AEC Mk I icon 617

[Charles M]

The photo is wrong - it is of the Mk I prototype. A better photo of the true Mk I can be found in Bellona Print # 16, Bracknell 1968.

Suggested commentary: These white elephants were the result of Winston Churchill's personal intervention after seeing a prototype that gate-crashed a parade. A post-war report stated that the Mk I "never played an important part in the struggle"* and "hardly ever went into action"*. Their main use was to pull stranded vehicles out of soft sand (Fletcher, Universal Tank, p. 6). They were not used in action until April 1943, and were found to be too conspicuous, under-powered and tiring and difficult to drive.* 122 were built with the Valentine tank turret.

* Lt. Col. F.W.S. Gordon-Hall, Armoured Fighting Vehicles in the Mediterranean Theatre 1939-1945 for Military College of Science, January 1946, courtesy of Bovington Tank Museum, pp. 79-80 and 83.