Good morning i am one of the volunteers, in the Education Center in carlile, i want to talk to today about the american m4 medium tank. It is probably one of the most prolific tanks of the Second World War. This particular example is one of the earlier versions. This one is armed with a 75 millimeter main gum and we move to the commanders weapons station hair it has the caliber 50 machine gun where the commander is and it has to 1919 machine guns. The other gun is mounted here up in front of the tank. This one is manned by the bell gun and he could move that up and down he can show you how it lifts so that am 1919 machine gun is shot through this ball right here this whole. Hes got his ammunition back there and the shell casings as they come out. You could see those. You look at the top of the hatch, right over his right shoulder there, there is a periscope that goes in there. It is just as the name implies, its the periscope that fits up in that space, and inside there, is a land and it has a radical and it. And it uses that radical to fire the machine gun. This is the other end 1919. This is done with the main gun, and this is controlled by the gutter. He has the switch all edgy, in the control station. He could switch to fire the machine gun. He has a similar setup, the gunners periscope is there it comes up from the inside of the turret in the housing. That is how he is looking. One of the things you will notice that, because you are looking through a periscope, the field of vision is limited. So the critical thing for the commander was, when he had to identify the target, hed have to lay that main gun so theyre gonna could see it in his field of vision. The tank commander will announce the engagement, what he does is the preparatory command, he will say gun or the next thing he will do is announce the type of ammunition were going to fire. And in the tank, usually its armor piercing ammunition. And then he will give a target description, armored car, or tank or whatever it might be. While he is doing that, once that gun is lead to where the gutter can pick it up in his site, i mean he could now see the target in his field of vision. Hes defining his and point. He is now taking that shot round, loading it in the main gun, and when he gets that into the main gun, and arms the main gun. In that process, the commander will make an estimation of range. And as soon as he gets it he will announce the range. That was particularly important, because there was no organic range estimate in this tank. So it was an estimate. The gutter will use the appropriate sight for that enemy target. That sounds complicated but actually it would happen between four to six seconds to get around off. So its happening very very quickly. A lot of men were skilled to hone those skills. This one is 75 years old. These days its dramatically different. We have late we have leisure finders. For enemy target. A laser beam of light goes out and back, in micro seconds, and that range is automatically calculated. It goes into the computers. So everything like the range, it factors all that in, and is dramatically different though for the soldiers who are on these tanks during the Second World War. And heres the thing about these vehicles, most of these soldiers in these things were 17 to 20 years old. In fact, guys, like 20 4 25 years old, were sort of old timers. And oldtimers like me would not have been on one of these things. These are four young men, they were the ones it did this. One of the port and important things about the Army Heritage center, its great for people to see, and great to talk about, but the real focus, of the Army Heritage and education is the soldiers. Its the soldiers who served on these vehicles. They were all across europe, they were first deployed in north africa, then went into europe, we have them in the south pacific. Naturally the focal point of this, is to convey the sacrifice that the soldiers had who were in these things. Thats an important part. They are its an interesting backdrop to the whole story. The sherman tank, was one of the two most prolific tanks of the war, in terms of numbers manufacturing. Sherman series were over 49,500 of these tanks manufactured during the Second World War. The only production totals that were bigger than these ones, was the soviet. The soviet union, england, and nationalist chinese, received sherman tanks, so it really was a vehicle that had a strategic effect on the war. Because of the numbers of those that were out there, and the number of allied nations that use them. This tank was infamously reliable. It had an operational rate of about 94 . Meaning was ready 94 of the time. That was as compared to some of the german tanks. Which usually hovered around 50 or 60 . This tank was reliable, this one has the earlier suspension system, what that means is the shock absorbers were vertically. The later suspension system, was a horizontal value, suspension system. Or the age fierce as system. The system was the shock absorbers were not horizontal, hence the difference in the name. More importantly what that equates to us a better firing program. As a tank comes to a stop, you get a lot less role black. As we move around the tank, you will notice all the equipment thats hanging on the outside. The tank has accrual five. By the caliber 50 machine, then you have the tank commander. Seated down inside, youve got the gun or. Who operates and fires the meghan. Also inside the turret, you have to loader. Down here, in the hall you have to, you have the bow gunner, here down the whole. To his left on the outside, you have the driver. You will notice on the outside of the tank, the reason is those five soldiers essentially lived in here. It was important to keep it clear of equipment, its kind of cramped inside, and the more equipment you had inside, it was hard for the soldiers to do the job. So these tanks had all sorts of things on the outside. If you move around to the rear, you take a look at the engine. This particular tank, is powered by a v. Eight engine. It was originally designed as an aircraft engine. There was never number of different engines that were placed in these korean earlier in the