2 Spigot Mortar Emplacements - Previously unrecorded.

Discussion in 'United Kingdom' started by MyOldDad, Oct 6, 2008.

  1. MyOldDad

    MyOldDad Senior Member

    I thought these photos, taken in the spring of this year, might be of interest. This spigot mortar emplacement is situated in woodland guarding the approach to the village of Deanston near Stirling. 56 11'15.64"N 4 04'07.91"W will locate it's position on Google Earth.

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    The last photos shows the line of fire onto the road.

    There is another at 56 11'07.10"N 4 04'38.98"W which is buried with only the steel pivot showing. I couldn't find it on my last visit as it was heavily overgrown but I have some old photos of it from the 1980s.

    Neither were recorded in the Defence of Britain survey. The county archaeologist has been made aware of their existance and (as of July 08) they have now been officially recorded.

    Tom.
     
  2. Paul Reed

    Paul Reed Ubique

    Very interesting indeed!
     
  3. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    They're quite a bit inland aren't they?
    I suppose thet were built to defend Whisky Distilleries from German Invason.

    Thanks for posting those, it looked in very good condition.
     
  4. Smudger Jnr

    Smudger Jnr Our Man in Berlin

    Just searched the internet and found a 'Defence of Britain Project'

    E mail address for people to contact with information relating to WW2 sites like the one mentioned above. defenceofbritain@hotmail.co.uk

    Run in conjunction with The Council for British Archaeology and The Archaeology Data Service.

    Has anyone photos to show of the complete installation with weapon?

    Tom
     
  5. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    Photo Number: H 30181

    [​IMG][​IMG][​IMG]
    [​IMG]Photographer: Taylor (Lt)
    War Office official photographer

    Title: THE BRITISH ARMY IN THE UNITED KINGDOM 1939-45

    Collection No.: 4700-37

    Description: Home Guard soldiers operate a 'Blacker Bombard' spigot mortar during training at No. 3 GHQ Home Guard School at Onibury near Craven Arms in Shropshire, 20 May 1943.

    Period:Second World War
     
  6. GRW

    GRW Pillboxologist

    Nice one, Tom. I'm in Stirling and had no idea they were there. Are they at the Teith Bridge end? That looks like the road towards the junction. It's unusual to see a Scottish one in that state, you normally only get the mount showing.
    Do you know if Lorna Main got them added to the NMRS as well as the Stirlingshire records? Since the DoB Project is long finished, anyone who finds any Scottish military sites could send them to David Easton at RCAHMS : Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland
    Wales - Cadw,
    English Heritage-English Heritage - Stonehenge & the History of England : English Heritage
    DoE, Northern Ireland-Built Environment
    If you have Google Earth, you can download the entire DoB database from the DoB website and install it on GE. It's superb.
     
  7. GRW

    GRW Pillboxologist

    Owen likes this.
  8. MyOldDad

    MyOldDad Senior Member

    Nice one, Tom. I'm in Stirling and had no idea they were there. Are they at the Teith Bridge end? That looks like the road towards the junction. It's unusual to see a Scottish one in that state, you normally only get the mount showing.
    Do you know if Lorna Main got them added to the NMRS as well as the Stirlingshire records? Since the DoB Project is long finished, anyone who finds any Scottish military sites could send them to David Easton at RCAHMS : Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland
    Wales - Cadw,
    English Heritage-English Heritage - Stonehenge & the History of England : English Heritage
    DoE, Northern Ireland-Built Environment
    If you have Google Earth, you can download the entire DoB database from the DoB website and install it on GE. It's superb.
    Hi Gordon,
    Lorna Main visited both sites with me and took her own photos in July. She has updated the SMR and also informed David Easton. She was kind enough to let me see the rather enthusiastic reply she got from him in which he states that these mortar sites would have been part of the 'River Forth to Loch Lubnaig Stop Line' which would also have pill boxes, road blocks, flame fougasses etc at various points along it's length.
    The one in the photos is just off the road between the Teith bridge and the distillery (behind the old sewage works) but it is hard to find unless you know exactly where to look.
     
  9. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    Interesting stuff.
    Are there many bits and pieces of Fougasse equipment still scattered about?
    I'd kind of hope they were quite thorough in removing it...
     
  10. GRW

    GRW Pillboxologist

    Good stuff, Tom. I know Lorna from working with the council myself years ago; she helped me get started on the DoB Project in '95.
    I don't know if you're actually anywhere near Deanston yourself, but do you know anything about a PoW work camp called East Deanston somewhere in that area? I can't find any farm of that name on any old map, but there is a house of that name in Dunblane, just down the road fom the Hydro.
    Just trying to narrow it's location down.
     
  11. GRW

    GRW Pillboxologist

    The odd one still lies around in various places, Adam. I've heard of a few decommissioned ones in England.
     
  12. Smudger Jnr

    Smudger Jnr Our Man in Berlin

    Owen,
    Thanks for the photo showing it operationally.

