Fascine - Military Fascine in WW1 and WW2

Military Fascine in WW1 and WW2

First World War tanks, namely the British Mark IV, started the practice of carrying fascines on the roof, to be deployed to fill trenches that would otherwise be an obstacle to the tank. These were constructed from the traditional bundles of brushwood used to make facsines since Roman times. Although these were cumbersome to deploy they proved an effective gap crossing device and were used widely by the tanks of the day that weighed up to about 30 tons. In World War II the use of fascines continued as a gap crossing device and within the British Army these were launched from the Churchill AVRE - a Royal Engineer derivative of the standard Churchill tank (40 tons).