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10a Motocorazzata company

Dili

Member
Of 10 Bersaglieri regiment. Said to arrive in Africa with main unit, was this some unit with experimental AB-40 autoblindo? because i can't see any reason to be motocorazzata?
 
Dili
I don't know where he got this news but according to what I know the 10th Bersaglieri Regiment was destroyed in Beda Fomm in February 1941 then rebuilt and sent to Tunisia in 1943 ... therefore I can't understand what it could be like the platoon of 3 AB40s of the Nizza Cavalry Group which went to AS in October 1941 (experimental and first armored personnel carrier to arrive there) almost together with the 10 AB40s of the PAI also sent first in AS can be somehow matched with the 10. or Bersaglieri regiment .... on the other hand, the news that some Ab40s had been sent to AS as early as 1940 was false news to me since according to all official reports, even from the archives, there is no evidence of this fact ... ... anyway I would be curious to know where this news comes from and above all the name given to the motorized bersaglieri unit (motocorazzata ??????) .....
All the best
Maurizio
 

jwsleser

Administrator
Staff member
Dili

What source mentions the 10a Motocorazzata company>

Pista! Jeff
 
Actually the site reports this wording but most likely it derives from some Italian text of the time which tended to report everything that was part of an armored department (Raggruppamento Babini or Armored Brigade) to this wording. It is however established by now that the brigade was in charge of only remodeled Lancia Terni Tipo Tripoli and some Morris and Rolls Royce armored cars of war prey indeed the first armored car that was put out of use by the British at Beda Fomm was an English armored armored car ( Gruppo Balestra)
 

jwsleser

Administrator
Staff member
I agree with Maurizio on this.

Checking my article on the « brigata corazzata speciale » here on CS, there were five of the Lancia Terni Tipo Tripoli assigned to the brigata. These were organized as a separate unit which also included the 60° cp. motociclisti and 3 Solothurn c.c. on light trucks. The sources I used identified this unit either as a battagione bersaglieri or a nucleo esplorante corazzata (the latter likely being the better term).

None of my sources that provide a detailed OB of the 10º ragg. bers. list a motocorazzato unit.

v/r Jeff
 
Hi
This topic leads me to one of the darkest dilemmas that weigh on my over ten years of research on the Royal Army in AS and that is ... many sources of the same Royal Army declare that it was part of the Armored Brigade (or Babini Group) on 60. o BATTALION motorcyclists (on two motorcycling companies). It is well known, however, that throughout the 1940s there was no motorcyclist battalion battalion throughout the AS but indeed there were various motorcyclist targeting companies. The existence within the Armored Brigade of an armored scouting core formed by Lancia Terni Tipo Tripoli and some reconverted British armored personnel carriers called the Balestra Group (from the name of the senior commander CCNN Balestra) is extremely reported in many official reports. Now Jeff tells me that he has a source that reports a mixture formed by the 60th motorcycle company Sabratha, a Soluthurn core and an armored personnel carrier such as MOTORCYCLIST BATTALION ....... maybe after years I found the solution to the riddle. .... Jeff what is your source ....... interesting really sooo interesting .......
All the best
Maurizio
 

jwsleser

Administrator
Staff member
Maurizio

The source I cited in my paper is La prima offensiva Britannica pages 155-156. I will check that cite once I return home today.

Here is the discussion of the two different names from my paper:

La prima offensiva Britannica offers two different names for this unit. The text on page 156 lists the battagione bersaglieri but not the nucleo esplorante corazzata. Schizzo 17 lists the nucleo espl cor. but not the btg. bers. It is likely these are one and the same. This appears to be a separate unit from the nucleo esplorante created at Ain el Gazala with five M11/39s, a motorcycle platoon, and a battery of 20mm c.a. This latter unit was under army command. (ibid page 162). The identification of the 60°cp. m/c is based on the association of this unit with the brigade on 5 February.

Pista! Jeff
 

Dili

Member
Very interesting, it is possible that the Fiat Terni were attached to 10 Cp Motociclisti even if temporarily

PS: i have it has Fiat not Lancia

 

jwsleser

Administrator
Staff member
Dili

Very interesting, it is possible that the Fiat Terni were attached to 10 Cp Motociclisti even if temporarily

I doubt it. The only 10º cp. m/c I have listed is the one from the X CA. The 10º regg. bers. didn't have a separate motorcycle company (at least all my sources don't list one). The three battalions in the regg. were all autoporto and only the cp. cc. is listed as with the regiment as a separate company.

