A Royal Navy TANK ?

buffdog

buffdog

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While doing a bit of Research on some Ross Rifles, I came across this WWII picture of a Royal Navy Tank.

Apparently, after WWI, it was given to the Royal Navy at HMS Excellent in Portsmouth, England, in appreciation of their training Army Gunners to use the 6 pdr. Cannons. And there it sat as a Monument until WWII.

Using a second Tank for parts, it was rebuilt for Defence of the Base, in 1940 and was ran at regular intervals until better vehicles became available. Note the Naval Ensign flying from the top of the tank.
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Later, in the early 1970s, it was handed over to the Tank Museum in Bovington, England, where it was refurbished and put on display.
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Fitting in a way since it was Churchill as First Lord of the Admiralty who largely initiated the tank in WWI and I believe the early work was done under naval auspices and with Admiralty money. Hence the Hotchkiss naval pattern six pounder guns IIRC.

Was the Lewis gun front and centre a WWII fitting?
 
They actual development was under the Landships Committee of the Admiralty because Winnie controlled the Admiralty and no-one else was interested.

Working with Foster's of Lincoln, the Committee built two Tanks only: Little Willie (still extant) and Mother, the ancestor of all Service heavy Tanks used in the Great War.

Mother was identical to a Tank Mark I except for the fact that her rivets were Boilermakers' Pitch rather than Engineers' Pitch: closer together.

Little Willie demonstrated that the concept could work. Mother demonstrated that the concept could be built into an effective WEAPON.

I do hope the Navy still owns this baby; they deserve one! BTW, this is a Mark IV Male tank; Females had only MGs. Mother was MALE!

Little Willie has been preserved and That Is Good. Poor Mother was lost in 1940 when some lunatic bureaucrat ordered her SCRAPPED for materials! SOB should have been used for track lube!!!

Lovely pics, Buffdog. Thanks for posting.
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ive seen this tank in person, terrifying to think of the crew conditions inside on smooth field, never mind no mans land

its just a metal box full of all sorts of machinery that moves or gets hot or both, with no guards of any sort, imagine fighting a war from the inside of a 58 buick trucks engine compartment
 
smellie said:
Working with Foster's of Lincoln, the Committee built two Tanks only: Little Willie (still extant) and Mother, the ancestor of all Service heavy Tanks used in the Great War.


Little Willie demonstrated that the concept could work. Mother demonstrated that the concept could be built into an effective WEAPON.



Little Willie has been preserved and That Is Good. Poor Mother was lost in 1940 when some lunatic bureaucrat ordered her SCRAPPED for materials! SOB should have been used for track lube!!!

Lovely pics, Buffdog. Thanks for posting.
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For the beer drinkers out there you can enjoy Little Willie beer that the proceeds from go to preserve Little Willie.
Don't ask me where to get the beer, I just recall an article in a Military Machines magazine I picked up.
 
Donny Fenn1 said:
For the beer drinkers out there you can enjoy Little Willie beer that the proceeds from go to preserve Little Willie.
Don't ask me where to get the beer, I just recall an article in a Military Machines magazine I picked up.
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LoL I can hear the commercial now: " oy' whatcha drinking mate? Aahhh I'm enjoying an ice cold little Willie!" :D
 
smellie said:
They actual development was under the Landships Committee of the Admiralty because Winnie controlled the Admiralty and no-one else was interested.

Working with Foster's of Lincoln, the Committee built two Tanks only: Little Willie (still extant) and Mother, the ancestor of all Service heavy Tanks used in the Great War.

Mother was identical to a Tank Mark I except for the fact that her rivets were Boilermakers' Pitch rather than Engineers' Pitch: closer together.

Little Willie demonstrated that the concept could work. Mother demonstrated that the concept could be built into an effective WEAPON.

I do hope the Navy still owns this baby; they deserve one! BTW, this is a Mark IV Male tank; Females had only MGs. Mother was MALE!

Little Willie has been preserved and That Is Good. Poor Mother was lost in 1940 when some lunatic bureaucrat ordered her SCRAPPED for materials! SOB should have been used for track lube!!!

Lovely pics, Buffdog. Thanks for posting.
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Click to expand...

