I'm not a wargamer - I model in 1/700th, and I feel I need more precision. I can't shed any great light on Spanish colours for the period, but, with the possible exception of the French, each of the power's navies has now an historically accurate set of colour notes.
My own view is that in these navies/warships were very likely to be painted in the prescribed colours: This was peacetime and they were on show to everyone else and, with the exception of the Germans, close to a home dockyard supplied with pukka paint. So what colours were used?
ROYAL NAVY
Alan Raven has done great work in sorting out the shades used. For most RN ships operating off Spain (principally Mediterranean Fleet ships) these are given below. For what its worth Spanish ships seem to be a slightly darker shade than their RN counter parts, putting them between the two contemporary British greys and close to the WW2 AP507B or USN WW2 Haze Gray - note the choice of white for ID letters as opposed to black or red as in RN and Italian usage, perhaps suggesting a darker base tone. However, the German Dunkelgrau 51 seems little diferent in shade, and was only fractionally, if at all, darker than RN AP507C, so we're no nearer, I think.
All outside vertical surfaces : AP507C Light Grey - Introduced in 1920 this was a light grey with a distinct blue aspect, matching the 1930 BS381 shade number 31, and still in the current BS381c as 631. Alan Raven states that it matches the Munsell Book ofColors 1929 edition shade 5PB7/1.5. 1929 Munsell is almost impossible to get in the UK, and so I've translated this into the Methuen colour system as about 21B2 (see Mefhuen Handbook of Colour 3rd Edn Methuen 1978). For those with access to the US FS595a this is about 36495. In modellers terms it's white with Wumbrol 87 in the ratio of about 4:1 for use in 1/700 and larger - lighter and more neutral in smaller scales.
Decks: Metal decks were dark grey (AP507A - close to Humbrol 112); wood decks were scrubbed wood. Non slip areas medium brown linoleum in all classes until the I class destroyers, and semtex, a medium-dark green non-slip material for Tribal and later classes. The exact areas covered will vary with the class.
Details: Black "boot topping" along the waterline; Black pennant numbers on destroyers; red funnel bands edged white to indicate the flotilla. "Neutrality" stripes are on "B" gunhouse/turret - red leading.
Pennant Examples: H15 - Esk; D44 - Imogen; D09 - Imperial; H35 - Hunter; F24 - Maori.
References: Alan Raven: The Development of Naval Camouflage in World War II: Part III. In Plastic ship modeler 1997/1 pp. 16-26. (This a superb magazine, for ship fans - available on sub. In the UK via White Ensign Models Gardeners Cottage, Cowarne Court, Lower Eggleton, Ledbury, Herefordshire HR8 2UF). Excellent coverage of contemporary RN destroyers is given in John English 'Amazon to Ivanhoe ' World Ship Society, 1993.
GERMANY
The Kreigsmarine is very nicely documented in a new edition of Dieter Jung et al. 'Anstriche und Tamanstriche der deurschen Kriegsmarine' Bernard und Graefe Verlag, 1997 - this includes good colour notes, printed swatches and lots of photos (mostly WW2). Basic pre-war finish is ;
Water line : dark grey WL I and 11
Exteriors : light grey 50 (superstructure) and dark grey 51 (hull)
Metal decks: Bitumen Tf 99 - black - any wood decks were unpainted, and superstructure decks were covered in a reddish brown linoleum.
Pennant numbers and letters : white shaded black.
Neutrality markings : Red-white-Black, red foremost on Bruno and black foremoston Cesar mounts (or equivalents - that's B and X in RN terminology). These were usually applied as bands, but Konigsberg had flag shapes (Black uppermost) on the sides and roofs of her Cesar and Dora turrets. U boats seem to have had their stripes on their conning tower, vertically only.
However....it's worth noting that some units, Graf Spee for example, seem to have been 51 overall, as, it seems, were S-Boats, before changing to white, and most U- Boats. Some U-Boats at least had white, rather than Light grey conning towers
Matches for the greys are: 51 Dunkelgrau - very close to AP507C - hence FS595a36373 and white with Humbrol 87 or 27. Despite its name "Dunkelgrau" is a light grey. 50, Hellgrau is a pale grey near FS595a 36436. Mix as 51 but with more white, in effect just add in a touch of 27 to white. The contrast between these colours is very slight except when the hull is in shadow.
Pennant examples: MO on torpedo boat Mowe
References: Jung et al as cited above. Robert C Stern: Kriegsmarine... Squadron Signal, 1979.
ITALY
Falk Fletcher in Plastic ship modeller 1995/3 gives standard Regia Marina colours as: verticals Light grey - Grigio Chiaro with Grigio Scuro (Dark Grey) horizontals. He matches these to FS595a 16314 and 16099 respectively, which gives a light blue grey and a dark blue grey. Pletcher uses Humbrol 127 for the light and 32 for the dark - I'd suggest white with 27 or white with 87 for the light grey and 79+67/112+white for the dark grey - and notes that in weak light these colours look somewhat darker - as borne out by the FS matches - than one would expect. Black waterlines.
Delphis do very very tasty Italian vessels, mainly WW2 in 1/700 resin - available via White Ensign Models. ID letters are red for all craft smaller than cruisers, and are listed in Aldo Fraccaroli Italian warships of World War II, Ian Allan, 1968. Pre-WW2 examples are: OA - Oriani, FL - Fulmini; ST -Strale. No neutrality markings, of course.
FRANCE
No exact shades available at the time of writing. However, photographic coverage suggest greys very like those used by Italy. Neutrality stripes are Blue-White-Red in that order on what, in the RN, would be B and sometimes X mounts. Pennant numbers are very large and in white shaded black or what looks like red shaded black.
Submarines seem to have been grey-green overall, with possibly unpainted wooddecks.
Pennant samples: 8- on Le Malin, 2610 tonne class destroyer, 1938; 5 Aigle, 2400Tome class in 1932; X103 Le Terrible, 2610 class 1839. The prefix X or T was used on destroyers in 1939, but I cannot be sure if this came in in time for the Spanish Civil War - X103 on Le Terrible means "Large Destroyer, 10th Flotilla, 3rd ship".
References: Henri Le Masson 'Navies of the Second World War - The French Navy I' , Macdonald and Co, 1969 and Jean Labayle Couhat 'French Warships of World War One' Ian Allan, 1971.
Spanish Ships at Sea (Colour Discussion)
Back to Abanderado Vol. 3 No. 4 Table of Contents
Back to Abanderado List of Issues
Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List
© Copyright 1998 by Rolfe Hedges
This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com