They reached the bridge, and one by one the Tanks crossed over. He led them on towards a road that would take them straight up to the enemy positions, the machine-gun fire growing more and more intense as they advanced. They reached the road, and as they reached it, Captain Robertson at last fell, shot through the head. But the Tanks went on, and succeeded in their mission. The object for which Captain Robertson had so deliberately sacrificed his life was achieved. The 2nd and 3rd Brigades had by now gone back to Arras to refit their machines, and to replenish their ranks. The 1st Brigade, however, made two more efforts to take part in the fighting. The battle was by now recognised as a serious British check. The Germans’ “elastic tactics” and the weather had together delayed us for so long that they had defeated us. We had inflicted heavy losses on the enemy, and had in the act suffered still more severely ourselves. Our hopes of clearing the coast were gone. At the end of ten weeks we had achieved gains which had been on the programme for the first fortnight. The whole plan of campaign had to be reconsidered, and to take Passchendaele must now be our ultimate ambition. On October 7 two Tanks were to operate ahead of their infantry and endeavour to capture two fortified farms. Halfway to their objective a derelict Tank blocked the way, and the two advancing machines became ditched on trying to make a détour. By the time they had been unditched it was too late to go on. On the 9th eight Tanks were to have attacked strong points on the Poelcapelle Road. At midnight on the night of the 8th-9th they started for their objectives. The road was everywhere encumbered with blown-up limbers and the bodies of dead teams. Large shell-holes had been blown in it. The Tanks managed to get on as far as the Poelcapelle cross-roads, but the enemy then began to shell the road heavily. The leading Tank ditched in a new shell-hole, the second Tank as it waited to pass was set on fire by a direct hit. These two wrecks formed a complete barrier to the advance of the rest of the column. No way being found by which the surviving Tanks could circumvent the obstacle, and the shelling having grown hotter, it was decided to return. But they had not gone far on the return journey when they discovered that on the way up the last machine of the column had somehow fouled an old derelict Tank. The remaining machines were trapped, and could neither go forward nor back. The efforts of their crews proved vain, and they were all five lost, some being hit by enemy shells and the crews killed or wounded, and some ditched in vain efforts to make their escape across country. The enemy continued to shell the road, which was one we were obliged to use, and it was a work of extreme hazard and difficulty to clear it of the wrecks by which it was completely blocked.