Chassis components were purchased from Ford Canada and fitted with a four-wheel drive train produced by the American company Marmon–Herrington[5] (hence the designation).

The armament was UK-made (with the exception of the U.S.-made M1919 Browning machine gun), and armour plates were produced by the South African Iron & Steel Industrial Corporation (ISCOR).

[6] Mark II "Middle East Model" denoted the vehicles serving with British forces in the North African campaign.

Marmon–Herringtons saw extensive combat in North Africa, being the only armoured car available to Commonwealth divisions in sufficient numbers, and had a reputation as a dependable, if somewhat light and undergunned, vehicle.

Besides those cars utilised for reconnaissance, others were adopted for use as mobile command posts, military ambulances, recovery vehicles, and Royal Air Force liaison.

Local crews adopted the earlier South African configuration of twin Vickers machine guns; in Dutch service these were designated Zuid-Afrikaanse pantserautos and continued to serve as late as the Indonesian National Revolution.

About 4,500 were used by South African units, while others were employed by British, Indian, New Zealand, Greek, Free French, Polish, Dutch East Indies, and Belgian forces.

The Greek army used Marmon–Herringtons in the islands of the Aegean well into the 1990s, in mechanized infantry battalions of special composition, alongside Jeeps, M-113s, and Leonidas AFVs.