The planned organization of the «brigata corazzata special» in November 1940 lists that the btg. moto. would be formed using the 10º cp. moto. from the X CA, and 2 cp. moto. from the 60º. The 60º is listed as coming from the 60º d.f. «Sabratha». That division only has one cp. moto., so I have assumed that the second company is coming from a different unit. Which of course leads us back to trying to understand which motorcycle units were in A.S.

PS: i have it has Fiat not Lancia

In the end, you are correct. There is a note in Gli autoveicoli da combattimento volume primo p. 101, that the Terni (which is the correct original name), became known as the Fiat tipo Libia sometime in the mid-late 30s.

Pista! Jeff
 
I agree with you Jeff but I always have the doubt of the biker battalion bersaglieri which is reported as part of the armored brigade on page 83 of the volume The first British offensive in AS then also appears in the graphics of table 12 attached to the same book but strangely it is .... reduced for the losses suffered by a motorcycle company, 5 armored cars and 3 trucks with Soluthurn rifles on page 156 of the same volume ... and even stranger the dates of the graphics of the attached table 12 coincide with those of the pag 156 of the volume The first ..... following the logic of the Italian syntax it would seem that the battalion was originally composed not only of trucks with soluthurn rifles and armored cars but also by more than one company bersaglieri mah .... knowing the Italian relations it could also be different ....... mah .....
all the best
Maurizio
 

jwsleser

Administrator
Staff member
I agree with you Jeff but I always have the doubt of the biker battalion bersaglieri which is reported as part of the armored brigade on page 83 of the volume

I believe the btg. motociclisti did not exist at that time. Creating it was the plan. It was to be created by bringing together three of the independent cp. motociclisti. La meccanizzazione dell'Esercito fino al 1943 tomo II, document 38 has the original order to create the «brigata corazzata special» (pp. 216-219). The btg. motociclisti was to be formed with 10º cp. moto. from the X CA and 2 cp. moto. for the d.f. «Sabratha» (60º cp. moto.) I believe that the «Sabratha» only had one compagnia moto. and that the second compagnia would come from some other unit that was not identified.

Like many other ideas during this time, the plan was never fully executed. The btg. moto was never formed.

Pista! Jeff
 

jwsleser

Administrator
Staff member
Schizzo 19 likely reflects that two-three cp. moto were present as an ad hoc btg. I believe that the 5 autoblinde with the Solothurn, ecc. is the nucl. espl. brig. cor. you see at Tmimi on schizzo 17. There are two cp. moto. at Mechili at the same time. I think these two cp. are the btg. moto. you see later on schizzo 19. I don't know whether the nucl. espl. rejoined the brig. cor. in schizzo 19 or not.

Pista! Jeff
 

Dili

Member
So the corolary, 10 cp was X Corpo unit supposedly to be attached to Babini brigade that eventually might have had a Fiat Tripoli autoblindo platoon ?
 

jwsleser

Administrator
Staff member
Dili

I can't say whether that is a true statement. The organization I cited which lists the Fiats doesn't list the 10º cp. moto., only the 60º cp. moto.

Were the Fiat armor cars and the Solothurns assigned to one of the cp. moto. or were they under the command of the ad hoc battalion leadership? Was there an ad hoc battalion headquarters? I don't know.

Of course, the planned battalion was never fully assembled. Instead we see the Italians throwing together whatever was at hand. The plan was for the 10º cp. moto. would be assigned to the brigade, but the only unit I know that actually operated as part of the brigade was the 60º cp. moto. There is an unknown cp. moto. shown on schizzo 17 that I would guess is the 10º cp. moto.

Pista! Jeff
 
Jeff
The 10th company bersaglieri motorcyclists had gone to Bardia a dozen days before ... I would lean more for the 202.a as the 201.a had been aggregated to Sabratha to form the motorized groupings ....... ..
All the best
maurizio
 
Maybe I found the reason for the word motocorazzata. It could derive from a staff of 1936 where a bersaglieri company combined with a company of light armored vehicles or armored cars formed a battaglione motocorazzato .... mah ...... perhaps
All the best
Maurizio
 
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