Greenhill Books- The Kaiser's Panzers

German Tanks of the First World War

Book Specifics

Author: David Mitchelhill-Green

Price: $26.95

ISBN 978-1-80500-179-9

Softcover, 272 Pages, 6.75 x 9.75 in, 200 illustrations

What's Inside

The Images of War series have been a favorite of mine since I started reviewing for AMPS back in 2018. For their price, you get some great reference material loaded with excellent rarely-seen photos. In this latest installment of the series, the reader is treated with 200 rare photos that are well over 100 years old- and nearly all of them are crisp and clear in detail. It charts the development of German armored vehicles throughout the Great War- from captured British and French tanks repurposed as Beutepanzers through to the design and implementation of German-made armor. The Table of Contents after the Acknowledgements and Abbreviations sections are as follows:

• 1. An Armoured Fighting Vehicle
• 2. 'This strange creature, with its steel hide...'
• 3. 'The enemy succeeded in achieving a surprise attack'
• 4. 'The finalising of a German model is highly urgent'
• 5. A7V Sturmpanzerwagen at War
• 6. ''An armoured caterpillar carrying a 6-pounder gun...'
• 7. Mark IV Beutepanzer
• 8. Beutepanzerwagen at War
• 9. Post War

The first chapter gives an overview of how armor has been used throughout history from chariots in Biblical times to Chinese war carts in 1200 BC. We get a brief glimpse into some early steam tractor based designs and there are some sketches and photos from this time.

Chapter 2 gives a look at early British designs, their drawbacks and flaws, and German reaction to these steel beasts rolling towards their trenches. An interesting sketch of their first impressions are in the chapter and scattered throughout are wartime journal and newspaper articles and propaganda photos. The chapter concludes with a section on German armoured cars.

Chapter 3 centers on early actions in Arras and talks about some of the counters the Germans devised including armor piercing bullets and trench mortars (Minenwerfers) that limited the threat. The chapter then goes into the development of French tanks like the Schneider and Saint-Chamond and closes on a detailed account of the Battle of Cambrai in November of 1917.

Chapter 4 shines a light on German tank development and shows some early design ideas- including precursors to the halftracks that were so prevalent in WWII. Included are accounts of the A7V-U, K-Wagen, Leichter Kampfwagen, and then into A7V production, technical data, and variants like the Flakpanzer, Funkpanzer, trench digger, and heavy artillery tractor versions.

Chapter 5 is all about the A7V at war- with loads of action photos and crew posing near their vehicles. The book goes into detail of its debut at St. Quentin and the first tank versus tank action at Villers-Bretonneux. The last page of the chapter features a chart of leading A7V tank actions throughout 1918. The following photo shows some excellent weathering references for that Meng kit sitting in your stash.

Chapter 6 spends some quality time looking at captured A7Vs in Allied hands including:

• Elfriede
• Mephisto
• Hagen and Schnuck
• Nixe II
• Herkules
• 527

Chapter 7 highlights Mark IV Beutpanzers and photos show some in action, as well as some brought to Germany for war fund-raising drives and propaganda. While only in black and white, the camouflage schemes are of interest for those looking to recreate these captured specimens.

Chapter 8 continues the Beutepanzer theme with tanks in combat, as well as abandoned examples left in the field or scrapped and sent back to Germany for material. The chapter also looks at captured examples of Mark A Whippet tanks, as well as French Renault and Saint-Chamonds in German camo. The chapter ends on dummy tanks-- wooden mockups of Renault, Whippet, and Mk. IV tanks used in training gunners on weak spots to aim for in tanks.

Chapter 9 gives the reader a glance at the use of some wartime tanks by the right-wing Freikorps to suppress armed uprisings in Berlin and Leipzig by revolutionaries contesting the new Weimar government. We get a real glimpse at the post-war military and their eventual evolution to devise new armored strategies as history inched towards a new worldwide conflict and another attempt from Germany to dominate Europe and beyond. Armoured theory and tactics authored by Ernst Volckheim and other A7V veterans like Josef Dietrich would form the basis for the likes of Heinz Guderian in preparing Germany's vaunted Panzertruppen for the next world war.

Conclusion

We have had a nice increase in WWI armored vehicle books as of late and I am all for it. This latest volume in the Images of War series is a welcome addition and the abundance of excellent photos of these vehicles in and out of combat really adds to the appeal. I would love to see a resurgence in kit releases from the Great War- and hopefully with these recent books, maybe model companies might follow suit as interest grows. 

Highly Recommended for anyone interested in Great War German armor and vehicles.

Thanks goes out to Casemate Publishing for this review sample.

Reviewed by Michael Reeves, AMPS Albany

If you liked this review, consider joining AMPS. Your annual membership
includes six copies of AMPS's magazine, Boresight,
and helps to support our ongoing reviews.

Click here for more information about joining AMPS