war. This is probably one of the most common, throughout the war. Dual carburetors, and it generates about horsepower. Which will move this tank about 35 miles per hour. If we sneak around the back, one of the grill doors is open. Were trying to get a peek inside. Again its a v8, so four cylinders on each side. Again a very very reliable reliable engine. This particular configuration of tank, the engine is in the rear of the tank. It goes the length of the vehicle to the front, and thats where the trends axle was. In a lot of the power plants the engine the axle were mated. But this was attributed to the reliability as they could deal with them separately. The tank had a number of innovations that were unique to the Second World War. One of those, was the hydraulic turret. The turret does have power, it can be traversed manually but it has a power system and it gives us the capability to rotate the target, 360 degrees in 50 seconds. That is very very quick. What that contributes to is the ability, to the crew to target and engage those targets. That was a significant advantage another innovation was something called stabilization they had stabilization in the vertical plane. Which meant you could actually the gun will track up and down as you move. That was innovative. Again so we can compare that tank, to the german tanks. Well this one could slew, 360 degrees and 15 seconds. Where would take the german tanks maybe a minute to do that. It gives the tank a tremendous advantage, to be able to engage targets. Again infamously reliable. This again, one of the earlier versions, you see the armor plates. There are several of them to on the side. One of the port side. In the earlier versions of the tank, this is where the ammunition was stored. In the upper hole hole. We realized, they started adding these armor plates on the tank, as a means to help protect that ammunition. Earlier on, they actually debuted in north africa, and they develop somewhat of a reputation of being death traps because of explosions. A lot of people contributed that to gasoline, but it was ammunition come busting when the whole was breached. Later on the move it from the upper hole, and put it in the lower hole, which they call wet storage tanks. The ammunition in those other versions, are stored in a metal box. Between the walls of those boxes, is a solution of glycerin and water. What that does should a whole be reached in that area, it holds the kinetic area, and the ammunition would no longer combust. That is another interesting point about the sherman tank, it was a continual process in improvement during the Second World War. It was designed in the late 1930s, as the world powers started to see the warfare on a grand scale, and again it was designed in the 1930s late 1930s. And it was designed specifically to go up against the german, main tanks of the day. And it was very effective against those. But as the war evolved, it they came out with the germans came out with a tank and they continue to improve it as well. The later versions, had the 76 millimeter, and it does not sound like much, the capacity for high velocity ammunition, which made a lot more effective. One of the things id also like to point out, about these is, is again the Production Volume how many of these tanker produced. All of the german armor, was just about 49,000. Have the panthers, thanks they were just over 1600, tigers that were made during world war ii. So just over 1600, and in the case of the panther, just over 6600. So collectively, if you compare those numbers, against 49,500 of the specific tank, you start to get an appreciation that this tank had a strategic impact on the war. A lot of the tankers, that were interviewed after the war, one was my uncle, who we spoke to, and when i asked him about this, he said i never saw them, when i talk about the panthers and the other tanks, he said the only ones i saw were blown up near the side of the wall based on the side of the street. So if you are facing that panther tanker tiger tenth tank, with their guns, and a frontal armor, youre not gonna have a good day. But what that gave those tanks, was something called stand off range. They could engage asked before we could engage them. That was the advantage of those thanks so. We had numbers though on our side, and a lot of people will point to the fact that it would take five germans to take on a tiger or panther, but at our lowest level of organization in warfare, it was the tank platoon. Thats the way we employed them and another thing with the speed of this tank and the mover maneuverability, of what a lot of the tankers did in the Second World War, was to maneuver in position of advantage over the panthers and tigers. It was very easy to operate, and all in all, a very capable weapon system. Do you have any stories from your uncle . He had some interesting stories, some of them he was reluctant to talk about. He served through the break out of the normandy campaign. Through the battle of the bulge. I had a number of photos, but he left me. Some of them are fairly interesting. Because there is a picture of his tank, and crew, with for some reason a bass fiddle strapped to the tank. So why somebody felt they had to take a bass fiddle with them, on the side of the tank is interesting. Try to convey some of, that if we walk around the tank here. You will see that we have, we have a case of wine bottles on the back here. Again, talking about soldier life on board these things, the crews lived on these. So whenever they had an opportunity, to get some fresh eggs, or a few bottles of wine, or whatever they would come and grab it, and take it with him. You will see our coffee pots there, and a lot of it was just the crew interaction, and that was really the essence of being a tank crewman during the Second World War. You truly became a family. And all five soldiers, have to Work Together to get this done. And a lot of people dont realize, the importance of the driver in these things. But if we are moving across a terrain, and it comes time for us to engage that target, that driver also has to be sensitive to the fire coming in. What he is doing is bringing that tank to a stop, and his