The serial appears to be incorrect. The VWs were a batch M6264421 to M6269420. Production began in late 45 early 46. Further batches were delivered after 1949 in the XH and XJ series (see below)
The Military Serialling System 1920 to 1949After WW1 the vehicles of all three services wore civilian registrations to comply with the Roads Act of 1920. The registrations were issued by London County Council office which was housed in County Hall on the other side of Westminster Bridge from the Admiralty, Air Ministry and War Office. There are suggestions that the RASC did this near their Feltham depot but this seems unlikely as I suspect large batches of registrations (see below) were reserved for use by the forces and little detail was held by the London office.
The RAF are known to have used a number of distinct civil series – consisting of two alpha and four numeric characters or three alpha and three numeric - such as MV1001 to MV9999 or CMM101 to CMM999.
From To
MG Mar 1930 1935
MH July 1924 August 1925
MK August 1925 September 1926
MP August 1927 August 1928
MT September 1928 June 1929
MV July 1931 June 1933
CMM ca 1934
GMF ca 1935
HML
JMG
JMV
OMG
PMG
RMC
RMG
The Royal Navy also followed the same practice and used:
HX June 1930 March 1933
LR
LT
LU
MG Mar 1930 1935
MH July 1924 August 1925
MK August 1925 September 1926
ML September 1926 August 1927
MP August 1927 August 1928
DMC ca 1935
PMX ca 1939
RMX
SHX ca 1939
The Army already had a ‘fleet’ numbering system with separate series of serials for ‘A’ vehicles and ‘B’ vehicles (there may also have been a sequence for ‘C’ vehicles). This numbering system was underway by 1922. The ‘A’ vehicle system of serials started at number ‘1’ being a Dragon Field Artillery Mark I. The ‘B’ vehicle system started at around 15000 possibly to allow for vehicle serials from WW1. The Army Serial number was usually preceded by a single letter that indicated the type of vehicle “A” for Ambulance through to “Z” for Truck up to and including 15 cwt. There is a full list of these prefixes in Dick Taylor’s book.
All Army vehicles also had a civilian registration, and these were:
MC August 1917 August 1920
ME November 1921 May 1923
MF May 1923 July 1924
MG Mar 1930 1935
MH July 1924 August 1925
MK August 1925 September 1926
ML September 1926 August 1927
MP August 1927 August 1928
MT September 1928 June 1929
HX June 1930 March 1933
MV ca 1933
AMP ca 1933
BMM ca 1934
CMM ca 1935
DMC ca 1935
DMF ca 1935
DMV
EMG ca 1935
GMF ca 1935
EHX ca 1936
EMV ca 1936
FME
FMX ca 1936
FMG ca 1937
HMC
HMH ca 1937
HMP
HMT ca 1937
GMY ca 1937
JMX ca 1938
OME
RME ca 1938
RMY ca 1938
PMH ca 1939
PMK ca 1939
PMV
PMX ca 1939
RMV
Unfortunately, evidence is thin and so it is difficult to date some of the series.
This practice of vehicles wearing civil registrations (and Army ones wearing a serial number in addition) continued until some time in 1939 when the volume of vehicles being registered must have led to the Licensing Office calling time on the practice. Army vehicles then only wore their serial number but the RAF and RN now had to allocate a serial number. However, some vehicles from pre-1939 still carried their civil registrations and this is evident in photos from the Dunkirk evacuation.
The RAF numbered their existing fleet and these numbers seem to have run to around 70000 before new contracts added new serial numbers beyond that. It is possible that this numbering of the existing vehicles was carried out RAF Station by RAF Station as not much pre-RAF70000 makes much sense. The RAF wore their numbers in the format “RAF” followed by the serial number e.g. RAF73439. The RAF serial numbers ran to around 230000 but there were other series of numbers which may have been for overseas theatres of which examples are RAF291455, RAF344599 and RAF555832.
So little of the Royal Navy’s record system has survived that all that is known is that both series RN12345 and 12345RN are known.
In the case of the Army, by 1932 the sequence of “B” vehicles from 15000 had reached 23000 and new vehicles were to be numbered with the first two numbers indicated the year in which the contract was placed so for example L33000 was a Morris Commercial D-Type 30 cwt 6x4 Truck. However by 1934 the numbers being ordered meant that when 34999 was reached so the next vehicle nwas umbered 341000 which occurred during a contract forBSA E15 Solo 498cc Motorcycles. All went well until 1937 when 379644 was reached and the next vehicle was numbered 3710133. [It is assumed that 379645 to 3710132 were a ‘Cancelled’ batch.]. By 1940 this “year prefix system” (possibly alongside the civil registration system was abandoned and the vehicles were number in sequence. The highest known serial is 6277385 based on a Chilwell List from November 1944. However although no comprehensive records exist after 6277385 it has been possible to reconstruct an incomplete list to 6288024 from Contract Cards.
Of course, the “year prefix system” led to many areas where there were available serials and these were used for a variety of purposes:
Acquired and Impressed Vehicles
Vehicles for Service with the RASC
Overseas Theatres
Some Ambulances (numbered in the 24000 to 29000 and 1204001 to 1239000 series)
Motorcycles (numbered in 46001 to 99490 series)
Captured Vehicles
Some Trailers (numbered in 1239001 to 1250000 series)
Allied Forces (Free French, Dutch, Czech, Norwegian and Polish Forces)
Rebuilt Vehicles (numbered in 1400000 to 1799999 series).
In the rush to equip units of the BEF prior to its deployment in May 1940 and to re-equip after Dunkirk large numbers of vehicles were “Impressed” which means they were removed from their owners by the War Office and there were also vehicles “gifted” by their owners to the War Office. Many of these vehicles did not survive the war and were probably scrapped for their metal content. The most obvious survivors were the limousines (Rolls-Royce, Bentley) used by senior officers. Incidentally many voluntary organisations throughout the UK and the Commonwealth raised funds for specific vehicles such as Ambulances.
Some series were “Not Taken Up” according to the records – but sometimes the records indicate this and there is photographic evidence to the contrary!
Presumably because they received many of their vehicles direct Overseas Theatres were given their own batches of serials to apply. A good example is 4411561 to 4419560 allocated to the Middle East Theatre around 1940 and presumably used on vehicles arriving from Commonwealth nations direct by ship.
During the war, but principally towards the end, numbers of captured vehicles were given serials by all three services.
Strangely, perhaps, the “A” vehicle system ran from 1 to 353485 in sequence!
The whole system was replaced in 1949 by the two numeric, two alpha and two numeric character system (e.g. 00 AA 01) apparently at the request of the Police who found seven numbers difficult to remember before committing to their notebooks!
References:
Central Census Tanks and Vehicles of “B” Vehicle WD Numbers RAOC COD Chilwell 23 November 1944
A version is available from Rob Van Meel – go to
https://robvanmeel.nl/product/b-vehicles-wd-numbers-central-census-chilwell-1944-numerical/ .
Beware this is based on an OCR’d copy of the original document and contains some errors and omissions!
Contract cards for ‘B’ Vehicles – held at The Tank Museum, Bovington
An “A” Vehicle List was compiled by Peter Brown from ledgers held in the Tank Museum. A version of this appears in Volume 1 of Warpaint on P82 et seq - Dick Taylor Pub Mushroom Model Publications.
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11/4/2024, 13:02 by deandarvill
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