Hit by a shell, the British tank was neutralised. But in the village of Flesquières, where Deborah was located, German fighters were resisting with zeal. The element of surprise worked and the Tank Corps broke through. At 6:20am, along a 10km-long front, 476 tanks set forth towards German frontlines. It was the first time the British made massive use of tanks, a technology then in its infancy. On November 20, 1917, this British Mark IV tank – a “Female” model, equipped exclusively with machine guns – took part in an unprecedented offensive. At times captured British and French tanks were reconditioned for use by the German Army.Deborah is one of the very last direct witnesses to the Battle of Cambrai. They saw limited service on the Western Front in 1918. Of Germany’s A7V Sturmpanzerwagen only 20 were ever built for use in war. The images below show early British and German tanks.The Germans began developing tanks after the British first used theirs during the battle of the Somme in 1916. They were first developed by the British, who went on the manufacture thousands of these trailblazing vehicles. Tanks were developed during the course of the First World War in an attempt to help break the stalemate. Hundreds of thousands of men and women on both sides lost their lives. In this situation the rival armies dug trenches both to defend the territory they controlled and to launch attacks to try to capture more land. However, a stalemate set in along the Western Front in Belgium and France. Initially, it was believed that the First World War would be over within a few months of its declaration.
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