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Battles Tanks at Tsaritsyn
On the 15th June 1919, Baron Wrangel launched his offensive against the Bolshevik
positions around Tsaritsyn.
Since April twelve British Tanks-six Mk Vs and six Whippets had been in South Russia
manned by Russian crews. An additional three Mk Vs and three Whippets arrived as
reinforcements early in June.
Despite the British Tank Corps personnel (15 officers and 55 Enlisted Ranks) having been
given explicit instructions that they were only to be employed in a training role, when
the attack began one of the Tanks was manned by a British Crew under Captain R W Walsh.
Two of the Russian manned tanks broke down at the start, but four others smashed their way
through the wire entanglements and crossed the outer trench line. The Bolshevik defenders
dropped everything and ran for their lives.
As White Russian cavalry came up to occupy the captured ground, Captain Walsh's Mk V drove
forward as far as the inner trench line, which was later cleared by the 4th Division of
Kuban Cossacks.
By the 19th June the battle was over, Baron Wrangel's forces had taken over 40,000
prisoners and the remainder of the Red garrison was in full retreat up the Volga. A
decisive victory had been achieved to which a lot of the credit can be given to the bold
use of a small number of Tanks.
Source Material: Jackson, Robert- At war with the Bolsheviks (Universal-Tandem 1974)
-posted by Hobilar, a club member |
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