Starmer's Armour British & Canadian M4 Shermans in Europe 1943-45

by Peter Brown

This sheet will be welcomed by small-scale vehicle modellers looking for British and Canadian subjects. Clearly printed by Fantasy Printshop, it has all the markings needed for 14 specific vehicles. All items are provided, vehicle serials, names, cartoon logos, unit and tactical signs and even air recognition white stars and roundels. Each item is on its own small piece of decal film which makes selecting the items needed easier and they are numbered for easy identification. The RAF-type roundel for one option comes as three separate parts for even better definition, with the yellow outer ring having a white centre which is a neat trick to cover over the dark vehicle colour.

Colour illustrations show where each item goes, this covers two A4-sized pages and a separate notes page gives background as to where the vehicle was located and the references used to provide the markings. Note that these are not intended to be detailed scale plans nor accurate colour matches, for modelling purposes other references should be consulted.

Most are with British units in the UK before crossing over on D Day, or in France, Holland or Germany:
"Balaclava", "Charmer" and "Conquest" of 13th/18th Hussars June 1944
"Armageddon" 24th Lancers June 1944
"Snow White" HQ 5th Guards Armoured Brigade late 1944
"Monck" Coldstream Guards late 1944
"Ardnacrush" Irish Guards 1944
c/s 66 and 65 144 RAC August 1944
Firefly "Belvedere" 2nd Fife & Forfar Yeomanry June/July 1944
Firefly "Velikuye Luki" 1st Northamptonshire Yeomanry August 1944

There are also three Canadian examples in Italy:
"Champlain" and "Challenger" 12 Canadian Armoured Regiment (Three Rivers Regiment) late 1943 and their tank "Cyclops" used in Italy and later in Holland and Germany 1944-45

These are all based on photos in books or magazine articles. Some are well known, "Velikuye Luki" for example is the tank which knocked out three Tigers with three shots at St Aignan le Crasmenil. "Cyclops" is very unusual as according to accounts it combined an M4A1 Sherman II hull with a 105mm turret.

Although designed to be applied to specific subjects, many items could be used for other vehicles.

Price is £8.00 plus 50p postage in the UK which is good value at around 50p per subject.

Available direct from Mike Starmer, 18 Hillside Road, Piddington, Northants, NN7 2DB. Email him at mike_starmer@hotmail.com for more details and overseas prices.