LCT 7074 Landfall at Birkenhead: risk of being scrapped

[Alex van de Wetering]

I have been wanting to give Landing Craft Tank 7074 some attention on the forum, for a long time.

Although WW2 vehicles are more my cup of tea, landing craft and ships related to D-day have always had my interest. About two years ago I heard about the last Surviving British LCT mk3 that was at risk of being scrapped.

The craft in question is LCT7074, which landed at Gold beach and successfully delivered 9 of its 10 tanks. After making several re-supply runs in the weeks after D-day, the decision was made to convert the LCT into a repair ship. Before this conversion was completed the war ended. After the war the LCT survived as an exclusive club ship in Merseyside and renamed “clubship Landfall”.

At some stage the craft became part of the Historic Warships Birkenhead collection and found a spot in East Float awaiting restoration.

In early 2006 the Birkenhead museum was forced to close down, due to redevelopment of the area.

Although efforts are/were being made to save other ships from the Birkenhead collection, like U-boat U534, Falkland veteran HMS Plymouth and submarine HMS Onyx, there doesn’t seem to be too much interest to save the LCT. The Onyx seems to have been saved in the meantime, but the faiths of other items from the Birkenhead collection remain unknown.

Are there any MLU members that know more about the current situation in and around Birkenhead? Is the LCT still there?

As often is the case, any attempt of saving, moving and/or restoring these sort of objects could prove to be very expensive, but it would be a shame to see the LCT being scrapped.

Ideally it could form a nice base for a D-day related museum on the UK southcoast or in Normandy (maybe even in company of some of the LCA’s that seem to “survive” in the UK and were displayed on MLU before)



The LCT can clearly be recognized on Google Earth as the following pictures show, but you never know when those pictures were taken.


Alex

Other links on the subject:


http://evans-experientialism.freeweb...tocontents.htm


http://www.maritimebritain.co.uk/risklist.html

[PPS]

There are two photos on:-

http://www.photoboxgallery.com/Marit...onNews/3208718

I cannot find a date to the photos though.

There is another mention of LCT 7074 here seems to be quite recent, within the past 3 months:-

http://www.arrse.co.uk/cpgn2/Forums/...p=1708931.html

LCT 7074 is stated as being part of the core collection here:-

http://nationalhistoricships.org.uk/...g%20Vessel

And here is an LST that will be closer to Canadian hearts, built at Esquimalt:-

http://nationalhistoricships.org.uk/...ssel/vref/1789

Paul.

[PPS]

Originally Posted by Alex van de Wetering

The LCT can clearly be recognized on Google Earth as the following pictures show, but you never know when those pictures were taken.

I took a look on both Google Maps and Yahoo Maps to see what could be found. There is little difference between the two of them, and they are almost identical to the pics that you posted Alex.

But looking on Multi map, there is a difference. She seem to have been moved alongside and slightly astern of what I take to be HMS Onyx (?)

Paul.

[Alex van de Wetering]

Paul,

I agree. It seems the Birkenhead collection has been moved closer to eachother, probably to enable the area around it to be developed.

Over the past few weeks I spent some time looking for landing craft survivors on the internet, LCA's, US LCT's, LST's and British LCT's. It seems that while I was conserned about LCT landfall, a few other "surviving" British LCT3's and 4's have been scrapped in my own country over the past few years.

Below are some examples, some barely modified, others hardly recognizable. I was surprised that some of them survived (and some still survive) in Holland, because we tend to "clean" our country, which saw several old army trucks disappear and even Sherman range targets being scrapped.



"De Kil" (LCT 3) scrapped only two or three months ago!!!!




Pictures: "Hans" www.kustvaartforum.nl



"Rio 2/ Trio2" (LCT 3) scrapped in 2000 after stranding.

Picture: www.kustvaartforum.nl



"Bogy" (2 LCT 3's welded together!) After an accident when loading, which killed the captain. The ship was scrapped in Belgium somewhere around 2002.



Pictures: "Piet Bieze" www.kustvaartforum.nl





"Jabo" seems to be stilll in business. I have only seen one picture, which makes it hard to determine, but I recon it is based on a LCT3.

