Tanks used in Operation Hush

[Sturmey]

 

A May/June/July 1917 tank expert question.

 

There appear to have been rehearsals by tanks against a piece of practice sea wall in preparation for Operation Hush at the special 1st Division camp built at Le Clipon w of Dunkerque . Does anyone know which Tank Corps unit that might have been?  

 

Thanks in expectation

[Gareth Davies]

I am pretty sure it was a ad  hoc unit, formed specifically for the training. In his book Tank Warfare Mitchell writes "in October the "hush hush" brigade crept quietly back to their units". 

 

From the D Bn WD 6 Aug 17:

"Major Hon J D T Bingham at present i/c Special Detachment Tank Corps will take over command of 10 Coy on completing special duty."

Edited 5 January , 2017 by Gareth Davies

[Sturmey]

That's so useful. I'd read the Mitchell reference and not got that inference from it at all, and the D Bn WD seems to nail it.

 

many thanks

[bonzillou]

Hi Gareth

I'm also interested in Operation Hush.

Could you track the tank units involved?

Cheers

Pascal

[bsears]

Pascal, I have a book written by a Subaltern in the 2nd KRRC. It contains passages from his diary.
It has a few entries in regards to the battle. My G Grandfather was a 2nd Lt with the 2nd KRRC in the battle and survived. Very did from the 2nd.

Regards
Barrie

[bonzillou]

hello barrie

Operation Hush was cancelled, may be you are talking of the battle of the Dunes?

if you have any information concerning the tank units involved in the training for Operation Hush, and may be more, I am interested.

Pascal

[RussT]

I don't recall ever coming across any document that referred to specific Tank units selected for Hush - the attached detailed order of battle likewise doesn't.

 

I think they were hand-picked and given the specialist training (scaling the sea walls etc).

 

Regards

 

Russ

 

 

[bonzillou]

Wow Russ! this is a great document.

Do you know why they called the female tank a winder?

and what is the Det. A.T. Co., R.E.? a detached company of engineers it seems?

Edited 18 April , 2020 by bonzillou

[Terry_Reeves]

Det AT Co RE. Stands for Detachment Army Troops Company, Royal Engineers.

 

TR

[bonzillou]

Thanks Terry

 

[RussT]

4 hours ago, bonzillou said:

Do you know why they called the female tank a winder?

 

The female tank was fitted with a winding gear that was to be deployed, once the tank was on top of the sea wall, in order to haul up the guns.

 

Regards

 

Russ

[bonzillou]

excellent!

[Lee Smart]

This is a photo of one of the FEMALE WInder Tanks built for Operation HUSH (Originally called Operation SILENCE).  Note the Winch on the left side with armoured plates to protect it (apparently they only had them on the left side because it was more than sufficient for the job). Although Operation HUSH was cancelled when the 3rd Battle of Ypres didn't pan out as planned, Opertion HUSH was supposed to provide a flanking amphibious attack against Ostend, concurrent with a Land based advance along the coast from Nieuwport.

the FEMALE MKIV Winders were then apparently used later on, inland, as a sort of early Armoured Recovery Vehicle (ARV), using their winches to rescue bogged tanks.

You might be able to trace the units involved from the Bort No. A2064.

 

Edited 12 March by Lee Smart

[Gareth Davies]

Op Hush was never officially used as a name. 

[johntaylor]

Hi, the dummy section of sea wall used by the tanks was at the Tank Corps Central Workshops in Erin - there was apparently another dummy wall in the camp at Le Clipon which was used for infantry training.

Re the selection of crews, Major William Watson mentions this point in A Company of Tanks, which shows at least some of the crews came from D Bn: 

As Gareth says, the commander was the Hon John Dennis Yelverton Bingham, an Olympic polo player and forebear of the vanishing Lord Lucan. On November 1, 1917 the D Bn War Diary says: "On this date Major J. D. Y. Bingham O.C. 10 Coy and O.C. Commanding special detachment with 2 Officers and 15 other ranks were struck off strength of ‘D’ Battalion and posted to Home Establishment." However this is ambiguous as he was subsequently put in charge of another special detachment, this time of wire-pulling tanks in the Battle of Cambrai. There may have been some overlap between the two detachments.

Re the winding tanks, there were diagrams in Weekly Tank Notes showing how they would have worked - these were reproduced in the series of articles about the Coastal Landing in Gunfire, the journal now available on the Western Front Association website.

Re Operation Hush, Gareth is also correct to point out that this name wasn't an official one, and I can't recall offhand where it originally came from.

