The Ypres Times.
219
was used in perfecting preparations. Construction of causeways over canals and across
marshes, taping routes to the jumping-off points near our front line, reconnaissance of the
enemy's positions, establishment of forward dumps, and liaison with their infantry com
rades no pains were spared, and every effort was made to bring the machines into action.
The opening attack of the 5th Army on July 31, 1917, was on the whole a success. The
enemy were driven from his front positions, for the weather, though now breaking, had been
fine. A number of the tanks managed to move forward, but owing to the rain and the
shelling the condition of ground was such that most of the tanks could not keep up with the
advancing infantry and became ditched. Acres of foul slime below, dark and heavy
clouds hanging low overhead, odours of gasses and corruption, a few tree-stumps, a few
bodies lying crumpled in the mud, half a dozen tanks labouring awkwardly in the middle
STRANDED TANK AT YPRES.
(By permission of Messrs. Hodder <5- Stou°hton.)
distance, and the shell-bursts shooting upward like vast ephemeral mushrooms,"* such
was the prospect that greeted those machines which could make any headway. Against
the strong points tanks were particularly effective, and in many instances the very
appearance of the tank created such consternation amongst the defenders that^they
immediately surrendered to the infantry.
But generally, the conditions proved too much for these machines, and in spite^of the
unditching beam with which each tank had been provided for the battle, and which
greatly prolonged the utility of a number of tanks, many of them came to grief. Here is
one picture J" The tank was sunk in mud to her belly, and would move only in one
direction. We arrived at length at a point abreast of the far edge of Kitchener's Wood
water lay everywhere about us, and immediately in front were two or three large shell-
holes, full to the brims. It being impossible to avoid them, G.46, like a reluctant suicide,
The Tank in Action, bv Captain D. G. Browne, M.C.
t Ibid.
