Landships II

whecsailor · Private

British tanks, How were they delivered to France?

CharlieC · Legend

You haven't discovered the parallel website landships.info I think.

Most of your questions can be answered by this article:

http://landships.info/landships/tank_articles.html?load=/landships/tank_articles/Tanks_to_the_Front.html

I remember reading an article about the restrictions on which railway lines the tanks could be transported on. From memory

the loading gauges were different enough between the different lines in Southern England so that some could not be used for tank transport.

I'll see if I can disinter the location of the article from my memory though I fear that entropy has eaten it.

Regards,

Charlie

-- Edited by CharlieC on Tuesday 4th of October 2022 12:50:17 PM

James H · Legend

Hello, Michael. I'm very glad you like Landships.

Charlie is absolutely right. In a nutshell:

At first they were taken to docks at Avonmouth, Bristol, and hoisted on to ships, then unloaded in France. Next, they started shipping from Southampton. Finally, a small port at Richborough, in Kent, was expanded massively, and roro ferries were, indeed, designed to carry tank trains. Huge savings in time and labour. Then they could go straight into the rail network in France.

This is useful: https://blog.railwaymuseum.org.uk/port-of-richborough-and-the-birth-of-the-cross-channel-train-ferry/

If you can find Railways and War Before 1918 - Blandford Press, that's got some excellent plans of the ferries. I've got a PDF of it somewhere, but I can't find it at the mo.

Hope this is useful.

Regards.

James H · Legend

whecsailor · Private

Thank you all very much!! fills in a knowledge gap in this old hollow head of mine :)

green_acorn · Captain

The roll-on roll-off ferry service did not begin until February(?)1918, after the two ferries were commissioned and the necessary ramp infrastructure was built at Southampton, Richborough Military Port, Havre and Dunkirk.