All the best, John

Edited 12 March by johntaylor

[Lee Smart]

I can easily imagine ‘HUSH’ being ‘Squaddie veiled speech’ for Op SILENCE, the official name cited elsewhere.

[Lee Smart]

Major Bingham went on to command 16 Tank Battalion where he was awarded the DSO.

According to the 'Tank Encyclopedia' The Belgian architect who had designed the sea wall was a refugee in France and supplied his drawings from which a replica was built at Merlimont, which is just south of Etaples, Erin is some twenty miles inland from there. Le Clipon camp is further North near Loon-Plage, Dunkirk. A mystery unless there were 3 walls.

"A detachment of tanks, developed at Tank Headquarters under Major J D Y Bingham (Special Tank Detachment), rehearsed on it, using "shoes" on the tank tracks and special detachable steel ramps, until they could climb the wall.

Elsewhere In experiments on the 'Thames Estuary', the pontoons apparently performed exceptionally well, riding out very bad weather and being easier to manoeuvre than expected, leading to hopes that they could be used again after the initial assault to land reinforcements. the following comment suggests that they were then deployed across to France for the rehearsals  "Night landings were also practised, with wire stretched between buoys to guide the pontoons to within 100 yds of their landing place". presumably this was at Merimont as I would imagine that Dunkirk would be too close to the front line for prying eyes.

Edited 14 March by Lee Smart

[RussT]

10 hours ago, Lee Smart said:

I can easily imagine ‘HUSH’ being ‘Squaddie veiled speech’ for Op SILENCE, the official name cited elsewhere.

I have come across the word/phrase Hush being used informally contemporaneously during preparations for the Operation but I have not seen it or indeed any other name being given to the Operation. My understanding is that the British did not give names to Operations, so I would be interested to learn where you have found reference to the name Operation Silence being used officially.

Russ

[Lee Smart]

https://tankmuseum.org/?s=Hush

[RussT]

I'm familiar with that site - perhaps I missed it but where does it say operation "SILENCE".

All I see on that site is unreferenced mention to HUSH.

 

[Lee Smart]

Seen here :   https://en.topwar.ru/192158-operacija-hush-morskoj-desant-kotoryj-ne-sostojalsja.html....and another site which I have not yet been able to find or revisit in my searches.

Another point of interest in my researches was, in addition to being a relation to Lord Lucan,  Major Bingham's brother was Rear Admiral The Honourable Edward Barry Stewart Bingham VC, OBE – he was awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions in engaging the German fleet during the Battle of Jutland, one of relatively few awarded for naval bravery during the First World War. 

In command of a destroyer division. He led his division in their attack, first on enemy destroyers and then on the battle cruisers of the German High Seas Fleet. Once the enemy was sighted Bingham ordered his own destroyer, HMS Nestor, and the one remaining destroyer of his division, HMS Nicator, to close to within 2,750 meters of the opposing battle fleet so that he could bring his torpedoes to bear. While making this attack Nestor and Nicator were under concentrated fire of the secondary batteries of the German fleet and Nestor was subsequently sunk. Bingham was picked up by the Germans at Jutland, and remained a prisoner of war until the Armistice. 

Edited 14 March by Lee Smart

[Gareth Davies]

21 hours ago, Lee Smart said:

https://tankmuseum.org/?s=Hush

Sadly they have got it wrong.

[Gareth Davies]

19 hours ago, Lee Smart said:

Seen here :   https://en.topwar.ru/192158-operacija-hush-morskoj-desant-kotoryj-ne-sostojalsja.html....and another site which I have not yet been able to find or revisit in my searches.

Another point of interest in my researches was, in addition to being a relation to Lord Lucan,  Major Bingham's brother was Rear Admiral The Honourable Edward Barry Stewart Bingham VC, OBE – he was awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions in engaging the German fleet during the Battle of Jutland, one of relatively few awarded for naval bravery during the First World War. 

In command of a destroyer division. He led his division in their attack, first on enemy destroyers and then on the battle cruisers of the German High Seas Fleet. Once the enemy was sighted Bingham ordered his own destroyer, HMS Nestor, and the one remaining destroyer of his division, HMS Nicator, to close to within 2,750 meters of the opposing battle fleet so that he could bring his torpedoes to bear. While making this attack Nestor and Nicator were under concentrated fire of the secondary batteries of the German fleet and Nestor was subsequently sunk. Bingham was picked up by the Germans at Jutland, and remained a prisoner of war until the Armistice. 

12th cousins once removed?