate it using Airfix multi-pose infantry in my youth. Spectacular failure!
ReplyDeleteMatt - I'd like to have seen it... ! :o)
DeleteDear Steve,
ReplyDeleteThe helmets really are not a poblem. The British army issued some new helmet types prior to D-day and a number of D-day photos demonstrates the two different types in the same unit.
Jerry
A/K/A The Celtic Curmudgeon
"Grumpy is good."
Grumpy - I honestly didn't know - I thought they looked a bit warsaw Pact'like... learnt a lot from this thread!
DeleteHerman nailed it. The machine gun is a Hotchkiss, but what to make of those strangely blank shoulder flashes? Here is the original image, from IWM British Army in Normandy collection
ReplyDeletehttp://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205196113