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Post Info TOPIC: Tanks in North America - the Britannia enigma
Gwyn Evans


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RE: Tanks in North America - the Britannia enigma
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There couldn't have been two tanks that visited Toronto could there, one named and one not?

Will try (once more - failed first time) to post the photos I have of the car crushing in Toronto for comparison to the film.

Gwyn

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Gwyn Evans


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Here goes:


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Gwyn Evans


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As you'll see, the photos are captioned Toronto and bear a striking similarity to the Pathe footage. I've seen photos of the car crushing in Chicago and Duluth and there's no sign of trees as there are in this scene.

Gwyn

-- Edited by Gwyn Evans at 20:30, 2008-10-19

-- Edited by Gwyn Evans at 20:32, 2008-10-19

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Centurion


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No need I've got them. No I wasn't saying they were Duluth, Chicago or Baltimore - merely pointing out that crushing a car appears to have been part of the act and could have happened in many other cities. If you look at clip 2352_31 rather than 1922_41 this shows more detail of the tank coming down on the roof of the car which is standing on its side and smashing it to pieces yet in the Toronto newspaper photos the roof of the car isn't visible in the first shot and is there in the second (but a different shape and relatively intact)  in the wreckage on the other side of the car. What is confusing in the news paper shots is that the tank in the second photo is pointing in the other direction.

Whilst it is a working hypophesis that there may have been two Britannias I feel sure that two tanks visiting Toronto together would have been noted in the various accounts of the visit. Shots of the Montreal visit show very similar archetecture and tree lined roads (but then again I could point out quite similar scenes in Boston even today and there is a possibility that the tank visited that town on its was back to New York). I think the best we can be sure of is winter, North East.

-- Edited by Centurion at 20:58, 2008-10-19

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Centurion


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One thing we may be overlooking - there is a city in Ontario geting on for the size of Bristol - it's called London

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Rhomboid


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In 1914, London, Ontario was a small city of 55,000. It's located on the main rail line connecting Detroit with Hamilton and Toronto. I was born and raised there and, although not of WWI vintage (it only feels that way sometimessmile.gif), I don't recall any local lore about a tank visit during the Great War. The large building with domed towers seen in the background in Pathe 1922.10 and 1922.41 is also unfamiliar and, I think, larger than any building which would have existed in the city during that era. 

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Centurion


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Its remarkable how some things don't appear in local lore. The railway link with Hamilton and Toronto is interesting as the tank visited both those cities (and was entirely dependant on the railway for transport. When six months before someone tried to move a truck mounted dummy tank (weighing a mere 16 tons) from Hamilton to Toronto by road  it took over two days and a battalion of volunteers to get it there. Tank visit locations might have been determined as much by accesibility as by size. I guess that any such visit (if it ever happened) would be recorded in the local press - does London (O) have a long standing local paper?

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Rhomboid


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The London Free Press has published continuously since the 1800's. The paper has an archive search service. A tank visit would undoubtedly have been newsworthy. Many years ago, I reviewed the micro-filmed archive of the Free Press for 1917-18, but not in a methodical way, so a story about a tank visit could have been overlooked. I'll investigate this further.

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Centurion


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Thanks - its a long shot I know but it would explain whay Pathe labelled the clip as being in London and there is an unexplained gap between the Hamilton visit and Toronto and the tank had to be somewhere.

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Centurion


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Just a further thought. The tank was not reported in its own right in Toronto and Montreal papers but as part of the coverage of the victory loan campaign.

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Gwyn Evans


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Centurion wrote:

Thanks - its a long shot I know but it would explain whay Pathe labelled the clip as being in London and there is an unexplained gap between the Hamilton visit and Toronto and the tank had to be somewhere.


Brilliant!  Fingers crossed Rhomboid turns up something.


-- Edited by Gwyn Evans at 21:38, 2008-10-21

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delta


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Hi there

The picture (N1) in New York shows Richard Haigh leading the tank

Stephen

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Stephen

http://www.firsttankcrews.com/
jagjetta


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Attached is an Underwood & Underwood press photo that I assume is Britannia.  Handwritten inscription on back only states, "English Tank Brought to New York".

John A-G

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John A-G.
Hudson, WI USA
jagjetta


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RE: Tanks in North America - the Britannia at Camp Upton
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Attached are two images of Britannia during the demonstration at Camp Upton  in New York.

The third image shows Britannia somewhere in the United States but I am not sure where.

John

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John A-G.
Hudson, WI USA
velotrain


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RE: Tanks in North America - the Britannia enigma
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I actually stumbled onto this thread while looking for something else on the net, but that was so long ago now I can't even recall what it was.  I should have gone to the bottom before I did any research.  I'll add what I know.

 

The Copley Square area was the original location of MIT, but it moved to a new campus in Cambridge in 1916, so "the old Technology buildings on Trinity Place" being knocked down are MIT's former vs. future home.  See Wikipedia for a 1905 map and info.

 

Not having seen the image on the Boston postcard that Gwyn contributed, I can't comment.

 

I see that additional info had been found on the Chicago photos, so I'll edit what I had written.  Mark's orientation is the correct one, no doubt misinterpreted due to the written text.  However, the writing is actually on the negative, and therefore the final print will show it in reverse. 

 

The parade is moving south to north on South Michigan Avenue, and sprawling Grant Park is to the right.  The orientation can be told from the shadows, as the sun is unlikely to be angling down like that from the vicinity of Winnipeg in September - make that never.

 

I'm wondering if the fat fellow on top of the tank in the first photo could possibly be the comedic actor Fatty Arbuckle, who was near the height of his fame at this time, and sometimes seen with this style hat.  Of course, it could also just be some local politico who was fond of food and the same style hat.

I just recalled what I had been looking for.  I've very recently purchased a 4" x 6" print of this photo, and wondered if I could locate it without the text across the middle.

The angled structure in the background of this and N4 and N5 is the famed Flatiron Building, which I have youthful memories of.

BTW - unlike most 5th Avenue parades, this one is going up it and not down - the direction coinciding with that of the street numbers.

 

Good-by for now from faux Boston



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Benjamin Moogk

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I've seen a few pictures of the tank in Toronto with its bow gun on parade down University Avenue across from the old armoury and up Bay Street. Dates on the photos are conflicting, but they are of one event. Better yet those photos lead me to recently identify the tank in that parade in a film. British Pathé had it in their collection mislabelled and catalogued only by accession number.  There seems to be two tanks in the movie: one with a bow gun and one without.

https://moogk.wordpress.com/2015/06/04/crushing-cars-is-as-old-as-tanks/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_hRl-WXbWM



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Benjamin Moogk

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If there are not two tanks on display in Toronto then the bow gun wasn't fixed on very securely. But the photos in Toronto are definitely of the same event in the British Pathé film. I've matched the landmarks to the streetscape of the day: the Goel Tzedec Synagogue and the Sergeant's Mess for the Queens Own Rifles. The film actually captures the photographer taking one of the photos. https://moogk.wordpress.com/2015/06/04/crushing-cars-is-as-old-as-tanks/



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