War salvage in Europe

[BCA]

In the 1980's a local veteran told me one of his army buddies stayed in France after WW2 and purchased the salvage rights to a stretch of the Normandy beaches. Sorry I can't be more specific and recognize it is at best anecdotal infornation. ... Brian

[Eric B]

Each country had vehicle dumps.

Canada shared some dumps with the British. We decided on what we wanted to keep, then turned some over to Allied Countries as aid. What was left over we turned over to the British.

Eric

[Frank v R]

Hi Jon, I know from my trips to France that many areas were not cleared of wrecks into the 70's, if you go to the Brit Mullberry site the museum has photos from the mid to late 50's showing much of the treadway bridge still there , farmers in the area also collected all manner of metal items , everything from beach obstacles to vehicles , there is also treadway on display at Omaha , every time I go I see new items that have come out of the country side, last time the other truck traveling with us found a Ben Hur trailer still with all it's US markings on one of the farms,

[motto]

One of the interesting salvage stories is told at the underwater or undersea museum near Port En Bessin in Normandy where a large range of materiel recovered from the offshore sea bed is on display including a couple of DD tanks.
The salvers operated for many years after the war and worked in conjunction with a local smelter or foundry. From memory everything had to be cut up so as to pass through a one metre hole. Unfortunately not knowing French I couldn't glean all of the information presented but suspect that all the Mulberry block ships and much more went through such a hole.

Not far out of Lae in New Guinea sitting in the jungle there was a pile of aircraft debris almost the size of a house. The debris consisted of what parts of the aircraft that were of no interest to the salvers who had brought in a smelting plant to recover the aluminium. I have no idea how many aircraft they processed.
Today they call it recycling. It went on all over. Wherever there was a dollar or few cents to be made from it there were the entrepreneurs, the opportunists, the unemployed, the destitute.
After WW1 there were enormous quantities of shells laying all over the battlefields and people were employed to remove the copper drive bands with hammer and chisel. Every now and then one went off. No problem, plenty of others looking for work. The human detritus of war.

David

[Michael R.]

Brit post wartime use carriers and trucks in Germany (?) heading for the razor blade factory.

[Richard Farrant]

Originally Posted by Michael R.

Brit post wartime use carriers and trucks in Germany (?) heading for the razor blade factory.

Hi Michael,
That photo and some others was taken in the 1950's after we had squeezed a bit more use out of them. Note the later numbering system which did not come in until c.1949. So not exactly clearing up war debris.

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Jon,

Fascinating subject; read up on this in the following Wheels & Tracks magazine issues:

ISSUE No. 55 (April 1996)
Canadian Disposals and Returns - Canada-Europe; some vehicles did it twice.
The Dutch Inheritance (1) - Deelen Demob Vehicle Park.
The Dutch Inheritance (2) - The Enschede Dump.
Holland's Vehicle Parks - Soesterberg: 1 VP, Stroe: 2 VP.

ISSUE No. 56 (July 1996)
Surplus MVs for UNRRA - Part 1: Transport for Albania, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Germany.

ISSUE No. 57 (October 1996)
Surplus MVs for UNRRA- Part 2: Transport for Greece, Italy, Poland, Eastern Europe and China.

For the full listing of CMP and related subjects in W&T see this thread.

HTH,
Hanno