The first meeting of the New Year was held on Thursday in the Expanse Hotel. In the absence of Chairman Cyril Dawson, Jim Hornsby welcomed members and guest speaker Chris Bonnett. He also reminded members of a visit to join Beverley Probus club for lunch on March 1st and of a possible visit to be arranged to the Houses of Parliament.
After an excellent lunch Chris Bonnett spoke about the “Atlantic Wall” a system of fortifications built on Hitler’s orders along the coast of Europe from Scandinavia to the Spanish border. It was built between 1942 and 1944 in anticipation of an invasion of mainland Europe by the Allies. The main component of this “Wall” was a series of bunkers built by the Todt Organisation often using imported forced labour. Wherever they were built it was always to the same pattern and they were very sophisticated constructions. There were two types of bunker. One was reinforced and had walls 6ft 6ins thick and the others were field bunkers and had walls 3ft 3ins thick. Compare these with the bunkers built on Bridlington beach and at Hunmanby Gap which had walls 6ins thick!
The Germans had bunkers for all purposes. There were mortar bunkers, searchlight bunkers, anti-tank bunkers, range finding bunkers, machine gun bunkers and even rainwater collection bunkers. Many bunkers had their own crew quarters, their own telephone, central heating and air supply and regulated temperature.
Chris used slides of his visits to the bunker system on Jersey and showed some fascinating shots of observation towers with range finders built in a prominent position to be able to attack passing ships. Most of the bunkers shown were still in excellent condition 70+ years after they were built.
Perhaps the most sinister of all were bunkers built in France to house the development of V1, V2 and V3 rockets. Fortunately these were heavily bombed by British and American bombers just in time before they came into mass production.
The vote of thanks for a talk that held everyone’s attention was given by David Vernon.
Thanks to Ken Tunstall for this report
After an excellent lunch Chris Bonnett spoke about the “Atlantic Wall” a system of fortifications built on Hitler’s orders along the coast of Europe from Scandinavia to the Spanish border. It was built between 1942 and 1944 in anticipation of an invasion of mainland Europe by the Allies. The main component of this “Wall” was a series of bunkers built by the Todt Organisation often using imported forced labour. Wherever they were built it was always to the same pattern and they were very sophisticated constructions. There were two types of bunker. One was reinforced and had walls 6ft 6ins thick and the others were field bunkers and had walls 3ft 3ins thick. Compare these with the bunkers built on Bridlington beach and at Hunmanby Gap which had walls 6ins thick!
The Germans had bunkers for all purposes. There were mortar bunkers, searchlight bunkers, anti-tank bunkers, range finding bunkers, machine gun bunkers and even rainwater collection bunkers. Many bunkers had their own crew quarters, their own telephone, central heating and air supply and regulated temperature.
Chris used slides of his visits to the bunker system on Jersey and showed some fascinating shots of observation towers with range finders built in a prominent position to be able to attack passing ships. Most of the bunkers shown were still in excellent condition 70+ years after they were built.
Perhaps the most sinister of all were bunkers built in France to house the development of V1, V2 and V3 rockets. Fortunately these were heavily bombed by British and American bombers just in time before they came into mass production.
The vote of thanks for a talk that held everyone’s attention was given by David Vernon.
Thanks to Ken Tunstall for this report