Alex

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by Alex van de Wetering

Over the past few weeks I spent some time looking for landing craft survivors on the internet, LCA's, US LCT's, LST's and British LCT's. It seems that while I was conserned about LCT landfall, a few other "surviving" British LCT3's and 4's have been scrapped in my own country over the past few years.

Alex, amazing info, never realised this.

Here's another to add to the Higgins survivor's list, it used to be located on a roundabout at Shoreham - see Whats The Last Thing You Expect To See On A Roundabout?

H.

[Alex van de Wetering]

Does anyone have any recent information regarding the fate of LCT 7074? Is it still there???? (Anyone interested in a trip across the channel, next June? )

It seems U-boat U-534 from the same Historic Warships collection has been adopted by Merseytravel. It has been cut in three sections and forms part of a new exhibition.

http://www.merseyferries.co.uk/u534/news.aspx



Alex

[griffo220]

Hi Guys I'm new to MLU usually spend my idle time on G503 as I have a 1943 GPW but I saw this in my local rag & done a search & ended up here, so thought you may be interested.

http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/liver...0252-25966368/

Best Regards

Dave

[Alex van de Wetering]

Hi Dave and welcome to MLU.

Thanks for your reply regarding LCT 7074......I also read something on it on HMVF.......shocking! Really shocking, let's hope it does get saved (again).

Last year I seriously looked at making a visit just to see the LCT....I guess because I always had an interest in D-day landing craft and the places where you can visit and experience actual WW2 landing craft is very limited. 7074 is unique in a way that the original camouflage and numbers are still visible and because the modifications made to the vessel after WW2 are pretty limited, compared to some other survivors.

Even last year at the 65th remembrance of D-day, only one WW2 craft was to be seen along the coast, an LCVP. While there are still some landing craft around, most of them are lingering in ponds....or rotting away in naval harbours. A real shame, because they played such an important role in the liberation of Europe......sadly some of them will soon be lost forever.

Alex

[griffo220]

Hi all sorry for the delay but I went to see the vessel last weekend & it is now totally submerged, you can only just see the funnel!

Oh dear it doesn't look good, how on earth would / could someone attempt at rescueing this vessel?

check this link

http://evans-experientialism.freeweb...om/lct7074.htm

I know there was another article in a local magazine & it was from the previous owner stating that he sold it to the birkenhead maritime museum which went bust so not too sure was the vessel's fate is?

Dave

[griffo220]

http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/war-sea...ection-11.html

[Alex van de Wetering]

Dave thanks for your reply. The link you sent to the WW2talk forum is very interesting.
If I understand correctly the LCT has been sinking for years, but someone regularly pumped the water out uptil a few months ago. So, did the leak get worse, or did they just stop pumping the water out (maybe even to attract attention)?
I am shocked by your message that only the funnel is the only thing sticking from the water at the moment. When it was still partially afloat, you could at least move the vessel around. Now it has sunk it does make any attempt to rescue it harder and even though I agree that the flat bottom could make it easy to slip some cables underneath it, you still need one or two cranes to get it back to the surface.

Let's hope this new attempt as suggested on the WW2talk forum proves to be the "winner" and we will be able to admire the LCT as part of a museum or collection in the future.

Alex

[Alex van de Wetering]

Sadly, LCT 7074 is deteriorating further and I haven't heard of any recent plans to save it. I guess the plans mentioned previously didn't have the desired result.

I bought a lottery ticket yesterday.....now I only have to wait.....





source:http://www.demotix.com

[griffo220]

Hi all, she's saved!

http://www.warhistoryonline.com/pres...an-sawyer.html

Regards

Dave

[Stuart Kirkham]

Fantastic news Dave . I've been following this story with 'optimistic' interest hoping that something could be done to save 7074.

Found some photos of the LCT being raised.....

http://jhlphotography.smugmug.com/Ir...2014/LCT-7074/

[hrpearce]

Great photos. By the time the driver climbed to the cab on the Crain it would be lunch time.

[Alex van de Wetering]

Some picture from the salvage operation of LCT 7074

source:

http://www.uk.arteliagroup.com/lct-7074-re-floated/
http://www.uk.arteliagroup.com/lct70...loat-part-two/

Awesome to see the LCT saved and on it's way to the D-day museum in Portsmouth!

