Details of the destroyed MkIV C-31 British tank.
3rd Ypres. 22nd August 1917
8 Company, C Battalion, with 15th Division, XIX Corps, 5th Army
8 Company had 10 fighting tanks and two supply tanks in action on 22nd August 1917
7 Section - Lt H.W. Johnston
C31, 2045, "Crocodile", 2Lt Franklin CWF
C32, 2728, "Crab", 2Lt Whyte WR
C33, 2046, "Crustacean", 2Lt Robinow W.
C34, 2729, "Caterpillar", 2Lt Raw RJ
Orders
Deployment positions near old British front line between Wietje and Mill Cott.
The tanks were to spearhead the attack.
7 Section - Southern
Section to advance along Ypres - Zonnebeke Road. (H3) in support of 45th Brigade (OH).
Zero hour: 4:45am
7 Section
The road in the vicinity of Frezenberg had been entirely obliterated by artillery fire and the tanks were thus unable to follow it, none of the tanks crossed the British front line, all having to be abandoned and left in the field.
C32 Bellied twice just after leaving the starting point, it was abandoned as the unditching gear was broken. C31 proceeded a few hundred yards before it was hit three times and had its left track broken. C34 almost made it to Frezenberg before it became ditched 200 yds and then lost a track to a direct hit. C33 made it the furthest before becoming bellied and flooded in a shell crater just beyond Frezenberg at 5:30am.
R.I.P. to all the brave men who fought and died that day in 1917.
2 окт 2020
