How many GIs can you get in a Priest?

[womble]

Chose a M7B1 Priest as my HE chucker for the first time... thought to look at the splendid internal detail, and was astonished to see how tight-packed the crew were in the fighting compartment. My Google-fu (fairly cursory, admitted) only found sources confirming the '7-man crew', but I can't help but wonder how they manage to avoid getting in each others' way, or what the apparently supernumerary 2 or 3 loaders would actually do during the time the gun was being served. Did they work in relays? Those 105mm shells are heavy, I guess...

[Renaud]

Apparently a full marine squad (12-13) could be crammed into 'defrocked priests' (main gun remove) used in the pacific.

The extra loaders would be handy to perform all the ammo lugging/sorting/arranging/fusing, before and during battle. I'm not sure that all 7 would actually be inside the M7 at once...the most i've seen inside the vehicle in photos of the M7 in a firing position is 5.

[gunnergoz]

The Priest was primarily a form of mobile artillery, used in the indirect role and in direct fire fairly rarely. It needed a large crew in part because someone had to set fuzes and run back and forth for more ammo from the caisson trailer...onboard ammo was used only as a last resort from what I've read.

I've never heard of priests being used to carry marines in the Pacific. Actually, I don't think many M7's reached the Pacific...one or two battalions at most, if that many. Mostly they were allocated to the armored divisions (which were all in the ETO) and some to army/corps artillery.

The only "defrocked priests" I've heard of were used by the Brits and perhaps some by Canadians in the ETO. The Brits had at least 90 of them surplus after the N African campaign since they did not want to use the 105 howitzer (preferring their own 25 pdr and mounting some of them into what became the Sexton, sort of like an M7 but based upon a Canadian Ram chassis, which in turn was the Canadian version of the M4 tank.) I suspect a lot of those redundant, gunless priests were later turned into infantry carriers as were most of the Ram tanks.

Given my drothers, for direct fire I'd select a Sherman 105 - better armor, enclosed turret, etc.

[Sergei]

M3 Lee also had a 7 man crew - and this was a closed top tank, so it was even more cramped than Priest.

[womble]

Apparently a full marine squad (12-13) could be crammed into 'defrocked priests' (main gun remove) used in the pacific.

I read 20! Sardinesville...

The extra loaders would be handy to perform all the ammo lugging/sorting/arranging/fusing, before and during battle. I'm not sure that all 7 would actually be inside the M7 at once...the most i've seen inside the vehicle in photos of the M7 in a firing position is 5.

The Priest was primarily a form of mobile artillery, used in the indirect role and in direct fire fairly rarely. It needed a large crew in part because someone had to set fuzes and run back and forth for more ammo from the caisson trailer...onboard ammo was used only as a last resort from what I've read.

That was what I was thinking was probably the case. It's also said in the Wikipedia article (I know, but why would they lie?) that a large proportion of the ammo storage was under the floor plates.

So, is there a case for adjusting the crew of the on-map DF-duty M7xx?

I've never heard of priests being used to carry marines in the Pacific.

Here's where I saw it...

http://www.militaryfactory.com/armor/detail.asp?armor_id=109

Not a primary reference, admittedly.

Given my drothers, for direct fire I'd select a Sherman 105 - better armor, enclosed turret, etc.

Oh, for sure. Rarity, it's a bitch. Especially in a small battle. I'd rather have a Sherman 76 and a Priest than a 105 Sherman and an M10, when I might be up against a Panther. I should soon be seeing how valid this preference is, cos if I can't get a favourable result with the '76 working with 2 '75s (now I've found the Panther, and enough Infantry to know he's not got 2...), it'll be down to the 'zooks...

[pagskier]

a sherman or a M10 won`t do much diff. with a high velocity 75mm shell.

But a open top infantry vehicule is much more vulnerable than close top 105 sherman to small arm fire.

Also M10 should have a higher ROF than sherm. 76. So more chances to ambush and succeding killing that panther...

So a 105 sherman + a M10 sounds better to me

Priest were use in italy as infantry vehicule 1st. With great result!

[gunnersman]

Must...resist...pedophile...jokes...

[Battlefront.com]

105mm shells are heavy. To keep up a decent RoF you need more loaders simply because of exhaustion. Plus, someone has to set the fuzes, which if firing on-the-fly could not be done ahead of time.

Steve

[MG TOW]

Priests make a great catcher's mitt for on map mortar rounds. When they catch one there is a big secondary. Sometimes it will bring a building down if next to one.

[womble]

a sherman or a M10 won`t do much diff. with a high velocity 75mm shell.

But a open top infantry vehicule is much more vulnerable than close top 105 sherman to small arm fire.

Also M10 should have a higher ROF than sherm. 76. So more chances to ambush and succeding killing that panther...

So a 105 sherman + a M10 sounds better to me

Priest were use in italy as infantry vehicule 1st. With great result!

There are swings, and there are roundabouts. Your open top M10 is also more vulnerable to small arms, and if that goes, so does your best AT weapon. If I lose the Priest, I've still got 3 HE chuckers, and that'll probably do. And I'm more confident in my ability to keep the Priest unmolested by random small arms than I am a hunting M10.

