"Battle of Dead Mule Ditch in SCW, any more info?" Topic

I'm looking at hashing out another scenario for SCW and ran across this nice little trench fight involving the Moroccans supported by Fiat tanks attacking Republican lines held by quintos and some IBers, notably the Abe Lincolns. Looks like the Lincolns held and with the aid of some T-26s were able to repulse the majority of the Nationalists.

So far it's just Cecil Eby's book, Comrades and Commissars, that I have found the source, but I haven't had a chance to get through my other books.

Anyone else heard of this?

Thanks,
Doc

"Dead Mule Ditch"?

That is one heck of a name.

I think it might be in East Tennessee.

Wuz thet yer mule, Jack?

Nope, it wuzn't my mule, but we wuz fightin' in a pasture and after the first shot wuz fired you should've seen that Bull Run.

Jayson,
Can you e-mail me with more info? I'll check the VALB archives and see if I can find anything. Year and location would be helpful. Maybe there is a vet with some recollection of the fight.
Nick
nnascati@yshoo.com

Dead mule ditch?. Never heard of that, is there any more info like location?.

I recall reading something about this in one of my many books, I think it was in the British Battalion(15th brigade) book, possibly during the Battle of Jarama.
I'll have a look see if I can locate it.

Yep Jarama was the battle with Abe Lincolns holding the line after a XV Brigade rout. Any other good books out there on this?

Thanks,
Doc

I have Arthur Landis's history of the Abe Lincolns. Will see what he has to say.

Jason Gurney, "Crusade in Spain", covers his experiences with the XVth Brigade, and theres a good leaflet type book by Frank Graham about the battle. There is a glossy Spanish book called Battle of Jamara, not sure on the content though.

That first British battalion fight is a horrible read, incorrect ammo for the Colt HMGs, LMGs are all Chauchats, and are useless, officers have no idea how to deploy their troops, and the first attack is by Moroccans, its not pretty!!!!

I wrote an article on it based on Gurney`s book for The Journal – recently re-printed in Miniature Wargames (with a T34 in one of the illustrating photos!!!!!).

The Republican army would have loved to get hold of a T34 or two ;-]]]]

The Gurney book is a good read. I was lucky enough to get hold of the Peter Kemp book "Mine were of Trouble" on the inter-library loan scheme, always good to see the conflict from the other side, and its well worth asking your local library to get hold of it for you.

I have a book on battle of Jarama. I'll have a look.

No luck in Landis. He wrote more of an overview several pages and quoted one first hand account of the counter charge. His account captures the feel of the swirl and chaos but not a clear picture of the hours and actions

OK
Found a reference in the Frank Graham leaflet about the Battle of Jarama, it appears to be after the fight that Eby mentions.
Its a long old bit, I will try to type it out later.

Might be the sunken road between San Martin de la Vega and Morata de Tajuna. However I always thought that was held by the British batallion.

This is getting a bit confusing now.

The Frank Graham account gives two dates March 5th and March 15th 1937
The section is entitiled "Battle for Dead Mule Trench" and it seems to involve, troops from the British Battalion, these being a recon group of about 10-15 men, the Franco-Belgian 6th February battalion, and the Lincolns, plus some Spaniards from Lister's brigade.

The British battalion attack at Jarama was on the 12th/13th February according to Gurney.

I've checked a book from Permuy Lopez and Artemio Mortera about Jarama. Nothing is mentioned about that "battle for dead mule trench". What's interesting is that Nationalist OOB for Jarama just shows Pzs I, no FT17. The Republican OOB shows T26B.

Lincoln battalion arrived at the battle on 16th February. The other mention of Lincoln battalion is on 27th when the battalion was ordered to cut the San Martin de la Vega road, the attack was intended to be in conjunction with more battalions from XV brigade, but being all wasted except the Licoln, they attacked alone the Nationalist lines with the support of two tanks and suffered heavy fire retreating at night.

I can try looking for more info. There are some books I know of published by the Spanish army (about 10 years after the battles) that may be of interest.

The XV BDE, held positions on the Jarama front for several months. I willsee if I can find anything of use on this action.

I believe Eby's date is March for the fight and I'm guessing the tanks were Italian CVs, but who knows they could have been Panzer 1s as a lot of reports got jumbled. Eby only has about two pages dedicated to it in "Comrades and Commissars".

"Battle for Dead Mule Trench" that is what Eby has it called also, my mislabel. That will teach me to type with bourbon :)

I'll have more to add with a little digging…

Doc

Hello. I've been checking various spanish sources and there is nothing with a similar name.

In two books about Jarama both say that Lincoln battalion acted at the last stages of the battle in innefectual and bloddy assaults against the nationalists positions where Licoln battalion suffered heavily.

Anyway, in a book covering the republican daily war dispatches (republican war dispatches – Army Historic Services) shows some action at Jarama in a nationalist attack on 14th March but no mention to Lincoln Btn. Maybe this is the skirmish you're looking for.

The dispatch says:

En el sector del Jarama nuestras tropas han batido a los facciosos con dureza, sin que haya tenido el menor exito el ataque que habian desplegado con todo lujo de elementos siendo neutralizado por completo.

Roughly translates to:
"At the Jarama sector our troops have defeated heavily the fascists, their attack, mounted with all kind of supports has failed completely"

I doubt the tanks (if any) being used would be FT17 nor Italian CVs, as at this time the Battle of Guadalajara was underway so the italians were compromised at it and nearly all FT17s existing were republican in the north sector. BTW, there's a great recent book about all weapons (tanks, small weapons, arty, air, naval) used in the war and rough numbers and where were used (armas de la guerra civil, don't remember now the editorial).