Talk:Landship Committee

H.G. Wells
The reference to "borrowing" Wells's idea, and Churchill's reaction to same, is unintelligible.


 * Also, it seems slightly absurd to think that military planners might be bothered by copyright law in taking their inspiration for the battle tank from H.G Wells' book.Landroo (talk) 16:54, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Not Good.
I'm afraid I must agree. This is very poor.

The reference to copyright of The Land Ironclads has no basis or meaning. The Committee was not connected with the War Cabinet; it was formed under the auspices of the Admiralty, and the War Office came to hear of it several months later. Churchill endorsed Hankey's memo, but it was an approach by officers of the R.N.A.S. Armoured Car Squadron that prompted him to set up the Committee.

The fifth paragraph is extremely confused and misinformed.

Accounts of the exact make-up of the Committee conflict. D'Eyncourt was Chairman, and Hetherington a founder member, but there are differing versions of the status of Dumble, Crompton, Tritton, and others, even within the memoirs of those directly or closely concerned (d'Eyncourt, Stern, Swinton, Fuller, etc).

Sorry, but this is shocking.

Hengistmate (talk) 19:31, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Edits March 25th, 2014.
I'll tell you what I've done: removed those parts of this article that are grossly inaccurate. What remains is passable. It actually needs a massive rewrite, but I haven't got time at the moment. Until then, I take the view that if Wikipedia is to have any pretensions to being an encyclopaedia, it ought to contain information that is, as far as can be established, broadly correct. I am not of the opinion that putting information that is wildly, demonstrably, and sometimes risibly incorrect on the internet as a temporary measure is acceptable. Better to say nothing. Hengistmate (talk) 13:19, 25 March 2014 (UTC)

Losing the 's'.
Consultation of memoranda at LHCMA, King's College, and sources such as Stern and Sueter. Name was 'Landship Committee'. Just as FT became FT-17. These things happen. Hengistmate (talk) 10:52, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

Edits by Lord Milner, Nov 12, 2022
The accepted and oft-quoted wisdom is that "nobody invented the tank." Albert Stern gives the credit to d'Eyncourt. Another says Tritton's trackplates were the "birth of the tank." The Royal Commission gave the bulk of the credit to Wilson and Tritton. Swinton spent the rest of his life trying to take the credit. And so it goes on. And, of course, the French were designing tanks at exactly the same time. Hankey says, "The result of our conversation was a kind of pact that we three would work for the development of some kind of ‘armoured caterpillar’, i.e. an armoured car, equipped with light artillery or machine guns, and mounted on ‘caterpillar’ traction, which should be capable of tearing its way through barbed wire and should be impervious to bullets. Tulloch was to make inquiries on the technical side; Swinton was to canvass the authorities at the front, and my task was to try to interest the War Office and the Supreme Command in the scheme. This conversation was the first step in the development of the ‘tank’."

He goes on, "My own recollection, however, is that the idea was evolved jointly, and I have no recollection of taking so predominant a part in the discussion as to justify a claim to describe the tank as ‘my idea’. It must be admitted that this branch of our activities was not very fruitful in results. In spite of the relatively small results achieved I never regretted the attention I devoted to the matter."

Meanwhile, Wilson and Tritton, working under the auspices of the Landship Committee, had built one prototype (Little Willie), and were at an advanced stage with a second. Swinton and Hankey knew nothing about this for six months, from February to August 1915, during which, as Hankey admits, they achieved nothing. So the exact date of origin of the tank cannot be said to be 20 and 21 October 1914. Hengistmate (talk) 15:48, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

In reply, I base my statement on:
 * Swinton's autobiography "Eyewitness", (pgs. 78 to 83): https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.210464/page/n83/mode/2up, ...
 * Swinton's wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Swinton#Development_of_tanks ...
 * Spartacus Educational (which is always conservative and dead on; please read par. 5): https://spartacus-educational.com/FWWswinton.htm ...
 * Spartacus Educational: "Tank Development" (the entire article): https://spartacus-educational.com/FWWtankdevelop.htm ...
 * ...and the excellent Youtube video, which I thought covered everyone's claim.

It's not important to me, but this is a little mystery, and it's nice to get it right. The fact that Hatfield House was used as a secret training center makes the story about the tank a super great one, and hopefully easily a blockbuster movie hit. Lord Milner (talk) 03:40, 17 November 2022 (UTC)