David,
According to the still-definitive ROYAL NAVY WARSHIP CAMOUFLAGE
1939-1945 (Almark, 1973) by Peter Hodges, on pp. 30-31:

Some ships had a non-slip cement-like overlay on their decks called
“Cemtex” whose natural mid-grey colour required no further treatment;
….

There is also a photo of HMS NELSON in 1941 showing her decks painted
over in dark gray to match her turret tops, etc.

I suspect the British would have also tried a dark blue or blue-green
as they used for vertical camouflage in the Mediterranean, generally, but
you are probably safe with dark gray.

(I bought a *beautifully*/accurately painted 1:1200 of the WWII HMS
EAGLE at Dick Sossi’s Ship Shop in Annapolis in 1993. Her deck is dark
gray.)

I’ll share your question with Mahan and MarHst-L and post any better
responses here.

Lou
Coatney, mslrc@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu

On Tue, 13 Jan 1998, Ferns1 wrote:
> Quick question for y’all: what color(s) did the British paint the flight
> decks of their carriers in WWII?
>
> I’m just looking for a simple, easy-to-paint answer here, rather than
> the definitive IPMS-grade paint scheme with FS595a references. I’m in
> the midst of painting the 1:6000 scale miniatures for the British WWII
> flattops, and while some people will attempt to put accurate paint
> schemes on these things (probably people sane enough to *not* buy the
> entire fleet like I am doing) I’m just putting on simple, quick schemes:
> light grey overall, appropriate deck color for carriers.
>
> One notices that one’s priorities change when painting these 1:6000
> ships en masse. In the old days, doing 1:2400 or 1:1200 scale ships, one
> would spend the time to put on historically accurate paint schemes,
> since one only had a dozen or so ships to paint up. It’s a *lot*
> different when you’re looking at the business end of 90+ ships sitting
> on the workbench, and that’s *only* the A-I class destroyers…
>
> DLF
> (finally got the WWII Japanese done, except the 7 packs of Kageros and
> Minekazes I still need. At this rate I could actually fulfill my New
> Year’s resolution and finish painting up my British and US fleets by the
> end of the year. YES!!! )
>
> ___________________________________________________________________
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