ability to do that, has a lot to do with our firing power at that point. And its a pullback, and break this tank to quickly now that tank is rocking back and forth. They would be keen to the fire command to, and kind of ease into a position, so when we are ready to engage, he will have the most stable platform possible. The bargain are, very important in terms of personal targets. And the enemies personnel. Another thing that was done with this particular gun, we talked about wrenching a little bit, that was an important part of getting steel on target. We can also use this on the range. About gun or, could use his sight to put out four range. That crew really had to have the affinity to Work Together. When these things were, attacked, successful successfully engaged, average loss was one crewman. Every time we had a sherman hit, we would typically lose one crewmen. It would depend a lot on where the sherman was engaged. In most cases, the other three would get out. But in the aggregate, the survival rates for the cruise, was pretty good. A lot has been made, to say that the whole crew would be would go up, there are a lot of cases, where there were a catastrophic kill, where the tank would blow up, then everybody would die. When the tank was engaged by an enemy vehicle, there was one or two crewmen that would be killed in the process. So if you like any photograph, of armored crewmen, during the Second World War, it would be tough to find any two of those soldiers that were in the same tank. There was a lot of variety, i am wearing one of the early sets of cover all. This is one of the early sets. This is a type one cover all. We have a gentleman up top, he is wearing a model 41 jacket and he has a pair of trousers on which has been the basic combat uniform, everything from cover oils to the two peace uniform that was common for more soldiers one of the things we have, this is the armored crew helmets, and if you are familiar with football they were actually designed by rollings and you can see the logo in there and it was really just a crash helmet. It offered no ballistic protection it was a crash helmet to protect your head inside the vehicle. It also included the Communications Gear that the crew would used to communicate inside the tank that we insist of the headsets that you see here in the ear flaps. These cables would plug into communication boxes. There be five of those one for each of the crew positions. That would be the crews capability to talk to one another inside the tank. So they can tell the driver to go left or right, tell the gun or to engage targets or whatever. This wouldve been a common piece of equipment for all crews during the Second World War. There were some other things, that were available depending upon the weather, there was a winter combat uniform, that would consist of a tanker jacket a special tanker jacket. This is a the top for the winter combat uniform they are commonly referred to as tanker jackets. High pockets blanket lining, a lot of crew were issued these, but they were most common among the armored crews. As we move around the side here we have some of the weapons, that they wouldve been having common in the Armored Vehicles. Inside the Armored Vehicles there were some machine guns that the crews were armed with if they ever had to get off the tank and set up an observation post or listening post. This is the and three submission gun. It was a 45 caliber machine gun as you can tell by the look of it its very easy to mass produce these things. Essentially it was a series of tubes. 45 caliber it shot the same as our pistols. Each of the armor crewmen wouldve had one of these. Again both this and the and three a one would fire the same ammunition. Of course hundreds and a lot of the stuff the ammunition a lot of the stuff in the amphitheater was common with cruz. We can take a look at some of the other equipment we have. And you will see an array of tools, what a lot of folks dont realize is that the tank crews spent more time maintaining these things than they did fighting on them. Obviously just by the very nature the required a lot of maintenance among the things that we will check on, a routine basis was track tension. Track tension does a couple of things for you it is cyst with maneuverability but most importantly it what it is what keeps the track on the wheels here. So your track tension if its not right you run the risk of throwing track. So the maintenance piece with a part of it. All the moving parts on this thing had to be grease routinely. It had for fuel tanks in it to an either side to on port side to on the starboard side you would get a cruising range about 265 miles. And today we dont hear miles per gallon but this is this tank will run about a mile on each gallon of fuel so it had a range of about 250 miles as these things were reef fueled it was not uncommon to have an entire battalion pull over on the side of the road budget and have a whole fleet of trucks which would transfer the fuel onto the tank. Pretty common display. The unit that we represent is the 68 tank battalion during the Second World War a. Couple of our members are veteran tankers including myself. So we got into the practice of trying to bring as we researched our unit history and realized it was a 68 tank patel ian. So this battalion on the side was actually the mascot during the Second World War and he comes from the walt disney cartoon the tortoise and the hair. He was modified they put the tank crew helmet the goggles the boxing gloves. He was the italians mascot throughout the war. There is ample photographic evidence that shows toe be displayed on italian tanks throughout the war. That would have been on the tanks the field phones, and what we are representing here is a tank in an Assembly Area or what might be the circle where we circle the wagons and service are Weapons Service the tank and it would generally be common to wire the tanks one to another so they can communicate over secure means. So they would typically have these linked tank to tank. They have an amazing depository, of combat as action reviews, and data and there is a wealth of information that has been public about armored wa