A Company of Tanks

r and Oct

he mud in a series of little local attacks, which too often failed, could scarcely have realised that there was a distinct lull in the battle. We were pulling ourselves together for another enormous effort. The guns were pushed forward, and mor

ttack. If it had not been for the growl of the guns, an occasional shell in Poperinghe while we were bargaining for greengages, or the perseverance of the enemy airmen, who dropped bombs somewhere in the neighbourhood each fine night, we might have forgotten

ck hair, a pleasant mouth, and the most marvellous teeth. Our friendship

e all thought so, because, if she had no dachshund blood in

op, and he possessed such a store of the barber's polite conversation that to listen was to become home-sick. So

uld scarcely have approached, if it had not

ecating cough w

strength, and their line bent and almost broke. We threw in Division after Division, attacking day after day. We thrust him back to the fringes of the Houthulst Forest. We crawled along the Passchendaele Ridge, and on the

anks. His company did excellent work, though, as had become customary in the Salient, only a few of his tanks returned. One tank particularly distinguish

ion had fought at the end of August. Our progress in a month, though we thought it to be satisfactory at the time, had not been astonishingly rapid. It was determined to clear Poelcapelle as soon as possible, since, while the German

company had just returned from Wailly, where they had greatly improved their driving by hard practice over the derelict trenches.

close field-gun range, was now respectably "behind the line." It was only shelled once or twice a night, and during the day on state occasions. It could not hop

section even found their way along the remains of a track so obliterated by shell-fire that it scarcely could be traced on the aeroplane photographs, and "bolted" the enemy from a number of strong points. Then, having placed the infantry in

rman gun which could bear had been turned upon it, and by dusk the enemy ha

er, of course, changed. A few days of drying sun and wind were followed by g

pelled us to take to the mud at the side. In places the surface had been blown away, so that the road could not be distinguished from the treacherous riddled waste through which it ran. To leave the road was obviously certain disaster for a tank. Other compa

two derelict tanks, when the enemy, whose shells had been f

e 8th. All the tank commanders and their first drivers had reconnoitred the road from St Julien to the outskirts of Poelcapelle. The attack was to be

ust that my temporary driver could not see in the dark. Naturally, no lights were allowed on the roads, and the night was black with a fluster of rain. After two minor collisions on

traffic, and in the side streets I was desperately alone. The sight of a military policeman comforted me, and, leaving the poor broken houses

e traffic; so, leaving the ambulance, I wormed my way through the transport, and, passing the big guns on the near side of the crest which the enemy had held for so many y

d house in St Julien, but when we arrived we discovered that it was already occupie

e persistently. One shell burst just outside our door. It killed two men and blew two into our

d, paying no attention to it whatever, began to uncover their tanks and drive them out from the ru

had been driven so adroitly into a ruin that for several hours we could not extract

might be blocked. A slip?-?and the tank would lurch off into the mud. The road after the rain would have been difficult enough in

ischief was done. For half an hour S. did his best, but on the narrow slippery road he could not swing his tank sufficiently to c

, they would see to it that the attack never developed. By 4.30 A.M. the enemy had put down a barrage on every possible approach to the forward area. And the Poelcapelle

dine and hot tea. A few wounded men, covered with thick mud, came in, but none were ke

fore "zero," but the activity of the guns worried me. The Poelcapelle Road was no place for a tank on suc

e line. It was still very dark, but, though the moon had

e was a deep shuddering boom in the distance, and a shell groaned and whined overhead. That may have been a signal. There were two or three quick flashes and reports from howitzers quite near, which had not yet fired. Then suddenly on every side of us and above us a tremendous uproar arose; the

le breakfast before t

driver, cursing the darkness, peered ahead or put his ear to the slit, so that he could hear the instructions of his commander above the roar of the engine. The corporal "on the brakes" sat stiffly beside the driver. One man crouc

unditch the tank which he had

the tanks. The German gunners had decided that no tank should reach Poelcapelle

passing a derelict. The two tanks in front went on. Behind,

each tank in turn slipped off into the mud. Their crews, braving the shells, attached the unditching beams?-?fumbling in the dark with slippery spanners, while red-hot bits flew past

bled out, all of them wounded, and Skinner brought them back across country. The second, seeing that the road in front was hopelessly blocked?-?for the leading tank was in the centre of the f

grey country like a mist. First a bunch of wounded came, and then in the distance we saw a tank officer with his orderly. His head was bandaged and he walked

pt apologising?-?his inexperience might lead him to exaggerate?-?perhaps he ought not to have come back, but they sent him back because he was wounded; of course, if he had been used to such things he would not have minded so much?-?he was sorry he could not make a b

they dribbled in, though one man was killed by a chance shell on the way. Talbot, the old dragoon, who had fought right thro

ilway a mile distant. Limbers passed through and trotted toward the line. Fresh infantry, clean and obviously straight from rest, halted in the village. The officers asked quietly for news. At last Cooper and I turned away and tramped the weary muddy miles

Mr King has got some whi

for hot

n to feel that we were dogged by ill-fortune: the contrast between the magnificent achievement of Marris's company

too much for individual enterprise. In the following week, after the enemy at last had been driven beyond Poelcapelle, I sent Wyatt's section forward to St Jul

Langemarck Roads and deploy in the comparatively unshelled and theoretically passable country beyond. To us, perhaps prejudiced by disaster, the scheme appeared fantastic enough: the two roads could so e

gs, informed their readers that Passchendaele had fallen. The event roused little comment or interest. Now,