1918 German pen and ink drawing of the road to Cambrai, France. Two smaller trees seem to serve as the good and bad thief on either side of the crucified Jesus Christ.
Strasse nach CambraiEKIECBJR?
". . . operations took place between the nights of November 15–18 [1917]. The tanks were hidden under trees and in the ruins of shelled houses. The 1st Brigade was hidden in the western edge of Havrincourt Wood, of which the Germans actually held the eastern extremity, 3,000 yards away. The 2nd Brigade was in Dessart Wood, two miles south of Havrincourt. And 3rd Brigade, having no convenient wood in which to hide, was concealed under camouflage netting in and about Gouzeaucourt and Villers-Guislan. . . . The whole operation was highly successful. Movements had been carried out so secretly and the tanks and petrol dumps so well concealed that even most British troops in the area didn't know they were there.But on the night of November 18th, thirty-six hours before the attack was to start, the secret leaked out."
After suspending the Third Battle of Ypres on November, 6, 1917, the British prepared to launch the largest tank offensive yet seen. Three tank brigades, 380 tanks in all, most of them Mark IVs, were concealed and prepared for a November 20 attack near Cambrai, France. Some British prisoners taken in trench raids told their German interrogators of the pending tank attack and its date. The intelligence, combined with reports from German air reconnaissance of increased traffic behind British lines, led German Second Army commander General von der Marwitz to move reinforcements to the area, although he thought an attack unlikely.
The Battle of Cambrai by Brian Cooper, page 86, copyright © Bryan Cooper 1967, publisher: Stein and Day, publication date: 1968
1917-11-18, November, 1917, Battle of Cambrai, Cambrai, tank, road to Cambrai