Alex

[David Dunlop]

What would a typical load have consisted of for her at the Normandy Beaches on D-Day?


David

[Alex van de Wetering]

David,

I understand LCT 7074 carried 10 Shermans during D-day, and landed on Gold Beach.

She joined the 17th LCT Flotilla at Great Yarmouth then steamed onwards to Felixstowe to prepare for the build up to D-Day. The backbone of the invasion fleet LCT’s, which could carry up to eleven Sherman tanks, were manned mainly by British crews and transported almost all the tanks, heavy artillery and armoured vehicles landed in Normandy. The 17th LCT Flotilla was part of Assault Group L2, LCT Squadron “H” of the Eastern Task Force, which supported the British landings (made up of two British divisions, one Canadian division plus two Army and one Royal Marine Commando unit), and LANDFALL carried troops and ten Shermans to Normandy, successfully landing nine of the tanks on Gold beach. For several months after the invasion, the vessel was consistently engaged in ferrying troops, supplies, vehicles and ammunition to ports across the Channel in support of the Allied Forces advancing across northern Europe, continuing in this role throughout the summer and well into the autumn of 1944.

source: http://www.nationalhistoricships.org...r/713/landfall


Some excellent info on specific laoding tables was posted in these threads:

http://www.mapleleafup.net/forums/showthread.php?t=2205
http://www.mapleleafup.net/forums/showthread.php?t=9387

[David Dunlop]

Thanks, Alex.

David

[Stephen Fisher]

Hi everyone,

I appreciate this thread is quite old, but I thought in case anyone is watching you might like to know the latest updates on LCT 7074. Last week, she received the final piece of funding necessary to complete her restoration and display her outside The D-Day Story museum in Portsmouth. You can read more about it here: https://www.nmrn.org.uk/news-events/...g-craft-secure

I've been doing some voluntary research for the National Museum of the Royal Navy into 7074's history and uncovered a few interesting details of her career, and the units she took to Normandy. She actually carried one Cromwell tank of 22 Armoured Brigade's HQ, two Sherman tanks of the 5th Royal Horse Artillery and seven Stuart tanks of the 5 Royal Tank Regiment's recce troop. One of these was drowned during disembarkation on Gold Beach, although the crew survived.

Whilst I've found a few pictures of her on Gold Beach, I've never seen the photo of her in Alex van de Wetering's first post. Does anyone here know its origin or how I might be able to obtain a better copy?

More updates soon I hope,
Steve

[Alex van de Wetering]

Stephan,

Thanks for the update! Most threads on MLU have quite a history, but there are always people watching....and a reply always brings the thread back to the top!

I think I got the picture from the Evans-experimantialism website at the time. It seems the website has been "disabled", but some of it can still be found on the Wayback machine.
https://web.archive.org/web/20120501...om/lct7074.htm

Alex

[Stephen Fisher]

Hi Alex,
Thanks for that info. It appears that George Evans ran that site. He was the former owner of 7074 but has, I understand, since passed away. I'll keep looking for more information and update you all as and when more details come to light.
Cheers,
Steve

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Not much news to report, but here's an update:

“D-Day landing craft tank in 'much better condition' than expected following restoration works”: https://www.portsmouth.co.uk/news/po...-works-2504131

The LCT 7074 before restoration works:


Artist impression of final resting place of The National Museum of the Royal Navy's LCT 7074 outside the D-Day Story Southsea:

[Alex van de Wetering]

Thanks Hanno.

I am checking the interwebs from time to time, but apart from the pictures and footage taken when the LCT had just been put indoors, I can't find any update pictures. Should be a good surprise though!

Alex

[Hanno Spoelstra]

She was scheduled to be finshed by D-Day +75 - well that didn't happen....

Note that she "will be restored to her original glory, becoming the ‘missing piece in the jigsaw’ for the newly-revamped D-Day Museum in Southsea", but also that "she is too large to move by car and sea to the museum, she will be taken apart into smaller pieces, driven to the seafront and then reassembled."

It should become a sight to be seen, with a Sherman and a Churchill tank on its deck.