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“It ‘stamped’ down a dug-out as though it were a wasps’ nest.

“It crashed through broken barns and houses, ‘straddled’ a dug-out and fired enfilading shot down German trenches.

“It put a battery and a half of guns out of action at Flers.”

Reuter added a cow-catcher to its equipment.

The French Press was enthusiastic:

“At the precise moment when the bombardment stopped, the Germans had the surprise of seeing advance in front of the waves of assaulting troops, enormous steel monsters from which spurted a continuous fire of great violence. One would have described them as gigantic infernal machines. Their front, which was shaped like a ram, smashed down every obstacle. The heavy automobiles bounded across the overturned and uneven ground, breaking through the barbed wire and jumping the trenches. In the German ranks there was a really mad terror. A prey to panic, the soldiers of the German Emperor fell back in haste, abandoning their arms, ammunition and equipment.”

And how did the Tank personnel itself view the events of the day?