Landships II

Before I post any further on the subject below please can I have some feedback? If its too boring (especially for non British readers) I'll keep further material on this on my files.

In late 1917 three Mk IV male tanks went on a fund raising (war savings) tour around the UK. These were 113 Julian, 130 Nelson and 148 Egbert. All three were said to be survivors of Cambrai. As far as one can see Julian was names after Julian Byng, commander of the Tank Corp, and Nelson because that tank started its tour in Trafalgar Square (how Egbert gots its name remains a mystery). I enclose shots of each of these. They were accompanied by crews, apparently also Cambrai veterans and gave displays in some of the towns they visited. Some of these are recorded on film. The crew probably consisted of commander, driver, and brakemen (gunners do not appear to have been carried). Advance publicity was often provided by a leaflet drop courtesy of the RFC/RAF. A typical leaflet is also enclosed.

I have been trying to track their progess, mainly by examining records and photos displayed on local council and newspaper web sites. The first conclusion from this process is  NEVER TRUST THE CAPTION ON A NEWSPAPER PHOTO! (They don't let the facts get in the way of a good local story) For example there is a photo allegedly showing the Mayor and other dignitaries of Hartlepool accepting delivery of Egbert that had been 'awarded' the town. They are in fact standing on tank no. 130 Nelson! Luton also claimed to be the holder of Egbert (in Wardown Park) and there is a photo of it being broken up in 1941 but again this appears to be a different tank! Walsall claims to have been awarded Julian but the photo of 'Julian' in a local park 1920 is of a female tank. Aberdeen and Duns also claim to have been Julian's last resting place. One photo of a tank in Trafalgar square is captioned on different sites as Julian, Egbert and Nelson (it's probably Nelson which certainly was in Trafalgar square at the begining of its tour). Newspaper texts are equally misleading and there is often confusion between the visit of one of the touring tanks during a local tank week and the later post war installation of a civic commemorative tank. Such tanks were usually Mk IV females but there are some photos of Mk IV males in this role and the Tank Museum Web site shows 2 Mk III females used as commemorative tanks. Sadly all but a very few of the civic commemorative tanks appear to have been scrapped in the salvage drive of 1940/41 (one in Ashford Kent survived for example).

With the amount of mis information available tracking progess is not easy and sometimes a process of elimination has to be applied (for example Blackburn's tank week was on the same dates as Dundee's, there are positive records of Julian being in Dundee so that the Blackburn tank would have to be either Egbert or Nelson (it's looking as if it might be Nelson). There are no dates I can find for Julian's visit to Aberdeen but references from other towns show that it was after Glasgow but before Dundee - and so on. Sometimes locations will have to worked out from the background in the photos. This is an ongoing exercise but I have worked out a probable itinary for Julian (with a possible big gap in the middle) covering both England and Scotland. I enclose a map with dates and places shown. I still don't know Julian's starting point (unless it was Glasgow, which seems unlikely as the tank tours seem to have started in late 1917) or if Duns was its last stop.

I also enclose a shot of Julian showing how to eliminate a barricade in a Dundee street. I enclosed a link to a video clip of Julian in Glasgow. There is a film of Julian operating in various Scottish towns and its final departure for England in the Scottish film archives but although one can get at the shot synopsis in the web it doesn't ppear to be available as a downloadable video clip. I suspect as is the case with some other Scotish photo archives  that a wee fee would be required.