Book Review
“Staghound Armored Car: 1942-62”
by Steven Zaloga
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Title
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Staghound Armored Car: 1942-62
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Author, Editor and/or Illustrator
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By Steven J. Zaloga
Illustrations by Peter Bull
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Publisher
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Osprey Publishing (New Vanguard Series #159)
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Subject
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Armored Car
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Media
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Soft cover Book
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Number of Pages
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48
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Number/Type of Photos and or Illustrations
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(36) Black & White Photographs, (2) Color Photographs, (13) Color Illustrations and (7) B/W Illustrations.
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Text Language
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English
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Review Summary
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Review Type
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Normal Read
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Basic Positive Features
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Great book to learn the basic information/general history of the Staghound armored car.
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Basic Negative Features
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The black and white line drawings are a bit disappointing.
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Recommendation
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Highly Recommended
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Detailed Review
Book Content
One of Osprey Publishing’s latest offerings in their New Vanguard Series is the book, “Staghound Armored Car: 1942-62”. It is authored by the prolific military author Steven Zaloga and covers the Staghound Armored Car from development through its post-World War Two use. The main content of the book is set up as follows:
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Development
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Origins
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Trackless Tank
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The Chevrolet T17E1
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Variants
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Staghound Anti-Aircraft (T17E2)
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Howitzer Staghound (T17E3)
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Specialized Staghounds (Including communications and mine clearing versions)
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Staghounds in Service
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The Staghound Enters Combat
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The Staghound in North-West Europe
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Post-War Service
Accuracy of Information
The accuracy of the information provided by the author is excellent.
I did not identify any wrong or misleading information contained in this book and there is absolutely no reason for me to believe the information is inaccurate in any way. I don’t think I missed any significant errors either. The sources I used to check the accuracy of the book are:
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“Armored Car- A History of American Wheeled Combat Vehicles” by Richard Hunnicutt;
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"Staghound Armoured Cars: Profile of a Long-Lived Family of Chevrolet-Built Wheeled AFV's" (Wheels & Tracks Issue #32);
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“The Staghound: A Visual History of the T17E Series Armored Cars in Allied Service – 1940-1945” by David Doyle
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“The Staghound in Canadian Service” by Roger Lucy;
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“T17E1 Staghound Vehicle Technical Manual (TM 9-741)” CD ROM by Easy One Productions;
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“U.S. Military Wheeled Vehicles” by Fred Crismon; and
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WarWheels.Net website (Staghound Vehicle Indices).
Editing of Information/ Text Flow
The text flow (e.g. the writing ability of the author) and editing of the information provided is very good. I also found the book easy to read, informative and it more than sufficiently described and explained the photos in the book. The only point that could be considered a “negative” issue is that there is a small mistake in the book’s table of contents. The table states the “Variants” section should start on page 18, when it really starts on page 17. However, being that we all should have half a brain, I’m sure we can get over this “error”.
Photograph and/or Illustration Quality and Selection
The photographs provided in this book are primarily used to “tell the story” of the Staghound, rather than being the focus of this book. Therefore, there are not huge numbers of photos provided in general, or many color photographs specifically. However, the quality of the photographs is from good to excellent, with most being very clear and crisp. Although I’ve seen books with better quality photographs, in this case, the photos were not picked primarily for their quality, but for their content.
Regarding the photographs provided by Mr. Zaloga, they are exceptional in selection and variation. There is a combination of photographs taken during the manufacturing process, some provided by the US government as well as many “in action” photos. The photographs do indeed “tell the story” of the Staghound quite effectively.
The (13) color illustrations created by Peter Bull are good as well. They give a nice representation of the vehicles decked out in their camouflage and markings. However, the (7) black/white line drawings are a bit disappointing due to the fact that a good proportion of them (5) are relatively small. The remaining two b/w drawings (which represent a scale plan of the interior) are a bit below average in clarity and ‘crispness’. In fact, they look like they may be copies from a vehicle manual, rather than illustrations done by Mr. Bull. Finally, all of the black and white line drawings do not have any scale listed. If I had to guess, the (5) smaller drawings look to be close to 1/72 and the (2) larger ones look to be close to 1/35. However, I am not sure. With all this being said, the weakness of the black and white drawings alone is not a reason that should prevent you from buying this book.
Use as Reference
Like many Osprey books, the apparent purpose of this book is to give the reader a basic understanding/general history of the Staghound armored car. It provides information from the inception of the Stag all the way through its post-World War Two use. In fact, although the book’s title indicates it only covers the Staghound through 1962, there is even some information provided by Mr. Zaloga that discusses the use of the Stag into the 1980’s! I have to say that I was very happy to see that the book contained information about the post-World War Two use of the Staghound. When it comes to available information about the Stag, information about its post war use is usually very limited or non-existent. In fact, I would have gladly liked to have seen more information related to the Stag’s “second life”. Mr. Zaloga and Osprey Publishing definitely succeed in providing a great book to whet our appetites about the Staghound.
Finally, although the book contains many wonderful photographs, it is not meant to be a “photographic encyclopedia” of the Staghound nor is its purpose to provide detail photographs for modelers or vehicle enthusiasts. Although I don’t consider this a negative point of the book as these purposes are outside its focus, I do want to make sure you know what you’re getting for your Dollar, Pound, Yen, Euro, Etc.
Quality of Print Medium
This soft cover book is “typical” of Osprey Publishing’s format. If you’ve seen one Osprey book, you’ve seen them all. Assuming you haven’t ever seen an Osprey book, they come in an 7 ¼”
x 9 ¾” format and the soft cover media is of very good quality. The construction of the book facilitates fairly frequent use/reading of the book, but won’t hold up extraordinarily well to abuse. Obviously, all soft cover books suffer from the fact that they don’t hold up as well as hard cover books. However, in my opinion Osprey uses a paper stock for their books which is above average when compared to other similar products.
Conclusion
True to their reputations, Mr. Zaloga and Osprey Publishing have created a book that gives readers a very nice basic understanding/general history of the Staghound armored car. It provides information from the inception of the Staghound all the way through its post-World War Two use. In my opinion, the only weakness of the book is related to the black and white line drawings. However, that is not a reason that should prevent you from buying this book.
Thanks to Osprey Publishing Company for the review sample.