A training fleet with a complicated family history
The Vickers Medium Mark II was a development of the earlier Mark I and became an important vehicle in British interwar mechanization. Its historical value lies in training, exercises, technical adaptation and the experience of organizing mobile armored units as much as in the tank's physical specifications. The vehicle is described as a family with production changes, later modifications, foreign patterns and specialized equipment, not one fixed configuration throughout its life. Sources
Its labels remain uncertain. Mark II, II*, IIA, II**, IIA* and close-support references are associated with different changes, while Australian Special Pattern and Soviet export accounts describe foreign requirements and service. A command installation or bridging experiment does not automatically represent another production series. Some family details remain uncertain. Sources
Developing the earlier medium
The Mark I had appeared in 1923; Published accounts describe introduction of the Mark II in 1925. The newer tank retained the general idea of a relatively mobile, turreted vehicle but altered the hull and fittings. More protection around the running gear, changes to the driver's position and ventilation, and other detail improvements distinguished it from its predecessor. These were practical responses within an existing vehicle concept, rather than an entirely unrelated tank design. Sources
British mechanization experiments gave the vehicle a role beyond testing individual components. Tank units used the mediums to develop movement, communications and cooperation with other arms. The account connects them with the Experimental Mechanised Force and later exercises, while distinguishing such employment from battlefield service. Their usefulness as a training fleet does not establish that every theoretical role had been demonstrated in combat. Sources
Production accounting remains unsettled. The accounts record figures around 131, 142 and 160 or more, alongside a the cited accounts range covering Mark I and Mark II together. Neither the largest figure nor an average of the smaller ones is a justified solution. The cited accounts do not firmly establish Contracts, completions, export vehicles, conversions and the boundary with Mark I. Sources
Layout, protection and automotive equipment
The family retained a five-man crew, a rotating main turret and a riveted hull. The published technical account separates the driver's position, fighting space and automotive equipment, and describes running-gear protection as a conspicuous change from the earlier medium. Even where the basic arrangement remained recognizable, changed fittings and turret details can identify a particular production or modification state. Sources
Protection was light. The source retains roughly 6–12 mm values across descriptions, with 12 mm associated with the museum's Mark II* account. They are not grounds for describing the entire family as uniformly protected to a single thickness. Crew exposure and vision arrangements also mattered, and external resemblance does not establish an unchanged interior. Sources
The account commonly gives an Armstrong-Siddeley engine of about 90 hp, with technical details and performance figures drawn largely from secondary summaries. The museum-derived II* entry gives 13.45 tons and 15 mph, or about 24 km/h. Other sources use different weights and speed values. Sources
Armament and close-support distinctions
The main gun in the standard gun-tank account was the 47 mm QF 3-pounder. Machine-gun descriptions vary with configuration: sources list different totals, and Australian tanks were not necessarily identical to every British modification state. A count of mountings, a count of weapons carried and a photographed installation is not established as the same evidence. Sources
Close-support vehicles used a different weapon arrangement. A listed 1936 War Office handbook concerns a 3.7-inch mortar in Mark II*, II** and IIA tanks. The title alone does not establish that every vehicle with one of those suffixes carried that weapon; detailed installations are not confirmed by the material cited here. Sources
Radio fittings, turret alterations and command use likewise need dated descriptions. A bustle or aerial in a photograph may help identify a state but cannot establish universal equipment throughout the fleet. Ammunition stowage and exact sight models remain incomplete for several configurations. Sources
Exports and national patterns
Australia received a small fleet that provides particularly valuable photographic evidence. Published accounts give a specific October 1927 Sydney arrival account and later summaries using 1929. These may concern different milestones, but the available material does not prove a reconciliation. Order, arrival, acceptance and entry into organized service remains separate fields until the records establish them. Sources
Different armament fittings, unit organization and later use belong to the national service history rather than being retroactively imposed on all British vehicles. Their training life also outlasted the original interwar development period. Sources
The Soviet export account, commonly associated with the name English Workman and a reported fifteen vehicles, is less securely supported in the cited sources than the British and Australian material. It remains explicitly qualified pending procurement and service documentation. Foreign purchase claims, offers and confirmed operators does not add indiscriminately to an apparently worldwide service map. Sources
Service, special roles and limitations
The British vehicles supported Royal Tank Corps training and exercise work. The museum vehicle is associated in the cited sources with 5th Battalion markings and later driver training in 1940. Those are useful individual-history anchors, but neither establishes a uniform history for every surviving hull or variant. Retirement dates also vary according to whether front-line suitability, training use or final disposal is being described. Sources
Reported use on the North-West Frontier and later North African static-defense employment remain unconfirmed. The account does not turn those leads into a detailed combat narrative. The same restraint applies to claims about which modifications accompanied a particular deployment. The published stronger story concerns experimentation, training and the limitations of light protection and aging mechanical equipment. Sources
Specialized bridging, box-body and command references remains unresolved in published figures. Their physical changes and equipment may ultimately justify separate articles, but their quantities cannot simply be added to the production total without establishing whether existing tanks were converted. The Mark II's many uses are evidence of adaptation; they do not remove the need for a vehicle-by-vehicle or contract-based count. Sources
A gallery of dated exterior views
The six images are exterior photographs: one British exercise scene and five Australian views. They show movement, formation, rear details and individual fittings, but none is a documented interior photograph. Several embedded archival copies are around 640 pixels wide, making them useful for modestly sized illustrations while leaving better-source-file acquisition as a separate task. Sources
The photographs can illuminate how the fleet was actually used while the unresolved production and configuration questions remain openly recorded. Sources
Photographs and image credits
Background reading and references. Each photograph has its own source and credit.
Sources and further reading
Background reading and references. Each photograph has its own source and credit.
- TM — The Tank Museum, "Tank Medium, Mark II*"
- NAM — National Army Museum, "Vickers Mark 2 medium tanks, Tidworth, 1928"
- IWM — Imperial War Museum, Vickers Medium Mk II interior photograph, MH 11705
- AWM-P02483.008 — Australian War Memorial, "Liverpool, NSW. 7-12 March 1938. Vickers Mark 2 Medium Tanks"
- AWM-P02835.036 — Australian Mk IIA photograph, c. 1939, public-domain image
- AWM-P01440.010 — Puckapunyal training, c. October 1941, rear-view public-domain image
- AWM-P01388.002 — Puckapunyal AFV School, c. 1942, public-domain image
- AWM-133675 — Australian War Memorial, "Vickers Medium Tank MkIIA (Special Pattern)"
- Morrison — James C. Morrison, Mechanising an Army: Mechanisation and the Conversion of the Light Horse, 1920-1943, Land Warfare Studies Centre
- AAJ 2024 — Later Australian summary; date conflict on 1929 delivery/service context
- MLRS/War Office 1930 — War Office, Handbook for Marks II, II* and IIA Medium Tanks, 1930; MLRS Books reprint page
- Armor Archives — Yuri Pasholok / Armor Archives, "Medium Tank Mk.II: Interbellum Long-Liver"
- Britannica — Encyclopaedia Britannica, Vickers Medium tank summary
- TE — Tank Encyclopedia / Tank-AFV.com secondary articles on Vickers Medium Mk II and related Vickers media — and related pages