IEEE - Aerospace and Electronic Systems - July 2023 - 62
History Column:
DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2023.3281528
Hobart'sFunnies
Hugh Griffiths , University College London, WC1E 6BT London, U.K.
Percy Hobart was a Major General in the British Army in
the 1930s. He had progressive ideas on the conduct of
warfare, but these ideas did not find favor and he was
retired in 1940. The military historian Basil Liddell Hart
argued to Churchill that Hobart should be reinstated, and
in 1941 he was put in command of the 11th Armored
Division.
to be used in specialized roles in support of the D-Day
landings. These tanks were known as Hobart's Funnies,
and included:
AVRE (Assault Vehicle Royal Engineers)
Churchill tanks equipped with a 290 mm Petard
mortar, to penetrate reinforced concrete bunker
defences;
Duplex Drive DD Sherman amphibious tanks;
Churchill Crocodile tanks equipped with
flamethrowers;
Sherman Crab tanks equipped with flails for clearance
ofmines and barbed wire;
Churchill tanks adapted for bridgelaying or for other
means of breaching obstacles on the battlefield.
Major General Sir Percy Hobart (IWM, Public Domain).
AVRE Churchill tank, preserved at Sword Beach, Normandy. An
example of the petard mortar projectile, from the Armory of the
Defence Academy, Shrivenham, can be seen to the right of the
tank (photo: H. Griffiths).
In 1943, he was directed to transform the 79th
Armored Division into a unit of specially adapted tanks,
Author's current address: Hugh Griffiths, University College
London, WC1E 6BT London, U.K. (e-mail: h.griffiths@ieee.org).
Manuscript
received 4 May 2023; accepted 25 May
2023, and ready for publication 9 June 2023.
Review handled by Daniel O'Hagan.
0885-8985/23/$26.00 ß 2023 IEEE
62
Hobart was described as an eccentric and difficult
character, but he was a born leader with a flair for innovation.
By the end of WWII the 79th Armored Division
had almost seven thousand vehicles, which had played
a key role in overcoming the German defences
(the so-called " Atlantic Wall " ) in the days and weeks
following the D-Day landings. He was knighted in 1943,
and after the war, he was awarded the American Legion
of Merit.
IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
JULY 2023
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9947-5553
IEEE - Aerospace and Electronic Systems - July 2023
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