Ist Airborne Brigade Uniforms?

[Dubar1]

Did the British 1st Airborne Brigade (or any Brit paras) wear summer type uniforms in Sicily?

 

[drummerboy]

I would kit the trooper out with KD shirt and pants. Put the first pattern jump smock with knitted cuffs on for the pre jump and immediate post jump phases as the smock was certainly uncomfortable in Sicily's hot climate. The KD's from recent Norman White figure will do with a bit of weathering and so on. I would also make sure that the webbing has the raw color as no blancoing was nessecary in the dusty terrain.

 

[Kev Longino]

Unfortunately there are'nt many pictures of British airborne from the Tunisian and Sicilian arenas but I do have these pics which might help.

 

[Dubar1]

OK, tell me what I'm looking at (I know nothing about British uniforms... my mom would kill me being from Wales!).

In one of the pictures it looks like they're wearing the darker battle dress (?) uniform and in another picture some of the troopers have the lighter KD (?) uniform.

Thanks guys!

Bob

 

[cablecommander]

Dubar1,
You made remember that I had a fiugre from the Sicilian campaign, Air landing Brigade.

I based mine off of the figure in "Khaki Drill and Jungle Green"book, pg 54 to 57.

He has a KD shirt, Norman white KD jacket over that, regular BD trousers, regular web gear and boots, 2nd model jump helmet, Enfield no.4 w/spike bayonet. You can give him a Denison smock if you want to, but the KD jacket is fine. with the smock I used a bergen rucksack also.

I need to re-do this figure as a lot of the stuff that I used was old stuff.

hope this helps,
CC

 

[Dubar1]

Thanks CC

Between here and the One Sixth Scale U.k. forum I think I'm on the right track.

I may try a pair of Hasbro Australian KD shorts if I can find a shirt that'll go. All the Brit stuff at the online vendors seems to disappear quickly

 

[Tuche]

For the helmet, the BBi (R Cooke) it the good one (DMLs ones are later models).

a KD shirt is good, and the others things should be like the one for normal brit paratropper.

For the Dension try to buy the R cooke one, it's the best one.


And go to see the Brave-rifles figure about a Glider in Sicily. It will help you (but the helmet is not the good one)

 

[Dubar1]

Thanks Tuche! Brave Rifles did a fine job on that figure.

I've gotten a lot of info between here and the One Sixth Scale U.K. forum, but some of it conflicts so I need to do more research. I have a feeling that what I end up with will be a cobbled together figure and not your regular store bought figure by any stretch.

I've been wanting to do 2 paras, one German, the other British, from the Primosole Bridge engagement south of Catania Sicily 1943. I even found a picture of the actual bridge thanks to one of the blokes on the OSS.

A lot of the data points towards wearing shorts, but I just can't imagine a paratrooper jumping in them too many chances to scrape and cut parts you don't want scraped and cut

Any more help would be great

 

[Tuche]

Sorry but all the few documents i have, for the AB troops in Sicily, are on the the Border Rgt (glider troops) during the assault against Ponte Grande bridge on the south of Syracuse.
But no pics, only reenactements in the Brayley & Ingram book on the KD jungle unifomrs.

 

[Kev Longino]

Sorry - meant to add this earlier but forgot. The pics I posted above are from the preparations for Operation Husky. They appear to show guys getting ready to drop wearing only KDs under their harness ( which surprised me as even in hot climates it can be cold in the aircraft and during the actual drop), whilst the glider borne troops seem to have a mix of KD and BD uniforms, and some also appear to have their Denisons on.
It's also difficult to be sure but it looks as if one of the guys in harness is sporting a certain "sandy" coloured beret.

 

[Dubar1]

Kev,
I downloaded that picture and enlarged it to see if I could make out a few things.

Question, It looks like they're wearing the KD uniform (long pants) but are they wearing just a long sleeved shirt or is that a KD jacket with the sleeves rolled up?

Also, it looks like some of them are wearing boots and socks without gaiters (the only one I can definately tell is wearing gaiters is the guy in shorts )

Could that be the wraps instead of just socks?

 

[Kev Longino]

I enlarged the shots too! It is difficult to tell because of the chute , to my eye the only one who looks as if he may be wearing a jacket is the guy in the sand coloured beret, the rest appear to have shirts and these seem to be tucked into the trousers. The guy in the sand beret is also wearing puttees instead of gaiters I think, I agree the guy in shorts is wearing gaiters, others may be wearing puttees or simply have their trouser legs tucked into socks.
All the shots create an image of a unit that has not yet been issued full tropical uniform or where the troops have discretion as to what they wear.

 

[Dubar1]

LOL!!! that's good for us I guess. Now I have the freedom to just about do as I please kitting this guy out

 

[Dubar1]

I've been perusing the other posts on British airborne and Brave Rifles had a couple of links in one of his posts.

