Tanks supporting the New Zealand Division near Flers on Fri 15 Sep 1916

[delta]

Kevin Pearce, a member of the FTC group who lives in New Zealand (NZ), has found the original orders for the four tanks which supported the NZ Div during their attack to the west of Flers on 15 Sep 1916. They were in the NZ Div General staff file and are available of the web through the NZ Archives. 

There are two pages which I have attached below; I thought it was easier that adding a link:

I have also inserted the details into a contemporary map - this reveals that the instructions required three of the tanks to move into 41st Division area at the end of the attack to secure the northwest approaches to Gueudecourt.   

The four tanks were

- Male No 729 with crew D8 (skipper George Bown),

- Female No 535 "Dinkum" with crew D10 (Harold Darby)

- Female No 547 "Diehard" and crew D11 (Herbert Pearsall) and

- Male No 719 "Dreadnought" and crew D12 (Graham Nixon).

The Div orders do not define which tank was which but, from other sources, it is clear that No 1 was Bown.D8 (Bown), D10 Dinkum (Darby), D11 Diehard (Pearsall) and D12 Dreadnought (Nixon). The NZ Div orders do not define which tank was which but, from other sources, it is clear that No 1 was Bown.

Hope this info will be of interest 

 

 

Edited 7 March , 2022 by delta
inability to spell

[WhiteStarLine]

The Western Front Association have previously published trench maps.  One of these has some annotations from M.P. Coghill from September 1916 showing handwritten notes including this one of a broken down tank with an 'x' marked at 50.017962, 2.834789 at 57c.T.20.a just south of Ginchy and north of the light rail.  This extract is 57C SW, 1:20,000, edition: 2D 1916, M.P Coghill Trenches corrected to 24/7/1916. Printed 24/07/1916.  Click to enlarge:

[delta]

Thanks for sharing Bill.

This is the area where B Group of C Coy HS MGC was operating in support of 5th Div in the period 25-28 Sep as part of the operation to capture the Quadrilateral  - east of Ginchy - and then the area around Morval. 

Sadly the group was plagued with breakdowns and ditchings so I will  undertake an extract from the War Diary so that we can narrow down the likely tank.