Color of US Omaha Beach Uniforms?

Thanks Shorty!

This is actually kind of a weird coincidence, the diorama I was originally working on that I was talking about in the original post never really got finished, but just last night I was starting to get stuff together to maybe take another stab at an Omaha dio, just in time to log on and see this post.

yes i know this post is very late but i thought i might as well pop something in as i have had a very similar problem as i have been trying to build an amaha beach diorama too. what i found after extensive reasearch is that the basic uniform worn by soldiers on the normandy beaches would have been a greenish buff/karki colour jacket, with brown trousers (thats pants to those in the USA), they would also have had on some gaiters of anklets (around the bottom of the trousers/top of boots) that would have been a very similar colour to the jacket (less green but just plain buff) they would also have had on brown boots. there is then a big but, as  mamny of these uniforms would have been different, to satrt with tank crew would have worn a buff coloured 'windcheater' jacket, and these were some times worn by the infantry (they were very prized pieces of uniform). The other major differecne in colour is the fact that there was a different set of clothing for training, this was called herringbone twill (or HBT), and this was a dark green colour, aswell as being worn for training this would aslo have been worn on amphibious operations such as tunisia, and also for normandy. so on the beaches there would have been some men in the plain basic unioform, some in HBT and some in a mix, so basic jacket with HBT trousers, or the other way round.

 

 

Also remeber that some soldiers uniforms got wet when they hit the water before the beach so the unifrms would also be a dar aolive drab and a dark Khaki.

Hey- great site. Just bookmarked it. Thanks, MM

SteveM 

The vast majority of troops still had the M1941 jacket.  The coloring on these jackets was a  green tinted khaki, with use and washing it became a light tan color, slightly darker than Tamiya's Buff.  All that really matters is that you use the correct uniform, coloring varied so much that it is impossible to define an exact color.  Anyone that says that _____ paint is the only color that matches is kidding themselves.  The M1943 uniform was issued to troops in Italy in the early spring of 1944, but was not issued in the rest of the ETO until supplies of the M1940/41 had all but disappeared.  This occured in the fall of 1944.  The color of the pants varied between OD and brown.  As far as footwear, service shoes and leggings...Oh yes, they still were in these.  As with the rest of the M1943 uniform, the boots with the two buckle leather gaiters attached didn't break out in quantity until the fall.  So what you end up having are troops wearing a uniform that was very similar to those in North Africa.    Here is a website I use for uniform colors.

Must bear in mind that all of the soldiers were wet, darkening any standard uniform color. Wet khaki is not the same color as dry khaki. Same for OD.

For color research for the different uniforms on Omaha, try looking up reenacting sites for the 29th, Rangers, etc. In addition, go to the Saving Private Ryan website. There's a good index w/ photos for most all of the gear, uniforms, helmets, etc. 

SteveM 

There are a lot of different factors that may or may not have played into each soldier's individual uniform.  Exposure to salt water would speed up bleaching of any fabric, for example - my father served in both the Army and AAC in WW2 and he told me once that they would soak their khaki pistol belts in salt water and lay them out in the sun in order to bleach them (to mimic the MPs' white pistol belts).

It may or may not be authentic, but the first season of Combat! presented the soldiers landing on Omaha in the older-style short khaki jackets, OD trousers and high-top leather shoes with leggings.  There was a big deal made about replacements coming up to the lines with the later-issue leather combat boots.

From dealing win the past with Tamiya 1/35 figurines, it should be easy enough to differentiate between the early and later styles of uniform; earlier uniforms landing on June 6 would have definitely signified veterans of North Africa and/or Italy, and the more action the soldier had seen, the lighter would be the shade of their uniform - jackets and trousers.  I'm not 100% certain if the later style jackets & boots were worn by any units landing on D-Day, but if they were they would have been new, and thus very close to the original color/shade.

 

wow, sounds like a VERY cool movie.  Glad for a reference that dependable as well, I would hate to paint 50 or so figures to find out they were the complete wrong color.  Thanks a ton!

Sorry I missed this one earlier.  I have a DVD titled D-Day in Color, a very cool disc that entails not only color footage of the invasion but stock footage of Britain itself, the training operations, fighter ops, and more.  I have several DVDs of color footage in WWII. 

Now to your question.  The uniforms in the DVD look mostly regular issue drab green.  That is the shirts and the pants are green.  The jackets/overcoats are khaki.  You can see very clearly that the jacket is a completely different color than the pants.  The shoes are a dark brown and the covering, what ever you call the piece of uniform that covers the top of the boot and the bottom portion of the leg is khaki.  Most of the backpacks and other accessories are khaki. 

The commentary portion of this particular DVD states that the reason why there is so little color film of D-Day is that there were, based on some estimates, fewer than twenty color cameras rolling on June 6th.  When the photographers got to the beach, the fighting was so fierce, that most of them stopped being photographers for the moment and they simply had to save their own lives.  There is actually very little film, b/w or color, at all of D-Day due to the limitations of the day.  The water, the beach, the sand, the fight itself took its toll on cameras and the camera operators.    

There is an extraordinary piece of added commentary about the Pathfinders, the troops who were dropped from C-47s behind enemy lines to lead the way for the invasion.  There is remarkable color footage of the plane, tail number 293098, that was the first plane in the air that night.  The invasion stripes appear to be still wet from application.  Parts of the plane are still masked off where the stripes are painted.  And the stripes themselves are rather shabby.  Brushed on, unven edges, and for the most part, looking like the job was done in haste.      

In the Osprey book D-Day (part 1), there is a great picture of troops going up the beach in a line, some with khaki uniforms, some in OD uniforms.

 i've seen kakhi uniforms and tan uniforms also before

Generally I believe that they were supposed to be the same color but it depends on the dye lot numbers of the cloth and the different manufacturers.  Some could have been faded more from wear, and some units might have recived new uniforms before they shipped out.  The same thing is true today with todays unfiorms.  There a great variety in shades with the new uniforms of today.  You could have a slightly different shade between different units as they probably received uniforms at different times.  Another thing to look at is whether the uniforms are wet from the surf as they will be alot darker.