M4 Sherman Tanks, were the United States Army main medium tanks used in WWII.
History[]
It was common American practice to name the American tanks they used after famous American civil war Generals, so the M4 was named for Union General William Tecumseh Sherman. American soldiers adopted this usage. All of the Allied forces, including the Soviet Union, were provided with M4's under the lend-lease programme. It succeeded the M3 Grant and Lee tanks.
WWII[]
They were issued to both the U.S. Marines, and the Army. They were shipped to Europe and North Africa, and to the Pacific.
They proved to be a worthy opponent to German Tiger I Tanks in the European front, though their armor was roughly as strong as the Tiger's, its main armament was weaker. (Though the front armor of the Tiger was about 37mm thicker, it was only very slightly angled). In the Pacific, they had more than enough firepower to take out a Japanese Ha-Go Tank.
Korean War[]
The Shermans again saw combat in the Korean War. They had an advantage over the Korean T-34/85, since they had better optics. Both tanks could destroy each other at normal combat ranges, although the HVAP round of the M4's upgraded 76mm M1A2 gave it an edge in armor penetration.
They were eventually replaced by the Patton Tanks.
Design[]
It's main cannon was a 75 mm M3 L/40 gun, and its secondary guns were a .50 cal. Browning M2HB, and two .30-06 M1919A4 Machine guns, one coaxal and one on the bow. Its frontal armor was 63 mm thick sloped at 43 degrees from horizontal, and the tank weighed 66,800 pounds. It had a crew of 5. Some variants, such as the Crocodile, 105mm howitzer, and Jumbo were also created. The M4 proved superior to older German tanks and to Japanese armour in the Pacific, but the 75mm was becoming obsolete against newer German tanks with thicker armor. The Americans upgraded to the 76mm gun M1, which could penetrate a Tiger I's front armor from a thousand meters. The British converted some to an upgraded version called nicknamed the "Firefly" by replacing the 75mm gun with a 17-pounder cannon, which also proved to be effective.