Kangaroo (armoured personnel carrier)

Kangaroo
A Priest Kangaroo of 209th Self-Propelled Battery, Royal Artillery, transports infantry of 78th Division near Conselice, Italy, 13 April 1945.
Type	Armoured personnel carrier
Place of origin	Canada
Service history
In service	1943–1945
Production history
Designer	Guy Simonds
Designed	1944
Variants	Ram Kangaroo Priest Kangaroo Churchill Kangaroo Kangaroo Badger flame tank
Specifications
Crew	2 + 8 to 10 passengers
Main armament	1 × .50 cal MG (Early models) 1 × .30 cal MG (Later models) (Pintle mount)
Secondary armament	1 × .30 cal MG (Bow or cupola MG depending on model) Flamethrower (Kangaroo Badger: Replaced cupola MG)

A Kangaroo was a World War II Commonwealth or British armoured personnel carrier (APC), created by conversion of a tank chassis. Created as an expedient measure by the Canadian Army Kangaroos were so successful that they were soon being used by British forces.

Their ability to manoeuvre in the field with the tanks was a major advantage over earlier designs, and led to the dedicated APC designs that were introduced by almost all armies immediately after the war.

In July 1944, Lieutenant-General Harry Crerar's First Canadian Army was concerned by manpower shortages and Lieutenant-General Guy Simonds, commander of II Canadian Corps, devised Kangaroos as a way of reducing infantry losses.

The original Kangaroos were converted from 72 M7 Priest self-propelled guns of three field artillery regiments of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division who were involved in the initial assault on 6 June 1944.

(Self propelled artillery were known as 'Priests' in British service, because of the pulpit-like appearance of the artillery-spotter's position. When converted to the carrier role were referred to as "unfrocked" or "defrocked" Priests, but the term 'Kangaroo' was applied to any conversion of any previously gun-armed vehicle to that of a troop or general-purpose carrier.)

When the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division was re-equipped with towed 25 pounder guns in late July, their tracked vehicles were stripped of their 105mm guns, the front aperture welded over, then sent into service carrying twelve troops.

First used on 8 August 1944 during Operation Totalize south of Caen to supplement already available half-tracks when re-converted Kangaroos were returned to U.S. custody other vehicles pressed into service, the vast majority (some 500) being Canadian Ram gun tanks, which were standing idle after being used as training vehicles when Canadian armoured formations re-equipped with Shermans.