Sturmpanzerwagen A7V "Mephisto"

Mephisto: the last surviving German A7V Sturmpanzerwagen tank from the World War I (1914-1918) is displayed in Queensland Museum South Bank's ENERGEX Playasaurus Place (Grey Street, South Bank, Brisbane).

The world's first tanks, the British Mark 1, went into battle on the Western Front in France in September 1916. Their impact on the troops was dramatic, as the following German account attests:

The arrival of the tanks had the most shattering effect on the men. They felt powerless against these monsters which crawled along the top the trench, enfilading it with continuous machine-gun fire, and closely followed by small parties of infantry who threw hand grenades on the gunners.

Although Britain and France developed several types of light, medium and heavy tank during the World War I, the Germans produced only one: the A7V. The prototype was completed and demonstrated in April 1917, but because of production delays the first operational A7V (Chassis Number 501) was not rolled out of the Daimler plant at Berlin-Marienfelde until October 1917. Only 20 A7Vs were built by the Germans, the rest of their tank force was made up of captured Allied vehicles.