I always think there was a LOT of stuff scrapped for material, we'd give our eye teeth for, :D but it was a desperate time.

Grizz
 
Death trap?

Yes.

They all are.

But better than walking shoulder-to-shoulder into massed Maxims.

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Tanks are cold/hot. They are freezing/roasting. With the engine stopped, they are a paperweight. With the engine running, they are filled with Diesel fumes. There is NO room to move. Everything is covered with a mist of oil. You breathe it in all day and cough and snot it out all night. The mechanical noise alone is so loud that you can't hear the next man if he screams at you; intercom is necessary. Co-ax, bow gun and Master all exhaust inside the turret. Casings from the MW glow yellow when they come out; they cool to merely red in a few minutes. Shut down and dug-in you are a pillbox. Moving, you are a target.... but you must move. With a gas-powered Sherman, chances of a brew-up after a hit are about 90%; it's only 60% with the Diesels. A Sherman will burn for 2 days; it was worse with the old ones. Tankers are nuts; they have to be. It is a tradition started by the HB/MGC and we haven't improved!

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Little Willie is made by Piddle Brewery in Dorset. Google dorsetpiddlebrewery for an entertaining website. Five p from every bottle goes toward restoration and maintenance of Little Willie. Have your liquor store order some! Have a brew and help the Tank Museum at the same time! Just think, you, too, can have a Little Willie!
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Speaking of Indiana Jones, next time you watch that movie, take a very close look at the Screen Credits at the end of the film. Watch for the 'Thanks".

The Tanks in that film were loaned from his personal Tank collection by KING HUSSEIN.

The pink city carved into the mountain also is real: Petra. It is a World Heritage Site but King Hussein gave permission for the film to be made there.

If you're the King, you can DO things like that..... and Hussein did them. A good man and a good King.

The Royal Tank Collection exists as a public Museum. It contains Tanks from the 1920s to the present. King Hussein also had a collection of airplanes, viewable by the public as the Jordanian Air Museum. Their museum got their last Voodoos while we were still using ours as our front-line Interceptors!
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BTW, Jordan has a new pistol available, the JAWS VIPER. JAWS = Jordanian Army Weapons System. Rotating-barrel semi-auto developed and made in Jordan. Being a long-time fan of the great accuracy of rotating-barrel pistols, I WANT ONE!!!!!
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So now, go have a Little Willie or six!
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RRCo. said:
Fitting in a way since it was Churchill as First Lord of the Admiralty who largely initiated the tank in WWI and I believe the early work was done under naval auspices and with Admiralty money. Hence the Hotchkiss naval pattern six pounder guns IIRC.

Was the Lewis gun front and centre a WWII fitting?
Click to expand...

Too true. And if you need any more proof, ask yourself why 'tanks' have hulls, hatches and periscopes instead of bodies, doors and windows.
 
Camp Bovington and the tank museum is a must for anyone visiting the UK. Grab the train from Charring Cross and in about 2 1/4 hours you are there. There are taxis at the station to take you to then museum and it is around 7 quid for the trip. The museum will also call you a taxi for the trip back. Great cafeteria and cheap as h*ll
If you take the train to Dorset, keep your train ticket as sometimes it is 2 for 1 entrance at the museum if you have used the train to get there.
 
I would just like to point out at this time that there is absolutely NO CANNIBALISM in the Royal Navy. Possibly in the RAF, but...

Dammit! Stop eating that man's leg!
 
RMXC51 said:
I would just like to point out at this time that there is absolutely NO CANNIBALISM in the Royal Navy. Possibly in the RAF, but...

Dammit! Stop eating that man's leg!
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There may not be NOW, but they sure practiced it in 1940 when times were desperate, and they needed anything that might even resemble a weapon.

As for the RAF, they made it a regular occurance to Cannabalize anything that could get back into the air again, using unserviceable aircraft as donors.

And the Americans, well they always seemed to have a "Hangar Queen" aboard their carriers.

:) As far as the German Army goes, there was a canned meat product with the letters "AM" stamped on the metal can. Some said it was the maker, but most of the troops said it was for "Alte Mann", or "Old Man" in English translation.
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