C15TA information
I found this information that formed the subject of an article in HERITAGE COMMERCIALS magazine:
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The military vehicle contribution that Canada made to the allied war effort is not that widely appreciated, but it is pleasing to note the enthusiastic reception that this short series of articles has had over the past couple of months. Letters and e-mails have come from all over the world, and quite a few have asked if we had any Canadian Military Pattern (CMP) armoured cars or armoured trucks in the Pearson photograph collection – the answer is not many, but those that we do have actually show two of the ‘prototype’ Completely Knocked Down (CKD) vehicles that were sent to Liverpool for assembly at the end of 1943. As far as we know just 150 CKD kits were built up at Liverpool and Chorley in 1944, and 100 at Rutherglen, whilst the rest of the order for the British Ministry of Supply was supplied as fully assembled vehicles, the receiving ports for these being Newport, South Wales and Liverpool.
The Canadian build can be briefly summarised as the Lynx Scout Car I and 2 (a version of the Dingo built by Ford of Canada), Fox Armoured Car (by GM Canada) the Otter Armoured Car (by GM Canada), and the C15TA Armoured Truck (by GM Canada). Note that the Chevrolet-builtTE17E1 and E2 “Staghound” whilst used by the British and Canadian forces were built by Chevrolet’s Flint, Michigan Plant and had nothing to do with CMPs. There were also a few Armoured Ambulance versions of the C15AA (one of which is preserved in the Canadian War Museum) and the CAPLAD by Ford and GM of Canada. Of these, probably the most famous was the Fox Armoured Car, which was made by General Motors (Chevrolet) of Canada. The Fox was really a marriage of convenience, achieved by utilising the British Humber MkIII armoured car hull design on the CMP Model 8446 rear-engined 4x4 armoured car chassis. Interestingly the same chassis was also used as the basis for the Australian Rhino heavy armoured car. The 45mph Humber 4x4 armoured cars car were very successful, especially after they were fitted with a 15mm gun and a co-axial machine gun. It was used throughout the war from 1941 onwards, and it remained in active military service for over two-decades - especially in the Far East. As an aside, I ought to mention that the Daimler armoured car (fitted with a two-pounder anti tank gun and two machine guns) was probably the most successful British armoured car of the war. The Fox was, by contrast only armed with a .50 and .30 calibre machine gun in a hand-cranked turret. The sole British order was to S/M 1077, and a total of 1,506 were built.
Although its war service was limited, the Royal Netherlands Army obtained 39 Foxes from the vehicle dump at Deelen in October 1946 and fitted 34 of them with a Humber turret for action in Indonesia. These became known as the Humfox armoured cars, and it is probable that several were handed over to the Indonesian Army after independence was granted! Out of a production total of only 1,506 Fox Armoured Cars, just a few are known to survive today.
Slightly more Otters (1,761) were manufactured (predominantly by GM) from 1942 to 1945, and they were all based on the Chevrolet C15A 4x4 chassis with the US-built front-mounted GM 270 cubic inch engine. Technically it was classed as a "Car, Light, Reconnaissance”, and armed only with a .303" Bren gun and a 4" smoke discharger. It also carried either a No.19 wireless set or a Boys Anti Tank Rifle, but rarely both The Otter was Canada's first attempt to manufacture a mass-produced armoured fighting vehicle, but its six-cylinder engine was a bit underpowered for the wieghty body produced by the Hamilton Bridge Company'. Nevertheless the Otter was a practical AFV crewed by the driver and commander up front and a gunner in a roof-mounted turret. The sole British order was S/M 2424.
Overall, the Otter was a successful vehicle which served with the Canadian Army in Italy and France both in it's reconnaissance role and for anti aircraft defence of road convoys. Post-war, the Otter was used by the Arab Legion against the new state of Israel. A derivative of the Otter, initially designated the C15TA-ARMD-1 was the basis for the subject of this article, the C15TA 4x4 armoured truck, which was designed in 1943 as the GM Model 8449. In the two years that followed (1944 and 1945), around 4,000 C15TA-ARMD-1 (for C.15 [15-cwt.] Truck, Armoured, Armoured Personnel Transport) were built albeit with the GMC 270 cubic inch engine as against the Chevrolet 216. This Armoured Personnel Carrier (APC) was an interesting development of the Otter (AFV) and could seat up to six personnel in the body of the vehicle in addition to the driver and commander at the front – this is well illustrated in one of the accompanying photographs. The APC was used extensively by the Canadian and British Armies, both of whom also had General Service and ambulance versions of the CT15A. As for the Canadian forces, it is reported that every Infantry Regiment got at least one C15TA for use as a command vehicle.
David Hayward notes; - ‘The British orders were to Supply Mechanical [S/M] 2611, as 'TRUCK 15 CWT. 4 X 4 PERSONNEL' and were ordered in early 1943 thus carried 1943 Model Numbers although actually built well into 1944. E.g. C15TA serial number 3844931561 ENGINE # 270 51,129 was built 8th January 1943 but C.15TA HULL # 731, serial number 384491734 ENGINE # 270 396,699 to S/M 2611 was built on 24th April 1944, both in Oshawa, Ontario. British census numbers were Z6192962 to Z6193965 and Z6263122 to Z6263827, although these were for deliveries to the British Isles and there may have been other contracts and locally applied census numbers if delivered say to the Mid-East although this seems unlikely.’
