World War Two: Evidence of damage/stuff left over now.

[wildcat45]

I thought I would start a thread about physical evidence of the Second World War you can still see today. It came out of a thread I started about a war damaged house.

The recent anniversary of the end of WWII and the Battle of Britain has sparked my interest in the physical impact the war had on our towns and cities. I've realised that you can still see plenty of war stuff today from out of place 1950s/60s buildings built on bomb sites to the stumps of railings taken away for the war effort.

I live in Tynemouth on the coast near Newcastle and there's still quite a lot to see. A random walk with the dog this morning produced these.

Below a window sill in my house. A barrage balloon broke free from the golf course and got stuck in our Elm tree. It's steel hawser tether sawed its mark into a few things including our window sill



Not much I know but it's a start.

Edited by wildcat45 on Friday 11th September 12:23

[wildcat45]

For some reason it won't let me upload multiple images.

Round the corner you can just make out 'E' and 'W' from an 'EWS' sign which sugnified the proximity of an emergency water supply . It used to be much clearer when I was a kid back in the 1980s.

Edited by wildcat45 on Friday 11th September 11:15

[steveo3002]

you can often see where metal railings have been sawn off and sent for war time scrap

[wildcat45]

Finally this. No real evidence of damage today but these are some flats near the Metro station. I'd love to know how to 'Ghost' the images together.

[Composite Guru]

This is an interesting site about stuff like that in the town I grew up in.

http://www.mooncarrot.org.uk/adalhs/downloads/Defe...

[MentalSarcasm]

Walk down the road that runs between The Natural History Museum and the V&A Museum, the facade of the V&A bears some pretty impressive scars from a bomb that landed in the middle of the road during the Blitz. They have more information on their website, but basically it blew out all the windows and moved a lot of the extremely heavy items were found a few feet away from their original places, but all things considered it did remarkably little damage to the actual contents on the museum.

I always find it fascinating as it shows you the power of the explosion, there's solid stone with huge chunks gouged out of it. It's been left like that as a memorial to what London went through, which I like as I think it's easy to mentally reduce the experiences of the Blitz, so much of it has been renewed and built over, but along that road you start to understand it better.

[Zippee]

Interesting thread - nothing to add at present but now bookmarked.

[moorx]

There are a couple of WW2-related facts/photos in amongst this:

http://www.bristol-culture.com/2014/08/08/18-thing...

(I'm Bristolian by birth).

This is also interesting - includes Bristol, but also other buildings worldwide:

http://weburbanist.com/2009/10/25/war-and-pieces-9...

[Issi]

There's a lot of visible shrapnel damage to walls in Swansea, especially on Orchard Street and out towards the Liberty stadium.

[Chris Type R]

There's one of these (part of a Mulberry harbour) outside my brother's house in Littlestone-on-sea

More info: http://www.combinedops.com/Mulberry%20Harbours.htm

Edited by Chris Type R on Friday 11th September 12:26

[yellowjack]

I'm out of the Army now, so no access for photos, but the building that housed my boss's office at Carver Barracks (formerly RAF Debden) was quite significantly scarred by what was variously described as shrapnel damage or spalling from cannon/machine gun fire, depending on whose version of events was to be believed. http://battleofbritainblog.com/airfields/raf-debde...

It was opposite the gymnasium (a far more modern structure) which had been built on the site of the medical centre, destroyed in an air raid during the Battle of Britain, so my money is on shrapnel damage.

Part of the building (now demolished) was the parachute drying tower, the tallest structure on the base at the time, so perhaps used as an 'aiming mark'. The building was a (non-armoured) reinforced concrete structure, and other than several coats of paint over the years, no effort had been made to repair the air-raid damage.


Also 'left over' from WWII is an Anderson Shelter in my uncle's back yard. My grandad used to work in the steel industry, and the shelter was never buried, as it was surplus at the end of the war. It has served for more than 60 years as variously a coal shed, a wood shed, and just a shed. The corrugated iron is quite a heavy gauge, and has needed patching in places due to corrosion. It's a while since I visited but I believe it is still in place, concreted into the back yard.

[Chris Type R]

Someone found a secret german bunker in their garden

[wildcat45]

I'm surprised you don't see more shelters - even "Trigger's broom" ones that have been patched up over and over again. Growing up in the 1970s which was only 30 years after WWII I never saw an air raid shelter. You'd think they'd have been useful storage.

[.:ian:.]

WWII bombing practice range in the New Forest:

http://www.airshowspresent.com/ashley-walk-bombing...

https://goo.gl/maps/0ydfS

[Vacumatic]

Look at the houses behind Westminster Abbey, in the Barton street area, a number of the houses still have signs showing the way to the air raid shelter.

Also a large number of private houses, especially in the north, had their cast iron railings cut from their garden walls, the stumps are still to be seen, the metal was to be used in the war effort, it is said that much of the cast iron wasnt used and it was more of a sacrificial token effort.

[Tickle]

I was told that the holes in this bridge in Liverpool were produced by a Messerschmitt in WWII, not sure how true this is

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.4256843,-2.98927...

[wildcat45]

Cairnryan Military Port on Loch Ryan in SW Scotland was built to get supplies and military gear into the UK. The main jetty is derelict and unsafe now but it is still there. It was used until about 20 years ago as a ship scrap yard. The famous Ark Royal - from the 1970s TV series "Sailor" - ended her days there along with her sister ship Eagle and other warships of the 1950s like Bulwark, Albion and Blake.

[Alfa numeric]

There's evidence of bomb damage from WWI on London's embankment- a zeppelin dropped a bomb near Cleoptra's needle and ruptured a gas main, killing a tram driver and two of his passengers. The damage is still visible:



It's commemorated by a plaque on the base:

[wildcat45]

Chris Type R said:

There's one of these (part of a Mulberry harbour) outside my brother's house in Littlestone-on-sea

More info: http://www.combinedops.com/Mulberry%20Harbours.htm

Edited by Chris Type R on Friday 11th September 12:26

Just up from Cairnryan are these. I used to play in and around them when I was a kid. My Dad - who grew up in the area during WWII called them "Beetles" I forget exactly but they were either small parts of Mulberry Harbour or prototype caissons built round the coast on Wigtown Bay.

[wildcat45]

Alfa numeric said:

There's evidence of bomb damage from WWI on London's embankment- a zeppelin dropped a bomb near Cleoptra's needle and ruptured a gas main, killing a tram driver and two of his passengers. The damage is still visible:



It's commemorated by a plaque on the base:

I was looking at that a few months ago. It is quite sobering isn't it?