In one link I found a picture of some glider riders wearing KD shorts and shirt. The various posts seem to have come to the conclusion that the glidermen wore shorts and the guys jumping wore the KD or BD uniforms so I STILL have to narrow that down.

Who would have been in the gliders? 1st paras or someone else???

 

[Kev Longino]

A very quick search shows that the elements of British airborne forces involved in Husky were...
British 1st Airlanding Brigade
British 1st Parachute Brigade
1st Airlanding Light Regiment, Royal Artillery
Number 2 Special Air Service Paratroop Battalion
( I guess the latter could account for the sand berets lol)
Glider troops will be the Airlanding, tropps such as the Border Regiment and the Ox & Bucks were retrained as airlanding and I have a funny feeling the Borders were involved in Husky.

 

[drummerboy]

The 1 SAS was temporarily designated the SRS or Special Raiding Squadron during the Sicilian campaign. 2 SAS also participated and that confirms as Kev pointed out the reason for the Sand Beret. The beret was changed to Red when the unit was formed into Brigade status prior to the Normandy landings and was amalgamated into the airborne forces. Their mission was Operation Chesnut which entalied the destruction of key enemy installations along the coast of Moro Si Porco outside Syracuse and communication and supply disruption further inland.

The Airlanding Brigade (Operation Ladbroke) was sent in to capture the Ponte Grande Bridge and did so without resistence in the intial phase. The Parachute Brigade's objective Operation Fustian was the Primosole Brigde over the Simeto River near Mt. Etna.

It really depends on the unit and at what point in the battle you want to portray this fellow. The paratroopers who engaged the the 1st Fallschirmjager Division - 4th Fallschirmjager Brigade, the only direct encounter between British and German paratroopers of the war, were from the Parachute Regiment. If you wish to have the chap right after or during the engagment, i would suuggest either KD or BD jackets and jump trousers or KD trousers. The fighting was hand to hand and the British only had a handfull of men reach the bridge (290) due to the horrific losses at sea from the friendly fire. You shouldn't depict the man in a victorious mood since the battle was intense and the British had to withdrawl to the south bank of the river.
I would make the trooper part of the 2nd Btn under Lt. Col. Frost.

The Borders were part of the 1st Airlanding Brigade and so were the South Stafforshires and Kings Own Scottish Borders.

 

[Dubar1]

Thanks guys Between this forum, the OSS, and the wwii reenacting forums, I'm finding out a lot of info on the Brit paras. By the time I get enough facts maybe one of the manufacturers will have come out with exactly what I need

 

[Dubar1]

I'm still digging for information on this engagement. I have found 3 pictures of the bridge. My plan is to do a small diorama with a German para and Brit para in hand-to-hand fighting on the bridge. I think a small portion of the bridge lattice work is in the works:

 

[woodlander]

The Airlanding Brigade (Operation Ladbroke) was sent in to capture the Ponte Grande Bridge and did so without resistence in the intial phase. The Parachute Brigade's objective Operation Fustian was the Primosole Brigde over the Simeto River near Mt. Etna.

Just to add, the planning for Fustian (Primosole Bridge) included an Airlanding glider-borne contingent in 11 Horsas and 8 Wacos (Hadrians, in Brit terminology) which were to take in anti-tank guns and jeeps. I think only 10 of the Horsas actually took off and not all made it; from p.65 of "The History of the Glider Pilot Regiment" by Claude Smith:

Only four Horsas on Operation Fustian had landed their 6-pounder guns close to the Primasole Bridge, and only two of these landed on the correct LZ south-west of the bridge...... The one redeeming factor in the almost catastophic glider participation in the [Fustian] landing was that members of the [Glider Pilot] Regiment proved their undoubted ability to take on the role of the 'total soldier' once on the ground. Some operated anti-tank guns and others made good use of a captured German 88mm gun during the defence of the captured Primasole Bridge.

I think I'm right in saying that the reference to Fustian being a parachute operation is because it was tasked to a parachute brigade though it is important to remember that such tasking did not prohibit the attachment and inclusion of airlanding troops (in this case in a anti-tank role). It's off-topic but the later Pegasus Bridge *coup-de-main* operation in Normandy is an example of where this can still get emotive - it often being referred to a parachute operation (which, technically, it was) when the early fighting and capture was conducted by attached airlanding troops.

The nub of my point is that Dubar's airborne soldier ar Primosole could be either paratroop or airlanding (which I think is where Dubar started! LOL ) albeit I fully concur that a para characterization would be more representative.

 

[Dubar1]

Thanks guys for all the support

Here's a "map" of the area around the bridge:

I've found that I have to search on a number of topics to get the info I want:

PrimOsole Bridge

PrimAsole Bridge

Simeto River

Catania

Sicily 1943

Operation Husky

and now another Operation Fustian

Plus all the participants of the fight, although I've found very little from the German and Italian points of view. I have enough to cobble together the figures, but I want to know more about the battle and I've only seen one book mentioned that goes into depth about it.