Italian armour during Spanish Civil War

Modeling Subjects Armor
1

Could someone tell me whether Italian armoured vehicles used during the SCW had the typical nationalst style markings (i.e. black cross on a white field) painted on?

I’m working on a Lancia 1Zm.

Thanks,

Domi

2

Domi,

I’s a interesting, but tough choice you made to go for the Lancia 1ZM in the Spanish civil war setting. According to a source I found, Italy only had 19 of those vehicles in Spain, so there are probably not too many photos of them. I don’t think that the Italians used the markings with black fasces or crosses on white background though. I havn’t found any pics of the Lancia, but here’s some of my links, that could be helpful.

Here’s a discussion about the Italian vehicles used in Spain, with some pics:

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=113511

A site dedicated to the vehicles used in the war:

http://www.balagan.org.uk/war/iberia/1936/vehicles.htm

Here’s a really interesting photo collection from the war, taken from an American newspaper:

http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_archives/spancivwar/scwgraphics.html

Bison decals have a decal sheet with markings of the nationalist forces, including the markings for the Italian volunteer forces - the “Corpo Truppe Volontarie” (only CV 33 and CV 35 tankettes though):

http://www.angelfire.com/pro/bison/35018.html

http://www.perthmilitarymodelling.com/reviews/vehicles/bison/bd35018.htm

Maybe you can find something really useful in these books about the Corpo Truppe Volontarie

http://www.tuttostoria.it/specificheing.asp?ID=395

http://www.tuttostoria.it/specifiche.asp?ID=453

It would be nice to the results when the model is finished. Good luck!

/Tony

3

Found a site with pic of the Lancia set in Spain. The camo is dazzling, but I can’t see any markings on it.

http://www.italie1935-45.com/RE/photoscopes/photoscopelanciaIZ.html

/Tony

4

Tony,

Many, many thanks! Fantastic picture of that Lancia in that great camo scheme!

I was set to build and paint a grey-green overal machine, but this is quite tempting. I have been shown another picture of a Lancia in Spain - in fact the pics shows 2 Lancias, including the double-turreted one, and does show a possible hint of a camouflage like the one shown in this much better quality picture of yours -. I was not certain because the vehicle is in the shadow of a tree and the shadows of the leaves tend to create a camouflage pattern of their own… That picture will be published for the first time along with an article I’m writing about my Lancia for a British modelling magazine.

I’ll show a pic of the completed Lancia here.

Domi