Vintage Photographs of Half-Tracks From Europe From the 1930s and 1940s

A half-track is a civilian or military vehicle with regular wheels at the front for steering and continuous tracks at the back to propel the vehicle and carry most of the load. The purpose of this combination is to produce a vehicle with the cross-country capabilities of a tank and the handling of a wheeled vehicle.

The French engineer Adolphe Kégresse converted a number of cars from the personal car pool of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia to half-tracks in 1911. His system was named after him: the Kégresse track, which used a flexible belt rather than interlocking metal segments. He applied it to several vehicles in the imperial garage, including Rolls-Royce cars and Packard trucks. The Imperial Russian Army also fitted the system to a number of their Austin Armoured Cars. From 1916 onward, there was a Russian project by the Putilov Plant to produce military half-tracks (the Austin-Putilov model), along the same lines, using trucks and French track parts.

After the Russian Revolution and the establishment of the Soviet Union, Kégresse returned to his native France, where the system was used on Citroën cars between 1921 and 1937 for off-road and military vehicles.

There were many civilian half-track experiments in the 1920s and 1930s. The Citroën company sponsored several scientific expeditions crossing deserts in North Africa and Central Asia, using their autochenilles. After World War I, the US military wanted to develop a semi-tracked personnel carrier vehicle, so it looked at these civilian half-tracks. In the late 1920s the US Army purchased several Citroën-Kégresse vehicles for evaluation followed by a licence to produce them. This resulted in the Army Ordnance Department building a prototype in 1939. In September 1940 it went into production with the military M2 and M3 half-track versions.

With the snow and ice of Canada in mind, Joseph-Armand Bombardier developed 7- and 12-passenger half-track autoneiges in the 1930s, starting what would become the Bombardier industrial conglomerate. The Bombardier vehicle had tracks for propulsion in the rear and skis for steering in front. The skis could be replaced with wheels in the summer, but this was uncommon.

The Red Army also experimented with half-tracks, such as the BA-30, but found them expensive and unreliable. Although not a feature on American World War II vehicles, steering could be assisted by track braking, controlled by the steering wheel.

Prior to WWII, the British Military had few half-track vehicles, one type being this Crossley, which was mainly configured for use as a staff car and scout vehicle.

Crosley half-track

A Bedford BT-6 Traclat. In 1943, after German medium half-tracks had been captured in Africa and tested in Britain, it was decided to copy them as towing vehicles for the British heavy field and anti-aircraft guns. The German SdKfz.7 8-ton half-track was chosen as the model, and Vauxhall Motors’ Bedford Truck Division was contracted to copy it as closely as possible. Vauxhall insisted on large orders before starting production, so the Army ordered 7,500 for 1944 and 5,000 for 1945 delivery — though doubts were expressed that these orders could actually be met. Indeed, by June of 1945 only six prototypes had been built. Testing showed that the Traclat was superior to all other vehicles being considered for the towing task, but production was cancelled due to high cost and scarcity of materials.

The Traclat was powered by two Bedford six-cylinder 140-hp engines mounted side-by-side with separate radiators. The engines drove via shafts into a coupling gearbox. The track bogie-wheels were of German pattern but copied from several types — the outer ones from the SdKfz-11 / SdKfz-251 and the inners from a DB-10 12 ton. Vauxhall re-engineered everything to Imperial measurements.

Another British experiment was adapting Canadian Military Pattern (CMP) trucks — built by the Canadian divisions of Ford and Chevrolet — into half-tracks. Interestingly, the track mechanism appears to have been taken from the British Universal Carrier. Although these vehicles may have been successful, like the Bedford Traclat only a few prototypes were built and the machines were never put into production. While it seems likely that other half-track prototypes were built and tested, information is scarce and the British military seems to have been satisfied using mainly their Universal Carrier and U.S.-supplied half-tracks during WWII.

Associated Equipment Company (AEC) was a British vehicle manufacturer from 1912 until 1979 that specialized in heavy vehicles such as buses, motor coaches and trucks. The AEC Matador was designed for the British Military in 1939 as a cargo carrier and artillery tractor.

The Matador was a rugged four-wheel-drive machine with excellent off-road performance. It became one of the most common vehicles in the British arsenal, and several half-track variants were produced.

Commonly known as the P-17, the basic Citroën half-track did indeed look more like a civilian recreational vehicle rather than a weapon of war.

Despite its rather elegant looks, the Citroën P-17 (aka P-107) proved to be a rugged and reliable machine and was easily adapted and configured for military service. Many Citroën half-tracks (and conventional Citroën trucks) were captured by the German Army and used until the end of the war.

A Citroën P-107 configured as a field kitchen. Presumably the French cuisine was ooh-la-la.

A Citroën P-107 configured as a staff car or scout vehicle.

A Citroën P-107 configured as a tactical ambulance. Note the front skis for use in deep snow.