IV
We have traced a Tank from its setting forth from home with unscratched paint through the vicissitudes of battle to its remoulding as a greatly improved machine or to its relegation to “Permanent Base.”
How would the military history run of a member of a Tank crew which had fought, say, at the Battle of Cambrai?
We have already related how the Tank Corps was chiefly recruited in early days, that is, either from among mechanical experts or from volunteers from other branches of the Service. Later men with no special qualifications were taken by direct enlistment. We will suppose, however, that 1234 Pte. John Smith got his transfer from the West Surreys when in the line in about June 1917, and that at that moment the training schools in France had no vacancies. To their great joy, therefore, Pte. Smith and his batch would be sent home for training to the Tank Depot at Wool.
Here was a huge camp where men like themselves, who had seen fighting, and also men fresh from the Recruiting Depots, were being formed into the new Tank Battalions. By July about nine of these new Battalions were in training. The men went through the usual recruits’ curriculum. First of all, drill, discipline and physical training; then individual courses in Tank Gunnery, Driving and Maintenance. Then they would go through the Signalling, Revolver and Compass Schools, the Gas and Reconnaissance Schools.
There was also here an Officer Cadet Preliminary Training Company where the same sort of instruction was given. Gunners at this time did all their firing practice with 6-pounders at the Naval School of Gunnery, Chatham, or rather, to be exact, on “H.M.S. Excellent,” Whale Island. All the other courses were gone through in and around the camp.
Practically, only individual instruction was given at Wool, and their collective and tactical training was done by the men at Bermicourt, after their arrival in France. At Wool it was reckoned that, with this important omission, nearly four months would usually be occupied in raising and training a Tank Battalion. It would, therefore, be towards the end of September that Pte. Smith found himself in France.
He was, he found, to be detailed to one of the old Battalions, and was, therefore, despatched to the Training and Reinforcement Depot, then established at Erin, and later to be moved to Le Tréport.
Here he was attached to a Reception Company, put through a kind of examination in the subjects he had studied at Wool, but passing satisfactorily and his records being duly completed, he was issued with his kit and equipment and posted to his Company. He was soon sent to join it at an improvised training area where it was at this moment “resting” from the Battle of Ypres. It was not actually having a particularly restful time, as tactical training with the infantry was in progress, and there was more than enough night work in the programme.
SLEDGE-TOWING TANK TAKING UP SUPPLIES
BERMICOURT CHATEAU NEAR ST. POL.
TANK CORPS MAIN HEADQUARTERS
GUN-CARRYING TANK TAKING UP A HOWITZER
A WHIPPET GOING IN
This phase did not last long, however, for the Company was soon sent back to join its Battalion in the Salient, where they executed an astonishing number of moves and were considerably shelled, but never succeeded in getting into action.
After that they were hurried off to do intensive training for Cambrai. Then came the battle, in the last three days of which a very much exhausted 2nd Driver Smith was wounded in the face by a bullet splash. The trouble was not serious enough to get him to England, and on his return from an all too brief stay in a Hospital in France, he again found himself at the Depot. This time, after only a day in the Reception Company and after a medical examination, he was posted for fourteen days to the Seaside Rest Camp at Merlimont.
This Rest Camp consisted of rows and rows of rather pretty bungalows built among the sand dunes. Here both men and officers were given a very pleasant time, though they were still under military discipline and had a certain number of parades to keep. For the officers there was a comfortable club, and for the men an exceedingly well-run Y.M.C.A. hut, where there were concerts or pierrot shows almost nightly—either home-grown or imported.
Games and, in summer, swimming and bathing were great features. There is no doubt, first, that the Camp was immensely popular, and, secondly, that the Tank Corps owed a good deal of its cheerful spirit and high moral to the refreshment which the Camp afforded to many a weary body and mind.
After this fortnight by the sea Smith rejoined his Battalion, and was, with the rest of the Tank world, plunged into winter training.