    Tom
     
  13. MyOldDad

    MyOldDad Senior Member

    Hi Gordon,
    I lived in Deanston in the 60s/70s. The POW camp was at Deanston House (now a nursing home). It had been a minor stately home, then a girl's school, then was requisitioned in the war. In my day it was a hotel. I remember seeing a number of trees in the grounds with Italian Grafitti carved into them c.1966-8. Some of it was still visible in the 80s when I took this photo:

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    I have always meant to go back and see if there was still some of it worth recording.
    Much of the grounds of Deanston House has been developed for housing but I remember large wooden huts, one of which was used as a garage by the hotel owner. There were rumours locally that a large house at the top of 'Dan Dhu's' brae (I think it was called 'Auchendoune') had been used for the interrogation of high ranking German and Italian officers and that a collection of their hats was still contained in a cupboard there.
    Tom.
     
    GRW likes this.
  14. MyOldDad

    MyOldDad Senior Member

    Interesting stuff.
    Are there many bits and pieces of Fougasse equipment still scattered about?
    I'd kind of hope they were quite thorough in removing it...
    Hi, It makes you wonder does't it. THIS happened about two miles up the road!!!
    Tom.
     
  15. GRW

    GRW Pillboxologist

    Thanks for that, Tom. Another mystery solved.
    One of the people involved in the Hill of Row explosion was still living in the Stirling area a few years ago. The Stirling Observer marked the anniversary a few months ago, and published photos. I'll try to find them.
    Eyewitness reports claimed a soldier and a female came running out of one of the huts immediately before the series of explosions. Funny thing is, a few months later the same soldier was fined at Stirling Sheriff Court after being caught poaching fish on a private estate....using handgrenades.
    So was there a connection?
     
  16. MyOldDad

    MyOldDad Senior Member

    Thanks for that, Tom. Another mystery solved.
    One of the people involved in the Hill of Row explosion was still living in the Stirling area a few years ago. The Stirling Observer marked the anniversary a few months ago, and published photos. I'll try to find them.
    Eyewitness reports claimed a soldier and a female came running out of one of the huts immediately before the series of explosions. Funny thing is, a few months later the same soldier was fined at Stirling Sheriff Court after being caught poaching fish on a private estate....using handgrenades.
    So was there a connection?
    Hi Gordon,
    It certainly sounds a bit 'fishy'!! Am I right in thinking it was a young boy that died in the explosion?
    I eventually found the 1982 photo of the second spigot mortar emplacement (circled bottom right) which overlooks the B8032 'back Callander road' with Deanston House and grounds beyond.

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    The other spigot mortar is actually within the grounds of Deanston House / POW camp. Possibly at least part of their function was to prevent a 'liberation'.
    Tom.
     
  17. GRW

    GRW Pillboxologist

    I think you're right about the Hill of Row, Tom. It was actually the Daily Mail which ran a feature in one of the Saturday editions a few months back, now that I think about it.
    The Spigot wouldn't have been used to control PoWs since there weren't really any in significant numbers until about 1942, and the position wasn't permanently manned.
     
  18. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    What I like about this forum is whilst reading on a subject seemingly unconnected with this thread I came across this.

    From Fourth Indian Division history, page 173 regarding 2/7th Gurkhas.

    The Subedar Major and Subedar Marasindu with the aid of the handbook hurriedly unpacked and assembled a recently arrived spigot mortar.
    The German tanks which approached us were just as afraid of the spigot bombs as we were of firing them.
    To fire a spigot mortar , one jams the canister onto an instrument which resembles a blunt marline spike.
    The bomb hits some unpredictable distance away, precipitates itself along the ground like a prehistoric monster, belching fire as it goes, until it finishes its career in an ear-shattering explosion.
    At least that is the way it behaved for us.
    They scared off any tank that looked as though it wished to try conclusions with us.


    I see the 4th Indian Div gets a mention on the wiki page too.
    Blacker Bombard - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

    Blacker Bombards were issued to some units in North Africa in mid-1942. Blacker Bombards were employed in the brief defence of Tobruk in June 1942 (where they are known to have destroyed at least one German tank), and were provided in the 4th Indian Division where the spigot mortars supplemented the anti-tank defence of the Division until mid-1943.


    page 189 September '42 at Alamein postions ..

    To supplement the anti-tank screen 120 spigot mortars were dug in along the Divsional front.
     
  19. adelphi08

    adelphi08 Junior Member

    Hello all.
    Their is also a spigot mount at the top end of the Moray park in Doune ,near the old railway line.
    And also one recently rediscovered in the grounds of old Newton house as you leave Doune heading for Dunblane.
    MyOldDad, I must correct you on one thing. Deanston house was not a POW camp ,but a military HQ during the war.
    I am an old Deanston resident myself, and my dad lived in Deanston for most of his 84yrs.
    He served with the 8th Battalion A&SH as a territorial and when it was made a regular
    Battalion during the war serving in France with the BEF ,North Africa,Sicily and Italy where he was captured at Termoli in 1943 and spent the remainder of the war in a POW camp in Sudetenland.
    Hey we probably even know each other.
     
  20. adelphi08

    adelphi08 Junior Member

    Me again .
    It was a Mr Cameron local farmer who was killed in the Hill o' Rue explosion and his son lost an arm.
    Hamish the son is still alive and lives in Doune.
     

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