Tanks - how they were introduced during World War One
Listener's query
"My wife's grandfather had been one of the first recruits into the Tank Corps during the First World War and had trained at Lulworth Cove. I've always been told that the tank was a very secret weapon in WWI - so how was the training kept secret and what did it consist of? How were the first tank crews selected for this role? Can you tell us any more about the first tank crews?"
Brief summary
It was at the Battle of Flers-Courcelette on the Somme, in September 1916, that tanks first went into action. If there is an originator of the tank it was Lt Col (later Major-General) Sir Ernest Swinton. He proposed the concept of a land battleship, an idea taken up by Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty. The first experimental tank was finished in December 1915 and three months later the HQ of what known as the Heavy Section Machine Gun Corps was set up at Bisley in Surrey with Col Swinton. This section was moved to Elveden in Suffolk on 200 acres of Lord Iveagh's estate. The whole programme was so secret that locals were warned that they would be shot on sight if they went past a particular point. The first tanks arrived slowly, travelling at three miles per hour from the nearest station. Six companies were set up and training went ahead, though it was all soon moved to Bovington in Dorset where the government had bought land. That site gave more space and greater isolation.
Even the word 'tank' was designed to confuse - people would think of something used for storing water rather than a war machine.
The Ministry of Munitions set up the Mechanical Warfare Supply Department under Lt Col Albert Stern, another key figure in developing the tank. In August 1916, four companies set off, though the HQ and its commander stayed on this side of the Channel.
All 49 serviceable tanks the Army had were sent into action in the Battle of Flers-Courcelette in September. Haig wanted more to be available; Churchill was disappointed for a different reason, saying they had been used before they were ready. The tanks were not, in this debut, very successful. They were unreliable travelling at only half a mile an hour. Only 15 of the 49 tanks made it as far as No Man's Land, but significant gains were made and the tank's future was assured.
The men who went into the Tank Corps (as the unit was renamed) were from the Army Service Corps - these were the drivers. Some recruits came from the Motor Machine Gun Service where they had been trained to fight using a machine-gun from a motor cycle and sidecar, and others were civilians with technical skills.
Experts consulted
David Fletcher of the Tank Museum
Neil Turner
Further reading
David Fletcher, Landships - British Tanks of the First World War (The Stationery Office Books, 1984)
Frank Mitchell, Tank Warfare: The Story of the Tanks in the Great War (Naval and Military Press, 2002)
Ernest Swinton, Over my Shoulder: The Autobiography of Major-General Sir Ernest D. Swinton (Ronald, 1951)
Websites
The Army's hundred years at Bovington
The Western Front Association
In the left-hand menu, click on The Great War - Educational Resources, and do a Keyword Search for Tank Corps to find the article 'The Organisation and Administration of The Tank Corps during the Great War. 1916-1918'
The Battle of Flers-Courcelette, 1916
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Vanessa has presented听science and current affairs programmes for 大象传媒, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5 and Discovery and has presented for 大象传媒 Radio 4 & Five Live and a regular contributor to the Daily Telegraph and the Mail on Sunday, Scotsman and Sunday Herald.听