Kelly's Heroes

[Scammell4199]

Was watching Kelly's Heroes last night.....again, and was wondering if anyone knows what happened to the tanks in it?

 

Richard

[IUTA009]

Was watching Kelly's Heroes last night.....again, and was wondering if anyone knows what happened to the tanks in it?

 

Richard

 

Yeah, two got blown up in the town and Oddball took the other one to Switzerland :-)

 

I read somewhere years ago that all the "Tigery" bits were plywood and chicken wire, etc so may not have survived as long as the T-34 underpinnings.

[Scammell4199]

Doubt he made it as far as Switzerland with the fuel system leaking everywhere, ha. I was thinking more about the shermans, there's a lot of them in one shot when all the lads are sat at the side of the road the morning after the opening scene.

[IUTA009]

"Doubt he made it as far as Switzerland with the fuel system leaking everywhere, ha."

 

There you go with them negative waves, Moriarity....

 

Dunno about the US stuff, it was filmed in Poland so maybe there was still a lot of kit about.

[Adrian Barrell]

I thought it was filmed in Yugoslavia. The Shermans were Yugo Army vehicles, probably still in service at that time and presumably returned after filming. Probably still there or cut up as a result of peace talks.

[IUTA009]

My mistake :-)

[ajmac]

I thought it was filmed in Yugoslavia. The Shermans were Yugo Army vehicles, probably still in service at that time and presumably returned after filming. Probably still there or cut up as a result of peace talks.

It has always surprised me that when the M36's and M18's were brought out of one of the ex-Yugoslavian states ten to fifteen years ago that no Shermans came with them, one would have thought that the state had more Shermans than M36s and M18s. Perhaps they were pensioned off before the others and are on the ranges or as monuments.

[Scammell4199]

Knew Adrian would have a good answer.

 

Good point Alastair. It was Bob Grundy who brought most of those M36s and M18s out wasn't it?

[Adrian Barrell]

Wrong Bob...... Bob Fleming was the man, Shermans would have featured along with much else but you can't save everything.

[ajmac]

True Adrian, I recall seeing an item on the news at the time which showed rows of T34s which had had the final drives gas axed from the back, said chunks were on the floor where they had fallen.

 

PS. I had lunch a couple of months ago with a chap who does what Bob F does (or did) but in a different market segment, a real eye opener.

Edited April 9, 2015 by ajmac

[Tony B]

Mutual Arms Reduction treatys. CFE requires all Main battle tanks regardless of age to be 'Put beyond Use' under witness. Was always considered a good job, plenty of booze and hospitatlity with a lot of expensive bangs thrown in.

[AlienFTM]

Yeah, two got blown up in the town and Oddball took the other one to Switzerland :-)

 

I read somewhere years ago that all the "Tigery" bits were plywood and chicken wire, etc so may not have survived as long as the T-34 underpinnings.

When Tiger 131 was still a project at Bovy (either just before or just after they fired up the engine, put it under load and put a conrod through it) I remember visiting and seeing a bloke in overalls inside 131, while next to it was a "T34 Tiger" which Bovy attributed to Kelly's Heroes.

 

Real metal, looked good close up, apart from being fundamentally wrong and too small. I remember looking in through the driver's vision port and seeing the T34 glacis hatch behind.

[Griffo]

Wasn't the bovy t34 tiger out of saving private Ryan :cool2:

 

Dave

[AlienFTM]

Wasn't the bovy t34 tiger out of saving private Ryan :cool2:

 

Dave

You may very well be right, though I had the distinct impression it was the same conversion.

 

Oh I don't know. I blame it on getting old.

[PanzerJohn]

 

One of my most favourite films ever...

[draganm]

I'm pretty sure the M18's came out of Bosnia, but Yugoslavia was a big place, much bigger than just Bosnia. So the Dayton peace accord and whatever arms reduction MBT cutting-up treaties they signed, would not have applied to Serbia, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, or Slovenia. The Shermans are still there, some were on ranges and are shot up, but most are just sitting in storage area's. I've done many searches on the net and come up with pics from all over Serbia of shermans, M10's, M18's, old T34-85's, even some ISU -122's and such . A lot were sitting on military bases.

Like this one, which really bugs me, an ultra rare Sdkfz. 251 with Pak 40 cannon rotting out in the weather at a base in Banja Luka, which is the Serbian portion of Bosnia.

 

the video is old though, since they say the half-track would take 30K German Marks to "restore" and it's worth 200K Marks. Obviously the episode was filmed before Eurofication.

the country is broke, so you could go there and buy some of this stuff , especially the Shermans. Trouble would be getting the right people to sign off on it so you wouldn't get "detained" at a border. I still have my citizenship, and often daydream of going there and rescuing some WW2 vehicles, might even be able to make some contacts with the serb army thru the net, but I hate to travel, and I would hate even more to be arrested as an "American spy"

[draganm]

from the Sherman registry

 

http://web.inter.nl.net/users/spoelstra/g104/yu.htm

 

During the 1950s Yugoslavia was supplied with both WW2 surplus and new military equipment from the United States for use by the Yugoslav armed forces.

Of the 3,000 US trucks provided between 1952 and 1958 the majority were GMC CCKW-352 and -353 trucks (these were later fitted with local bodywork). Armour included examples of the M8 Greyhound Armoured Car, M3 Half-Track, White M3A1 Scout Car, M3A3/M3A5 Stuart Light Tank, M18 Hellcat 76 mm and M36-series 'Jackson' 90 mm Gun Motor Carriages and the M7/M7B2 Priest 105 mm Howitzer Motor Carriage. Furthermore, 630 Sherman M4-series (including M32, M32B1 and M74 Tank Recovery Vehicles) and 300 M47 Patton Medium Tanks were supplied. Other vehicles included IHC M5 13-ton and M4 18-ton High-Speed Tractors, and Pacific M26 armoured tank transporters.

In due course it was superseded by Soviet and indigenous material. Although it was thought that by the late 1980s the WW- II era equipment had been taken out of service, many of them could be seen on television and in newspapers when the Yugoslav conflict raged in the early 1990s.

As far as can be ascertained, the Shermans of the Yugoslav Army were all M4A3-E4 76MM Shermans, remanufactured and retrofitted with 76 mm guns in the M34A1 gun mount. These long guns in the standard Sherman turret gave rise to the rumour that the Yugoslav Army was equipped with Sherman Fireflies.

In 1970 the film "Kelly's Heroes" was shot in Yugoslavia. Besides other Shermans and T34s (convincingly dressed up as Tiger tanks) several M4A3(75)W Shermans retrofitted with 76 mm guns were used in the making of this film. Contrary to the tank destroyers, no Sherman tanks were seen in action in the Yugoslav conflict. However, many survive as memorials in towns and army bases all around former Yugoslavia.

The picture on the left shows a Sherman on the small arms range of the VJ barracks just west of Pristina, Kosovo.

[draganm]

here you go.Shermans, hellcats, Stuarts up the wazoo. Even a 20mm rocket launcher on IFV : )

 

http://s106.photobucket.com/user/nammeci/library/Muzej%20Kozara?sort=3&page=1