Forums Forums Wirral History : Chasing the Past Wirral History WW2 Thurstatston ( Heswall ) Bombing Decoy

Visited a while ago, nothing left much, but one mystery remains - where was the control bunker:

The Site Now - nothing much left:



A WW2 RAF photo of the site - details at the bottom:




After a bit of PhotoShopping, some details emerge:



The Site Boundary is in red dots

The red arrows show groups of fire baskets (pic below)

The Green dot shows where I suspect the control bunker was, buried on the river side of the railway embankment; there is some concrete there, the right size, it is the top of something, right place, right thickness, nothing has sat on top of it, all it needs is a shovel !

It's even the right type of concrete ( MoD )

intresting derek was on about this the other night d.d. info please!

wow, the very first pic - I had my lunch there not so long ago, its very near the sign saying dungeon i belive !

a look see i think!

hope this helps

http://www.subbrit.org.uk/sb-sites/stations/t/thurstaston/index2.shtml

http://www.subbrit.org.uk/sb-sites/stations/t/thurstaston/index3.shtml

Ta - the HAA site was nearer the station, this was further south, pity they didn't leave the HAA site (or at least one emplacement) standing !

I've also got a video somewhere of a gang of blokes (flat caps, fags and shovels), shovelling yellow Uranium ore out of 10 ton railway wagons into a big pile, right in Thurstaston station good yard (ie the picnic site !).

Shovelling Uranium Ore in the goods yard ?? This we must see !!

Maybe for the secret H-bomb factory under the tea rooms next to the station ?

It was in a Wirral Railways video tape, it mentioned (remembering a while back ?) that it was for Capenhurst - which seems a bit odd as it's not the closest goods yard - perhaps it was at the time ? It was defo yellowcake.

Well I'm truly amazed at that. If it's Uranium Oxide Ore/Yellowcake, it's only got a very short half-life (I think). Hours rather than thousands of years. Nevertheless, surprised it was just loose material rather than in barrels or bags.

Breathing it in wouldn't be top of my agenda !

Interesting info w10694. Thanks.

Popped along to the site tonight, approached it from Heswall end, same as everywhere else, it is pretty overgrown at the moment where I wanted to dig - Aldi spade failed miserably at the second cut - endex. Had a wander around the fields, there is a mound that may contain the remains of some of the stuff, but the metal will have been recovered and scrap wood burnt, so probably left with rusty fence-wire if there is anything in it.

A tree seems to have rooted right across the end where the pipes should be if it is the decoy control. One thing I did find out is that it is a split level building there is another roof at a lower level next to it, on the short side away from the decoy site.

Here is a 1997 aerial of the area - underneath the "V" is the manmade "mound". There are some things starting to pop-up in the decoy field in 1997, but pictures after this and 1970 ones don't have them.

That's a bit close to the decoy site !

its the other side of the field if ur commin frm the carpark way theres an old bridge witch goes over the wirral way foot path,(the old railway track) go under that then look left and u will see the bunker over in the field,jst looks like a cave frm a distance but we walked over last week to have a nose its there.pm if u still need help in finding this hope it off some help.

Thanks to MattyWirral for finding this.

Heswall Decoy Control Bunker, in pretty good condition, covered in plants apart from front face.

Map shows B for bunker...