大象传媒

One of the first men to serve in tanks during World War One was a grocer鈥檚 son from Mansfield. Billy Foster, whose family ran a store on Alma Terrace, now part of Chesterfield Road, was 22 when he enlisted.

He joined the heavy section of the Machine Gun Corps, later going on to man a 6-Pounder gun in a Mark 1 tank during the earliest battle they were deployed on; 15 September 1916.

Having arrived in France with D Battalion in late August, he was deployed with his tank, D 24, a few weeks later near to Bazentin Le Petit. In the early hours of 15 September, the eight man crew, commanded by Lt Walter Stones, set off to fight in the battle at Flers-Courcelette. Billy Foster described his experience in a short memoir, now held in the Great War Archive at the University of Oxford:

"As we got in the tank we could hear bullets whistling by, and felt safer inside, at least for a short time. Shells were bursting all around the tank as we pushed through to the second German line of trenches. One burst just in front of us, injuring our officer in the head and the driver in his eyes. Another hit the right hand track of the tank and blew it off, so we were now stuck".

The crew were ordered to abandon the tank and take cover in the shell holes. A few hours later they were able to make a safe return to the British trenches.

Billy Foster stayed with the Tanks, re-training as a Lewis Gunner and first aider. Then in August 1918 at the Battle of Amiens, he was severely wounded in the abdomen and arm by a shell. He survived after treatment at the Military Hospital at Abbeville, to return to Mansfield with a war pension, later marrying Winnifred Morris in 1923.

Stephen Pope has been researching in to the first tank crews and says a great debt is owed to these men who went to war in the first tanks with very little training.

Location: Chesterfield Road, Mansfield, Nottinghamshire NG19 7EE 鈥�
Image: Private William 鈥淏illy鈥� Ernest Foster photographed in 1915/1916, courtesy of The Great War Archive, University of Oxford

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