greg3 Posted August 24, 2017 Posted August 24, 2017 (edited) Untitled by g.nat, on Flickr August 1917 and the Great War had been raging for almost 3 years. In an effort to break the stalemate, the British began an offensive that would become known the Battle of Passchendaele. Part of the plan was to use tanks to cross no-mans land. One such tank was F41, nicknamed “Fray Bentos” by its crew (After a popular brand of tinned meat) On 22nd of August 1917, F41 was one of several tanks took part in an assault on a German strongpoint centred around Gallipoli farm. By this time, heavy rain had turned the ground to mud and most of the tanks soon bogged down, leaving just Fray Bentos to reach its objective. As the tank got within a few dozen yards of the german lines, one of the drivers was hit by enemy fire penetrating a vision slit and the tank veered of course into a shell hole. Attempts to drive out failed and so one of the men (L. Cpl Ernest Braedy) volunteered to go outside and attach the unditching beam (a large reinforced wooden beam that could be chained to the tracks for traction) but before he could complete the task he was killed by enemy fire. At this point, the tank’s commander, Captain Donald Richardson, realised that although they were immobilised and their main 6-pounder guns were now useless (one was stuck in the mud, the other pointing skyward) the tanks machine guns could still hurt the enemy. This was proved correct when they were able to break up a German counter attack against the British. Of course this attracted the attention of the Germans and they launched an attack to try and capture or destroy the tank. For the next 3 days, the crew fought off attack after attack. At one point a German soldier forced open a hatch and threw in a grenade but one of the crew threw it back out. Eventually, out of food and water (having had to resort to drinking radiator water), with all but one man injured and down to their last few rounds of ammunition, the final straw was coming under fire from their own side who believed that the tank was about to fall into enemy hands. Captain Richardson gave the order to abandon the tank. One at a time the weary men slipped out under the cover of darkness and made it back to the British lines (taking the tanks machine guns with them!!) All the survivors received awards, becoming the most decorated tank crew of the war: Captain Donald Richardson 2nd Lt George Hill Sgt Robert Missen Gunner William Morrey Gunner Ernest Hayton, Gunner Frederick Arthurs, Gunner Percy Budd Gunner James Binley .Lance Corporal Ernest Braedy (shot and killed as he got out to try and access the unditching gear) I came across this amazing story when looking for references to make a microscale Mk IV tank MOC and couldn’t resist trying to recreate the scene. I wanted to try and copy a (probably exaggerated) newspaper illustration from the time of Germans crawling all over the tank - using microscale figures turned out to be very fiddly!!! Untitled by g.nat, on Flickr A few more views... Untitled by g.nat, on Flickr Untitled by g.nat, on Flickr Untitled by g.nat, on Flickr 35967104763_40272065bc_o by g.nat, on Flickr Anyway, comments are welcome (I’ll probably post pics of the tank itself later - as I'm quite pleased with how it came out! ) Edited August 24, 2017 by greg3 Quote
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