Customer Reviews

Universal Carrier 1936-48: The 'Bren Gun Carrier' Story

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The second sentence in this book pretty well sums up the entire story of the Bren Gun Carrier: 'Designed for a role that it never really fulfilled, it was adapted to dozens of others for which it was never entirely suited and was still in service, in vast numbers, long after it should have been pensioned off.'

In effect it was something like a tracked version of the Jeep. It was armored (sort of, about 1/3 of an inch), and because of the tracks had very good cross country mobility. It was reasonably reliable (in later versions) and cheap. It was made in several factories in the UK as well as Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the USA.

This book is another of Osprey's specialist books describing a single line of vehicles in great detail from its history to cut away drawings, dozens of variations, a magnificant set of photographs. It is probably the last word on Bren Gun Carriers (a name by which they are universally known, that was totally incorrect).

This is about what one would expect from an Osprey title: well researched and written, excellent color plates and photos.

The Universal Carrier ("Bren Gun Carrier") is amazing in that a sophisticated, well-funded military would actually buy and field such a useless weapon - and in quantity! Truly, here is a weapon that was useless in its intended role. It was too poorly protected to support infantry with direct fire and too small to carry any useful load.

The Universal Carrier is an excellent example of poorly thought-out weapons development.

This book is a good primer for someone looking to become informed on the Universal Carrier or the Bren Gun Carrier. It tells the history leading up to its use in World War II and has some interesting and unique pictures of the development of the vehicle. I was interested in the models that were used by the BEF in France during the Battle of France in 1940 and I found this to be somewhat lacking. Perhaps the information I am looking for is not available, because at this point I have not found it. I saw a picture in "Dunkirk 1940 Operation Dyanmo" (another Osprey book) that shows a Universal Carrier towing an Ordnance QF 2-pdr Mk IX antitank gun. I got this book expecting or hoping that it would provide additional pictures and history of its use in France during 1940. While there is an excellent story of its use against the Germans during the Battle of France, most of the book concentrates on the use and development after the Battle of France. However the Scout Carrier used at this time is reasonably well documented, its use in most other roles for the Battle of France is weak.

The color plates are good as are the pictures, just that I am more interested in the use and application during the Battle of France.

This is a good first book on the Universal Carrier for a WW2 book collection.

David Fletcher is an expert on British Armor and curator of the Bovington Tank Museum. The British wry sense of humor is plain in all of his books, which is rare and welcome in military books. I enjoyed this book as Fletcher sharply criticized this tracked vehicle.

This is a very concise short history of the Universal Carrier, filled with B&W photos, great captions and color diagrams. The "Bren Gun" Carrrier was popular because it beat walking or carrying a machine gun. Like the US Army jeeps, it could go almost anywhere, was often overloaded with gear and weapons and simple to maintain & operate. It had limited armor protection and could not carry a lot of firepower, but it was not designed to do so.

What did I not like? The author sometimes spent a lot of time discussing experimental types which were odd, amusing, but given such a limited space, would have been better spent on the main versions.

Still, I recommend this book to armor fans, a good addition to show the British use and development of tracked warfare in WW2.