30 http://www.britainatwar.comTHE WEARY 8TH
Though regarded as a highly professional
formation, 8th Division had been in
France since November 1914 and had lost
250 officers and 4,693 men in the Spring
Offensive alone. Its capable core of pre-war
regulars had been reinforced by a callow
draft of 18-year-olds that was described by
one unimpressed Aussie as consisting of
“pink-faced, round-cheeked children”.
The Australian 15th Brigade now held the
line to the north and Major-General Harold
‘Pompey’ Elliott was so convinced the Brits
would buckle and expose his flank that he
kept two battalions on standby.
Although the Germans turned the pressure
onto Flanders on April 8, 1918, they hadn’tABOVEBritish and Australian officers posing with the
salvaged ‘Mephisto’, August 4, 1918.taken their eye off the weak join at Villers-
Bretonneux. Before dawn on April 24,
British positions were hit by a thunderous
barrage of high explosive and gas, forcing
Major-General William Heneker to pull
the spluttering 24th Brigade back to the
reserve line at Bois l’Abbé and send in the
23rd Brigade.
At 6am, the Germans advanced in ‘single
file’ through the funereal shroud of gas and
fog – each company following the other to
disguise their strength and to protect the
supporting men from machine guns. Only
when they reached British lines did they
finally fan out and overrun the defenders,
while artillery continued to pound 8th
Division’s rear echelons, plunging the
HQ into disarray. Captain M S Esler,
the medical officer of the 2nd Middlesex
Regiment, recalled: “I have never knownDECISIVE ACTION, NO. 4
THE DEVIL IN THE CRATERNo.506, ‘Mephisto’, taking its name from the devil in Goethe’s Faust and adorned on its front with a
little red devil running off with a scrap of British tank, met a less than dignified fate when it tumbled
into a crater during the battle.
Abandoned by its crew and surviving a demolition attempt to prevent it falling into enemy hands,
Mephisto lay unnoticed in this shell hole for more than a month, until the wood was captured by
Australian 26th Division. Deciding he wanted to take the tank as a trophy, Lieutenant-Colonel James
Robinson sought the relevant permission and enlisted the help of the Tank Corps to yank the
stricken titan from its grave. Mephisto was taken to the 5th Tank Brigade demonstration ground at
Vaux-en-Amienois, where it was studied, graffitied and embellished with a drawing of a British lion
with a crown pressing down on an A7V with one paw.
In October 1918, Mephisto was sent to Brisbane and since 1920 has taken pride of place at
Queensland Museum where it remains as the only surviving A7V. A recent ballistics analysis of
the pock-marked armour offers a hint at the nature of the fighting as Mephisto advanced on 8th
Division’s positions, showing that the defenders hammered the left side with small arms fire before
they withdrew.such a barrage of shell fire – it was like
walking through Dante’s Inferno.”TANK ON TANK
The tip of the spear hit the 2nd Middlesex
and the 2nd West Yorkshires just south of
the town. For the first time, the Germans
used their own tanks in strength – 13 of
the intimidating but inefficient A7Vs. For
the new intake of fresh troops – without
anti-tank weapons – the sight of these iron-
clad dreadnaughts was too much. The line
crumpled, men surrendered or fled and the
enemy peeled off into the town, the tanks
raking the British trenches with their guns.
In another footnote to the attack, history’s
first tank-on-tank engagement occurred
when three Mark IVs (one ‘male’, with a
6Pdr naval gun, and two ‘female’, armed
only with machine guns) engaged three
A7Vs. The two females were swiftly