As far as I can ascertain, there were two orders for the Ministry of Supply, the first for 250 CKD units, followed by 1,500 r-t-r units. I am not sure if the three prototype CKD kits were included in these figures. We believe that about 42 were lost in transit due to U-boat action, with just over 1,700 entering service. In reality, the C15TA arrived too late for the Normandy offensive, and appreciable numbers only began arriving in the UK after the summer of 1944. Many were transhipped directly to ports in Europe, and the plans to build up the CKD kits at Liverpool and Chorley were therefore dropped. Shortage of armoured plate in Britain would have been another problem, so other than the initial 250 chassis / body kits shipped, it seems unlikely that any others were built here.
The two prototypes erected at Liverpool were a standard APC and a Wireless Car APC, both had fully armoured front ends, and armour extending halfway up the truck body. Two others were planned; a fully armoured body (van) and a soft-top armoured body, both of which would have the armour up the full side of the vehicle, but the latter would only have a canvas roof. It is noted that there were concerns about the availability of steel, and the overall weight this would impose on the chassis. I believe that chassis were made available for the purpose, but can see no record of their being completed. Of the two prototypes, the accompanying pictures clearly show the difference in the soft-top canvas back, the standard C15TA-ARMD-1 has a solid canvas cover, whilst the C15TA-ARMD-1WT has a two-piece canvas cover with ‘windows’. The latter allowed the back portion of the body to be open, whilst the front end provided a cover for the commander, driver and wireless operator. We know that fully armoured versions were built in Canada, including several C15AA Armoured Ambulance versions, which were ideal for evacuating wounded personnel in a front-line battle situation.
After the war the C15TA remained in service with the British and Canadian armies, though in Britain they progressively became allocated to reserve fleets and Territorial Units, some replaced the CMP FAT (field gun tractors discussed in the January issue of this magazine) and were paired with 17-pounder anti-tank guns. The British army used them during the in the Middle East up to around the time of the Suez Crisis, but we know that some were in service with The Green Howards Regiment in the late 1950s. However, it seems most of the British C15TAs either ended up in the areas where the British Army had been most active, or in dumps in the Netherlands or Belgium after the fall of Germany. From these dumps, the reconstituted armies of Holland, Belgium, Denmark and Norway were all supplied with substantial quantities. Some of these lasted in service with their respective countries until the early 1960s. Holland’s Royal Netherlands Army at one time had approaching l400 C15TAs, and in 1959 no less than 133 were still on the books. Like the Fox armoured car, the C15TA was shipped to Royal Netherlands East Indies Army in Indonesia where they were used for reconnaissance and infantry support duties. Some, like the British examples mentioned earlier, were used as a Field Artillery Tractor with 25-pounder field guns. Once Indonesia became independent, many of the Dutch C15TAs were handed over and the new government who eventually had the sides built up to the level of the cab and used them as police riot control vehicles. Of those that remained in Holland, many of the C15TAs ended up as ‘targets’ on the firing ranges. Incredibly a number (around six or eight) lasted at Amersfoort training base until 1989 but they were finally cut up and sold to the Hoogovens steel company for smelting. Denmark also began its purchases in 1946, and Norway in late 1947 or early 1947, but little is known of these thereafter. Many of the Australian survivors went back to war in the Korean conflict
Out of the ex-British C15TAs, a large number were left behind in the ‘Empire’ countries when they gained independence, as was the case when Britain’s Mandate expired in the Middle East. Both Israel and Egypt ended up with these old Canadian warhorses, although the Israelis made their APC into armoured cars with eight-sided turrets. In Malaya, one of the ex-British C15TAs was pictured taking part in the independence celebrations in Kuala Lumpur on 4th September 1957. In fact the C15TAs provided armoured protection for personnel, troops, VIPs, etc., during the communist armed revolt between 1948 and 1960. Many of these were transferred to the Royal Malaysian Police and painted dark blue. Later, hundreds of C15TAs were used by the Federation of Malaya Police from 1951 onwards, for patrol and escort duties, but most had some structural modifications like extended side armour. # Z5822762 was the pilot ARMOURED AMBULANCE C15AA, now preserved, ENGINE # 270 363149, and was allocated the post-war registration 43XB01. She was finally sold off at Ruddington in May 1958 after a very long career with the British Army.
It might sound odd, but the C15TA was also turned out to be a veteran of the Vietnam War, due to the fact that British troops moved into the southern portion until French troops became available to occupy Indochina in 1946. Naturally, the British took with them their own vehicles, including Bren Carriers, Lynx Scout Cars, Indian-pattern FATs and C15TAs. When these troops were replaced, much of their ‘dated’ equipment was handed over to the French. In due course, when the French pulled out of Indochina, many of these vehicles were handed over to the Army of the Republic of Vietnam. The soft tops of the British / Canadian APCs were not suitable for protection against snipers in the jungle areas, so full side armour was added at a workshops in Saigon in an attempt to improve crew protection. By the time America entered the fray, much of this older equipment was used for convoy escort, support duties or relegated for use by the South Vietnam Regional & Provincial Forces (territorials). Thus the C15TA completed over a quarter of a century of military service in almost every major theatre at war, and yet it remains a very little discussed vehicle. Fortunately the discovery of the Pearson photographs has stimulated new interest, and at a later stage I will come back and tell you more about other CMP vehicles in the collection.
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My query is over the two apparent types of C15TA, which I had no idea about previously! The British assembled truck appears to differ from the Canadian order one. This is the description next to the photo:
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Here we have a view of one of the C15TAs at the Chevrolet plant in Canada, note that the side armour around the troop compartment only extends to the tarpaulin, presumably to save weight. Also witness that the wheels are different to the British example shown previously
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Last edited by David_Hayward (RIP); 12-07-04 at 18:52.
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12-07-04, 18:43
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