_32nd Division, 107th Engineers, Company “F”_
He was a member of a patrol sent out from the battalion post of
command August 4, 1918, to reconnoiter the Vesle River front near
Fismes for the location of possible sites for pontoon bridges. The
patrol separated, but he continued to work alone, starting the
construction of the bridges without orders.]
“Instead of sinking into trenches as I feared she would, she crushed
them and continued to move forward. Of course, we were letting go
everything we had, and from my observation hole, I could see the
Germans didn’t like it. They had put up something of a stand against
the infantry. But against the tank they were quick to make their
farewells. It was a still black night, but under the star-shells we
could see them scurrying out of our way.
“This was very sensible of them because we were certainly making a
clean sweep of everything in sight and had the earth ahead throwing up
chocolate showers of spray as if the ground we rode was an angry sea of
mud.
“Every man in the tank was shouting and yelling with the excitement of
the thing and we were tossed up against each other like loosened peas
in a pod.
“Suddenly out of a very clever camouflage of tree branches and
shrubbery a German machine gun emplacement was revealed. The bullets
stormed and rattled upon the tank. But they did themselves a bad turn
by revealing their whereabouts, for we made straight for the camouflage
and went over that battery of machine guns, crunching its concrete
foundation as if it were chalk.
“Then we turned about and from our new position put the Germans under
an enfilade fire that we kept up until every evidence was at hand
that the Oxfords and Bucks and supporting battalions were holding the
trenches.
“But this was only preliminary work cut out for the tank to do. I had
special instructions and a main objective. This was a sugar refinery.
It was a one-storied building of brick and wood with a tiled roof. It
had been established as a sugar refinery by the Germans before the war
and when this occasion arose blossomed as a fortress with a gun aimed
out of every window.
“To allow it to remain standing in hostile hands would mean that the
trenches we had won could be constantly battered. Its removal was most
desirable. To send infantry against it would have involved huge losses
in life. The tank was deemed the right weapon.
“It was.
“And largely because ‘Razzle Dazzle’ took matters into her own hands.
The truth is she ran away.
“We rocked and ploughed out of the trenches and went swaying toward the
refinery. I ordered the round-top sealed. And we beat the refinery to
the attack with our guns. But they had seen us coming and every window
facing our way developed a working gun. There were about sixteen such
windows. They all blazed at us.
“My notion had been to circle the ‘sugar mill’ with ‘Razzle Dazzle’ and
shoot it up from all sides. We were getting frightfully rapped by the
enemy fire, but there was apparently nothing heavy enough to split the
skin of the wild, old girl. Our own fire was effective. We knocked out
all the windows and the red-tiled roof was sagging. As I say, my notion
was to circle the ‘mill’ and I gave orders accordingly. But the ‘Razzle
Dazzle’s’ chauffeur looked at me in distress.
“‘The steering gear’s off, sir,’ said he.
“‘Stop her then and we’ll let them have it from here,’ I ordered.
“He made several frantic motions with the mechanism and said:
“‘I can’t stop her, either.’
“And the ‘Razzle Dazzle’ carried out her own idea of attack. She banged
head-on into the ‘mill.’ She went right through a wide doorway, making
splinters of the door; she knocked against concrete pillars, supports
and walls, smashing everything in her way and bowled out of the other
side just as the roof crashed in and apparently crushed and smothered
all the artillery men beneath it.
“On the way through, the big, powerful old girl bucked and rocked and
reared until we men and the black cat inside her were thrown again and
again into a jumble, the cat scratching us like a devil in her frenzy
of fear.
“Closed up in the tank as we were, we could hear the roar and crash of
the falling ‘mill,’ and from my observation port-hole I could observe
that it was most complete. The place had been reduced to a mere heap.
Not a shot came out of it at us.