MYSTERY OBJECTS

[Stanley]

I think that at some time the landscape was explored by either trial bores or seismic testing.

[Wendyf]

None of those, it is very local, between the canal and the railway.

[Gloria]

Munition stores?

[plaques]

Wendy, I wasn't quite sure what feature we were looking at so I've enlarged one section which took my interest. These look like bore holes to supply water to the old sewage works?

Mystery plan.JPG

[Wendyf]

No, not bore holes. There are at least 6 rectangles like that spread over quite a wide area, I couldn't get them all in.

[Wendyf]

Gloria has it though!

[StoneRoad]

It looks like the areas of "squares" are connected by trackways - possibly a narrow gauge railway ?
So, bomb stores ? or maybe ordinary ammunitions

[Wendyf]

It was a cordite store during WW1 on Salterforth Moss. The marks you can see on the ground are the remains of the concrete pillars which supported the huts. You are right Stoneroad, there was a narrow gauge railway connecting the various sites, including a track to a wharf on the canal. The tracks connected to the main line at Barnoldswick Junction.
It was thought of locally as a cordite dump, as there were boxes left at the end of the war which were eventually blown up. We learnt from our speaker at the History Society last week that it was actually a distribution depot, another being at Slimbridge in Gloucestershire.
The cordite was manufactured at Gretna Green an then shipped on to Salterforth Moss.
One local man at our talk remembered being told that the trucks on the narrow gauge railway were pulled by horses.

Here is a map showing the tracks still in place.

[Tizer]

If they were cordite stores I would have expected there to be high protective banks around each array of squares. I suppose these must have been removed or ploughed out by the time the photos were taken.

[Wendyf]

The store was dismantled in 1923, and the area returned to farming so yes Tizer, it would all have been ploughed out by the 1960s. The concrete bases may also have been levelled and what you can see is just a crop mark. Looking at information on Slimbridge, the sheds were raised up on concrete pillars so that the cordite could be offloaded on the level.

[Tizer]

Thanks for the information, Wendy, I didn't know about the Slimbridge munitions dump. I found this map of the dump on the web at this link Slimbridge Also more info on this web page: LINK

[Gloria]

There was an ammunition store not far from us, they were made at Chorley and Blackburn, then stored here prior to shipping.
https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threads/l ... -08.33114/

[Wendyf]

That has a very similar layout doesn't it, with the banking around each hut that Tizer mentioned earlier.

[Gloria]

A lot of the huts are still there, and in odd places it can be seen where the train tracks went.

[chinatyke]

If they were cordite stores I would have expected there to be high protective banks around each array of squares. I suppose these must have been removed or ploughed out by the time the photos were taken.

Cordite isn't categorised as a high explosive, by design it is a slow burner, so would it need earthen protection banks?

[Tizer]

That's a good point, China. If the site was for storage of cordite and not manufacture then the need for blast protection might be less. My mind went straight back to the explosives factory that was at Hayle in Cornwall and which I've mentioned before on OG after a visit to the area. It was located among the sand dunes and there are still many things to be seen. Since the last time I wrote about it I've found this web site which has loads of information about the factory site. It might not be directly relevant to Wendy's site but it's very interesting nonetheless and definitely worth a browse! LINK

[Whyperion]

On some of the links on railway sites there were mentions at earby of branch to munitions site. Would that have been standard gauge and ww2?

[Stanley]

I can remember the pillars for the bases still being there in the fields in 1960. You could see them out of the wagon cab with being a bit higher. Walt Fisher said they were wooden huts and that it was cordite that was stored there. He could remember orange clouds of smoke when they burned what was left at the end of the war.
Re, banks or bunds round the huts. The general practice for high explosives, i.e. at Penrhyndeudraeth where Cook's Explosives made cordite using nitroglycerine, was light wooden huts and bunds. Separate small sites minimised the danger of domino effect and the bunds directed the blast upwards. For munitions the general practice was separate small locations underground covered by green mounds. The idea was upwards projection of the blast and containment of shrapnel. i.e. At the largest store in Europe just North of Carlisle at Moss Band. Cordite would only burn so was nowhere near as dangerous unless confined, hence the wooden huts.
The map I posted earlier in Forgotten Corners shows the standard gauge rail track siding that served it.

[StoneRoad]

On some of the links on railway sites there were mentions at earby of branch to munitions site. Would that have been standard gauge and ww2?

Some were standard gauge, others were not ...
From my own memory banks (I'm not that old, this is from visits and restoration work I've been involved with)
The cordite place "Devil's Porridge" near Gretna had a fleet of "fireless" locos on 2ft gauge. That was in 1915 - some of the site *may* still be in use as a store.


TiG - Fireless loco par StoneRoad2013, on ipernity

But "behind the trenches" there was a 2ft network, closest to the front line, internal combustion not steam for "secrecy" reasons.

The admiralty in WW2 had standard gauge supply to the magazines serving the batteries (emplacements) protecting Peterhead Harbour of Refuge.
After WW2 the Cleobury Mortimer & Ditton Priors Light Railway had an "extension" and continued to serve a RNAD depot at Ditton Priors until the 1960s.
There were others ...

[Wendyf]

On some of the links on railway sites there were mentions at earby of branch to munitions site. Would that have been standard gauge and ww2?

As far as I know there was nothing there in WW2.

[Stanley]

Walt's father was a guard at Salterforth in the Great War.

[Wendyf]

That's interesting, we were wondering if it was guarded by soldiers or locals. We have a suitcase full of drawings and paintings done by Walter Fisher in our archive, including one of the explosion when the cordite was burnt.

[Tizer]

What are these mystery objects?

[StoneRoad]

Aircraft "drop" tanks for extending operational range

[Stanley]

That sounds feasible.... they look like bombs so they won't be!