  
Mammut (Mammoth) (AEC Dorchester ACV)
Max, Moritz, 3,& 5
Just to try to clear the air about the use of the AEC Dorchester 4X4 ACV in NA and to help elucidate some incorrect information spread from this website http://www.geocities.com/firefly1002000/mammuts.html that have been reported, written into other works and repeated for years now. Several bits of information written there are obviously WRONG and other authors need to be aware of the now known confirmable facts! I have edited what has been previously shared to hopefully correct those previous statement errors and added confirmable facts from photographs and the available records! NACHT
The Captured AEC Dorchester Armoured Command Vehicles
Anyone who has followed the AFRIKAKORPS or Rommel in North Africa will have heard about at least two of the captured Armoured Command Vehicles named "MAX" & "MORITZ", which were captured by the AFRIKAKORPS during the early advances in the Mechili region. In all, three of these AEC "Dorchester" ACV vehicles were captured at this time. These HQ vehicles had left Barce a day ahead of the British generals themselves, whom had followed later in their Humber Snipe staff car. The generals were caught up in a traffic jam around Derna, and were actually captured by an advance German motorcycle platoon. The three AEC Dorchester ACV's were captured at the outskirts of Mechili.
These HQ vehicles originally belonged to:
1. Lt.Gen. Sir Richard O'Connor, assistant commander of the 8th Army.
2. Lt.Gen. Sir Philip Neams VC, commander of the 8th Army.
3. Maj.Gen. Gambier-Parry, commander of 2nd Armoured Division Readers probably know about the capture of the British Generals at this time?
These three AEC Dorchester ACV's (British Numbered 1, 2, & 3) were captured by Wechmar's Aufklärungs Abteilung 3 and this all came about when the 2nd Armoured Division headquarters waited too long at Mechili for the stragglers of its armoured brigades, and the HQ vehicles along with 7th Indian Motor Brigade were all captured during April 7 and 8, 1941. (From Irving's 'Trail of the Fox' and edited here for verbiage/grammar correction and clarification) "Mammut" (which means mammoth in German) was the name for the British ACV given them by General Streich, whom's units captured three of these enormous conveyances near Mechili. A black and white Wehrmacht cross painted on its sides marked its change of owners. War reporter Fritz Lucke described the "Mammut" in a soldiers’ newspaper a few days later: “An armored box as big as a bus, on giant balloon tires as big and fat as the undercarriage wheels of a Junkers plane. A spent machine gun bullet is still embedded in it. The walls are windowless and painted in blue-gray camouflage tints. Only the driver and his co-driver have windshields, protected behind armored visors.” Rommel’s & other DAK Commander's 'Mammuts' became a familiar sight to the troops in Libya." The True Facts:
Rommel's "Max" in British service was White 1 with British Serial Number L4426425 (later damaged by a British air raid on September 14, 1941 during Operation Mid-Summer Night's Dream /Sonnenwende-Nachttraum seriously wounding his driver and blowing ROmmel's left boot heel off!) (Rommel AEC-ACV had also been previously low-level strafed on April 27, 1941 injuring Rommel's driver's shoulder) Rommel took the wheel of this vehicle on a number of occasions and even unsuccessfully rammed 'the Wire' with "MAX"!
Crüell's Moritz in British service was White 2 British Serial Number L4426422
Streich's White 3 British Serial Number L4426424 (# Not Confirmed in my shared photos!)
White 5 British Serial Number L4426428 (Incorrectly noted for years on the above mentioned website as Streich's Mammoth... it was not!) Note: The Original British large solid White numbers on the AEC Dorchester ACV's also have a thin lined Red outline or surround and were painted in the same four consistant locations on all four AEC-ACV's seen in NA service!!!
See IWM-E-6867-AEC-Dorchester-19411201 photograph below as proof...
Here is the proof... Photo Number: E 6867
Photographer: Keating G (Capt) No 1 Army Film & Photographic Unit
Title: THE BRITISH ARMY IN NORTH AFRICA 1941 Collection No.: 4700-32
Description: AEC Dorchester armoured command vehicle and staff, 1 December 1941.
Period: Second World War
How could White 5 be captured in April 1941 when it was still in service with the British in December 1941!!! It was not Streich's AEC-ACV either... as he was allocated or used White 3 from point of capture...
 Rommel's "Max" in British service was White 1 / Red outline with British Serial Number L4426425
This photograph was sent to me from a friend at the AXIS History Forum... (see AANA WebLinks)  Note the barely visible White 1 and Rommel's personal driver... whom was injured in the British air attack
Wechmar with Rommel... 
Note the painted over 1... 
Crüell's Moritz in British service was White 2 / Red outline British Serial Number L4426422 
This is Streich's White 3 / Red outline British Serial Number L4426424 (# Not Confirmed in Photos!) Note: The Original British White numbers have a Red outline which is visible here on White 3 and on White 5 below! 
White 5 British Serial Number L4426428 (Incorrectly noted for years as Rommel's MAX... it was not!)  IWM-E-6867-AEC-Dorchester-19411201 Does someone have the movie film from this meeting? Let us know... 
Max in Color
The story of this vehicle and its use in North African service is intriguing. The capture of three of these by the DAK from the British has caused for greater interest in this vehicles employment and use. Rommel's MAX is seen still with the "White" 1 in this photo... 
Moritz (2) is seen in this photo... 
Magnified crop...  Moritz White 2
AEC Dorchester
Mammoth: MAX (1), MORITZ (2), (3) & (5)
 MAX
MAX is British Serial L4426425 White 1 and this is verified with this photo... 
  
Moritz (Has a lighter colored segment on nose... British Serial Number L4426422) Rommel is also seen riding on this vehicle at a meeting with Italian General staff members and Crüell... after MAX was damaged in a British aerial attack in September 1941... 
Rommel's Adjutant Major Schraepler's "Woody" is seen to right below: Another note from Irving's work about Schaepler being run over by the "Mammoth"... from a letter of Rommel to his wife Lucie... Hausberg, his own adjutant in 1939-40, had been killed. Schraepler, his successor, had been run over by the Mammut. And he wrote a belated letter to Hans Keitel, the bespectacled school friend who had helped to build the glider in 1906. “Tell him about the sandstorms here and tell him we’re squaring up for the coming march,” Rommel instructed his secretary, “the standard reply.”
Back in Wiener Neustadt, Lucie’s home seemed to have become something of a meeting point for most of the generals’ wives. They met for coffee, shared the latest news from North Africa and eagerly scanned news photos for pictures of their men. “How awful for Schraepler to have been killed in such a terrible way,” she wrote to Rommel. “Does his widow know how it happened? I’m thinking of inviting her down here . . . because all her thoughts are still in Africa.” 
Streich's 3 again a rather poor photo that often shown... 
White 5 British Serial Number L4426428 (Has been ncorrectly noted for years on a few websites as Rommel's MAX... it was not!) IWM-E-6867-AEC-Dorchester-19411201
There is plenty more to discuss about the use of MAX (1), MORITZ (2), 3, & 5
Original Caunter Schemes for Each
Soon...
Applied Paint Schemes for Each
Soon...
The 1/72 & 1/35 Scale Models (Awaiting Manufacturer's Sample)
Extratech has a 1/72 
Panzermodels from Brazil  
More Soon & References...
| 
White 1 and this is verified with this photo...
Link-IT, LLC Copyright© 2008, 