"Wartime Merchant ship colours ?" Topic

Hi,

Finally got some interest from fellow players in naval gaming. (Using VaS with WaS ships.) The Atlantic campaign requires a largish number of merchant ships. With only 3 types available in the A&A series, it made a convoy look fairly, shall we say, regimented.

To provide some variety I decided to jazz up some of the A&A ships with a repaint and built a few dozen ships of different types to make a decent size convoy. Came to the painting stage and while I had a lot of information on pre-war schemes, I have almost nothing on merchant ship colour schemes during the war for pre-war construction.

Where they left in their original colours or repainted? If repainted when was this done and in what colours?

Anyone have any good references ?

For the Allies its pretty much gray, gray and more gray. Most of pre-war construction ships got repainted fairly quickly while new constructon was commissioned in gray. Those ships actually commissioned into the RN or USN might carry a camouflage pattern, but privately owned merchants generally did not.

Merchant ships were usually painted their 'lines' colours but usually the hulls would be black with various other colours for superstructure--I.E. white, buff etc…… Later when the chance arose they may have been painted with a dazzle scheme…

Japanese merchants, in the early war period, were often left in their house colours.

Thanks for the replies.

Reading through some of the German Raiders histories they were still actively using colour schemes as part of their disguises until at least the end of 1941.

One can only assume that pre-war merchant ships may have retained their original colour schemes for a number of years into the war.

Using pre-war colours and the Raider disguises as a reference, hull colours varied, it appears that green, browns, red etc were in wide spread use as well as the prolific black. Superstructures appear to be in whites, buff, yellows and browns with funnel colours being quite varied, usually with a coloured band or shipping line emblem.

It is clear that war built ships, and requisitioned auxilary vessels were painted any colour they liked as long as it was a shade of grey. Neutrals did not change, for obvious reasons, until they were no longer neutral, eg Soviets and Japanese.

Think I shall paint my ships as early war to add a bit of colour, gray seems a little dull.

Standard schemes for British merchant ships were also adopted by other allies.
Early in the war all ships were to have black hulls and funnels, with brown or dark buff superstructure, masts and derricks.
Later this was changed to dark grey hull and funnel, with brown or dark buff as above.
Next it became all grey, but with recommendations for pale grey upper works.
In general merchant ships were not camouflaged, but this was certainly not the case on occasion.
The reason the above is somewhat vague, is because merchant ships were scattered all over the world and of course were far too busy to keep in dock unless completely necessary. Hence the schemes mentioned were more of a transitional thing than a total rule. A convoy could well have ships in several schemes.
Another reason was of course the availability of paint. Standard schemes were difficult to introduce among ships serving all over the world. Some ports would have sufficient available, other ports would not. Some ports may not have the exact paint needed, so something 'near enough' would have to do.
By 1943 Allied shipping was pretty standardised on all over grey. However the exact shade could vary depending on what was available. Where possible many still used dark grey hull and lighter upper works.
What makes it interesting in painting merchant ships for WW2 is that there were these variations, and your ships can therefore look more interesting and individual, than just boring old grey!
During the first two years of war the independent spirit of Merchant Skippers showed through in that those operating well away from the UK, retained various 'House' touches for as long as possible. This might mean adopting the current standard scheme, but leaving the company badge not over painted. There might also be retention of a company waterline colour and various other items of 'style' used in peacetime.

One of the biggest incentives pushing Skippers to adopt the standard schemes, was the gradual realisation that it was NOT a good idea for an individual ship of a convoy to stand out from others. Such things were thought to attract the attention of U Boats. Hence by mid war pretty well all ships had adopted dull grey. Of course another factor was that by that time, most ships would have spent some time in dock for refit or repair, and this time was used for repainting.

Note that many of the older ships had varnished brown derricks and masts, and this was often retained as the dull colour was considered sufficient.

From above, the colours seen did need to be very dull. German Condor aircraft hunting stragglers and individual ships were a serious danger. Even if not over painted, wooden decks would be allowed to go to dull grey due to the action of seawater and salt. Steel decks could be painted while the ship was at sea, therefore even if the over all colour of a ship might take longer to change, decks did not.
In general the practice was to paint all upper surfaces in the dullest colours available. Grey or blue grey in preference, but if paint was in short supply, dull black, dull brown, or dull green. Once again the Skippers had to make do with what was in their paint locker, or they could obtain during stop overs at various ports. But from my study of ship paint schemes over the years, it seems that the fear of being bombed was a mighty incentive for skippers to get the job done before approaching European waters.
You can therefore expect ship decks to be dark, and in a variety of shades concocted from what could be found in the paint locker and mixed together.

Note that GREY was a matter of interpretation at various times, until the Board of Trade was able to specify paint mixtures. Later in the war, shortages of pigments could also mean a big variation. Mass built ships were delivered in standard paint if available, but if not, they were delivered in what WAS available. Even some US escort carriers were delivered in 'battleship grey' because it was better to do that than keep the ship waiting for the right pigments to become available.

So you can feel reasonably free to use your own imagination as to how rigidly you should stick to the standard schemes.

This has been a fascinating and detasiled thread on a little know (to me) subject. Thanks to Jaegey for the thread, and to all the others for their info.

Mal … you are a God! : )

link

If you look at my ITALIAN merchant ship photographs you will see some colour illustrations of what they looked like.

Convoy OG79 will show you some Allied types. Also if you look in the photographs of the Narvik battle you will see a whole gaggle of my own model merchant ships gathered in the harbour.
They are done in 1940ish style.

For information. My wargames rule book for convoy battles in the 1941-42 era (Gibraltar run) is now in the hands of editors. It will have available with it, lots and lots of ship damage charts that I have prepared. These ALL feature colour illustrations of the vessels described, be they warships or merchants. So I have quite a store of coloured drawings I prepared. Many of these are the exact scheme various ships carried. With other drawings I have estimated, or simply shown them in a typical scheme for the period.

I'm always happy to share this sort of thing with other naval wargamers as long as requests are reasonable. None of the 'please give me 500 choices of ship paint scheme' type enquiries are welcome. I sort of expect people to do SOMETHING for themselves. But I certainly don't mind supplying a few illustrations and steering people on the right path.

Don't hesitate to let me know if I can be of help.