[gunnergoz]

Rarity in the game aside, if one is more inclined to put together QB's that are somewhat credible, during this period it would have been more likely to find a Sherman 105 on the front lines than an M7. The reason I say that is that the tank battalions all had a few Sherman 105's while all the M7's were assigned to SP artillery battalions. The tank battalions were on the front lines, the artillery battalions were generally well back in the rear. Only in situations like the Bulge, where artillery assets were sometimes the front lines, would have seen M7's likely to be subject to direct fire scenarios. This is not to say that an isolated incident did not happen here or there, I'm talking about what happened most of the time.

I did read up on the Marine use of the M7 and it seems that 12 each were in the two Marine divisions on Okinawa. How they got "defrocked" chassis is another question but one source I found commented how his father (who served on Marine M3 Half track 75mm GMC's) found the 105 less desirable than the 75 due to the flatter trajectory of the 75mm, which was felt to be more useful against Japanese cave bunkers. Just goes to show that conditions dictate what is the best weapon, not necessarily caliber and weight of shell.

[DLaurier]

There are swings, and there are roundabouts. Your open top M10 is also more vulnerable to small arms, and if that goes, so does your best AT weapon. If I lose the Priest, I've still got 3 HE chuckers, and that'll probably do. And I'm more confident in my ability to keep the Priest unmolested by random small arms than I am a hunting M10.

It's not the priest I'm worried about... it's the choirboys.

[womble]

Rarity in the game aside, if one is more inclined to put together QB's that are somewhat credible, during this period it would have been more likely to find a Sherman 105 on the front lines than an M7. The reason I say that is that the tank battalions all had a few Sherman 105's while all the M7's were assigned to SP artillery battalions. The tank battalions were on the front lines, the artillery battalions were generally well back in the rear. Only in situations like the Bulge, where artillery assets were sometimes the front lines, would have seen M7's likely to be subject to direct fire scenarios. This is not to say that an isolated incident did not happen here or there, I'm talking about what happened most of the time.

I have to wonder why the rarity of 105mm Shermans in July is set so fierce... I can't find a date-in-service for the type in Google.

[JonS]

I have to wonder why the rarity of 105mm Shermans in July is set so fierce... I can't find a date-in-service for the type in Google.

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=113&t=130334&p=1196780p1196780

[womble]

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=113&t=130334&p=1196780p1196780

Nice one, Jon.

[gunnergoz]

Presumably, BFC did their customary superior homework and looked at the arrival dates on the continent of tank battalions (with 105 M4's) and SP artillery battalions (with M7's) to get a baseline for relative rarity. What is still not clear to me is whether the fact that M7's were not intrinsically front line AFV's was considered in calculating their rarity, compared to M4/105's which were front line AFV's.

[JonS]

Top end, there were a total of

6 x M4(105) in France by the end of June

60 x M4(105) in France by the end of July

138 x M4(105) in France by the end of August

There were 60 x M7 in France by the end of D-Day (less the ones that were sunk on the way in )

Regards

Jon

P.S. no, I'm not confusing M7s for the DDs sunk off OMAHA. A reasonable number of M7s were lost when the landing craft they were on were mined off UTAH or sunk off OMAHA.

[womble]

Presumably, BFC did their customary superior homework and looked at the arrival dates on the continent of tank battalions (with 105 M4's) and SP artillery battalions (with M7's) to get a baseline for relative rarity. What is still not clear to me is whether the fact that M7's were not intrinsically front line AFV's was considered in calculating their rarity, compared to M4/105's which were front line AFV's.

I guess it comes down to how often M7s were allowed to operate in the DF role, outside their usual batteried positions. It's interesting that the M7 has the same rarity multiplier as the M8 HMC, even though the M8 is listed as being the standard assault gun of a Mech Inf Battalion, and so you might expect to be more available to be picked as a single vehicle detached to supplement a smaller unit, say, rather than having to have the Bttn-HQ Coy-Asslt Gun Plt command structure alongwith.

[Battlefront.com]

Rarity doesn't take into account how frequently a particular unit was seen at the front. If we did that, then yes... a M7 Priest would probably have about 10000 Rarity Point cost

Arguably we should not have included the Priest and should not include any other divisional level SP artillery asset (Wespe, Hummel, etc.). But let's face it... it's more fun to have them than to not have them.

Steve

[Salkin]

And without the fun it aint no game people!

//Salkin

[gunnergoz]

Rarity doesn't take into account how frequently a particular unit was seen at the front. If we did that, then yes... a M7 Priest would probably have about 10000 Rarity Point cost

Arguably we should not have included the Priest and should not include any other divisional level SP artillery asset (Wespe, Hummel, etc.). But let's face it... it's more fun to have them than to not have them.

Steve

OK, I'll stand down from General Quarters. Thanks for the clarification. I figured there was some fudging going on.

[theFightingSeabee]

Must...resist...pedophile...jokes...

Yeah, after reading the title of this thread, I was looking for a punchline.