From the Tank Field Companies the salved machines were sent to the Central Workshops at Teneur. Here they were repaired, and this work entailed considerably more skill and labour than the initial assembly of the machines in the home factories on account of the shattered and burnt-out condition many of these machines were reduced to. Much of this repair work was carried out by Chinese labour and at these shops over 1,000 Chinese were quartered for work, schools being instituted for them so that mechanics, fitters, etc., could be trained.
Besides testing and repairing machines much other work was carried out at the Central Workshops—“gagget” making, experiments, making good minor deficiencies of manufacture and generally improving the machines. This work frequently consisted in “panic” orders, such as the sledge and fascine making for the battle of Cambrai. One hundred and ten tank sledges and 400 tank fascines, bundles of wood which will be mentioned later, when dealing with the battle of Cambrai, were ordered on October 24, 1917. The former required some 3,000 cubic feet of wood, weighing 70 tons, and the latter 21,500 ordinary fascines, representing some 400 tons of brushwood and over 2,000 fathoms of chain to hold them together. This order came on the top of a particularly strenuous period following the tank operations round Ypres. At the same time another order for the overhaul and repair of 127 machines was made.
Owing to the limited amount of time allowed for the transport of material from the base ports to the Central Workshops and from the Central Workshops to the forward area, extensive use was made of lorries. From November 10 to the 25th, twenty-eight lorries engaged on this work covered a total of 19,334 miles, averaging 690 miles per lorry, while three box cars averaged 1,242 miles each.
The part played by the 51st Chinese Labour Company, attached to the Workshops, materially contributed to the work being duly completed in time for the battle. Owing to the necessity for secrecy the personnel of the Workshops were without knowledge of the immediate urgency of the work they were engaged on. In spite of this all ranks worked with the utmost enthusiasm, accomplishing the task in the required time. During these three weeks the Central Workshops were working 22½ hours out of every 24 without a break, and had it not been for the “grit” displayed by all ranks the battle of Cambrai could not have been fought, and without this battle the whole course of the war might have been changed; for it was the battle of Cambrai, as we shall shortly see, which demonstrated the full power of the tank and which placed it henceforth in the van of every battle.
CHAPTER XVII
THE THIRD BATTLE OF GAZA
As a result of the repulse sustained by the British forces at the Second Battle of Gaza in April 1917, the troops operating were withdrawn from their exposed position and the Tank Detachment was concentrated in a fig grove some 2,000 yards west of Sheikh Nebhan, at which place it was later on reinforced by three Mark IV machines.
A new plan of operations was drawn up in which the Turkish defences from Outpost hill to Ali El Muntar, which had resisted the combined onslaught of several divisions, was to be turned by an extensive flanking movement west of Gaza. This operation was to take place in conjunction with an attack on Beersheba.
The general plan of attack was as follows: