THE TANK.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1644, 30 November 1916, Page 4

THE TANK.

APPEARANCE AT THE ERONT. AN AUCKLANDER’S STORY. One of (lie most graphic descriptions of the work of the Tanks on the. Western front that lias yet come to hand is given by Signaller Alfred W. J. Maitland, of Auckland: Tanks! ! Personally I prefer the old name, Caterpillar, the name all the boys fondly call them. The old uante Is certainly fhe most descriptive, but, If officials insist on them Tanks —Tanks they will no doubt be —nevertheless, (hey are still Caterpillars, The arrival of the awesome machines of war occasioned not a little surprise, in fact everyone within glass range focussed on the distant hills as the long string of

awful creatures came apparently unceasingly into view. They gave one the impression of a hundred stranded whales following each other overland wilh some magic propelling energy —hut this was to (he expectant eye —the exact trightfulness the Germans experienced at a later stage is almost too awful to he translated into English. MEN DELIRIOUS WITH JOY.

Our hoys were delirious wilh joy at their advent —not at the damage they imagined they would do —not at the indescribable confusion they were likelv to cause —not at the immense, almost incalculable value they were likely to prove to the Allies, hut at their own absolutely ludicrous impossibility manifested in actual reality lie fore their own eves. Imagine an immense steel land-boat taking a straight course for a given objective, encountering a nuize of trenches, crawling tedious! v up one side of the trenches, carefully stretching over, feeling its way down to terra lirma again, and then readjusting itself, as if by magic, on the other side; imagine immense shell craters till (eel across and a dozen feel deep, and this awful crealure crawling laboriously, wilh annoying accuracy, in and out and over to the oilier side; think ot piles of trees broken by shell-lire crossed as if limy were a howling green; conjure up the picture of a village in ruined heaps ol bricks reprcscnling an almost invulnerable fortress of machine-guns being upproa died by lids monster absolutely wilhoul tear; see il climbing over and about (he heaps, and one by one wiping out I Ik* hidden ambushes, all of which were powerless to retaliate, until the German fortress was converted to a shelterground for our own infantry and you can almost conjure up enough thoughts to make you smile in unbelief. See it in action, and you would experience the blissful enjoyment tile hovs did.

GERMANY’S UNDIGNIFIED

FLIGHT

Ali thoughts ol' Hying' fragments were forgotten in 1 lisit first examination. dusters oJ; ism fairly danced with delight, and handy a wink of sloop blessed tludr eyes in ihe anticipation of the oiled on (he morrow. As was hound to ho the ease, the event fill morrow arrived, and in front of our incomparable infantry the Tanks crawled forward —and Fritz saw them oinning. The lirsl effect was one ot stupefaction. Almost to a man they stood up iji open-mouthed amazement, forgetting completely the shells bursting overhead in this newperil. This speedily changed to foolhardiness, and every machinegun and rilie in the trenches was trained on them. They might as well have lived at liangitoto; the monster, undisturbed, came on. Then came a panic, and half endeavoured an nndignilied (light, but the Tanks took no notice till, mounting the parapet and settling themselves calmly across the trench, raked the Hying Germans with machine-guns, smashed the remnants in the trenches wit It the four-pounders, and cleared (lie way for the jubilant infantry to enter with (riding losses. One German colonel was so overcome ilml he gave himself up without a struggle, and a tank’ obligingly accommodated him inside till lie collM he bid ter disposed of. In fact, anything impossible was child's play to I lie Tanks. There had been no doubt as to what their effect would lie, hut the evev-lmoy-ant Tommy hardly dared to hope for (he absolute demoralisation they caused and the very evident amj awful horror they stamped in the mind of that master of atrocities —• the German.