RAF Morpeth Wall?

reddwarf9 · May 9, 2008

I came across this wall recently while working in the area, only when I got home did I realise it is just over the road from RAF Morpeth so probably connected with that site.

It obviously never had anything connected to either end so appears to be just a large wall with supports either side and a row of 4" holes across it.

Any ideas anyone?

Sabtr · May 9, 2008

I'm sure these walls were for either zero-ing aeroplanes guns/discharging unspent rounds or testing them. Mind I'm probably wrong!! We saw a similar one at RAF Eshott (Felton). They are huge walls when you get up close - BigLoada has a pic of me next to one. The holes would be to let water through (there was soil at one side) so as it didn't push the wall over.

reddwarf9 · May 9, 2008

Sausage said:
I'm sure these walls were for either zero-ing aeroplanes guns/discharging unspent rounds or testing them. Mind I'm probably wrong!! We saw a similar one at RAF Eshott (Felton). They are huge walls when you get up close - BigLoada has a pic of me next to one. The holes would be to let water through (there was soil at one side) so as it didn't push the wall over.

Ye it was big, probably 30 to 40 feet tall, thanks for the info, its in your area too :mrgreen:

Sabtr · May 9, 2008

reddwarf9 said:
Ye it was big, probably 30 to 40 feet tall, thanks for the info, its in your area too

I had noticed the "infiltration" into my patch.

As an airfield I think RAF Morpeth has very little left. If you were north of Morpeth on the A1 you would have passed this lot:

http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=55.266767&lon=-1.70861&z=18.3&r=0&src=ggl

That's part of RAF Eshott(Felton). Many bunkers still exist (at least 15) with lots of the original buildings being put to good use.

Bishop · May 9, 2008

Sausage wrote.

I'm sure these walls were for either zero-ing aeroplanes guns/discharging unspent rounds or testing them.

I reckon you're right, certainly look like firing butts to me.

The RAF still have to do this today, I swiped the quote below from one of their websites weapons pages.

The guns are harmonised in the aircraft by aligning the aircraft on the ground with a pre-positioned sighting board and adjusting the guns onto aligning marks on the board.

b

batroy · May 10, 2008

As has been noted it's an RAF firing range. The big flat wall is the rear of the structure, the business end is the bank of earth with the undergrowth on it to the left of the wall in picture 2. Dig around in that bank and there's a good chance you'll find spend rounds. I don't have a very good photo of one myself because they're huge structures and all the ones I've visited with my camera have been well overgrown, however the one at RAF Grove shows up very well on Flash Earth.

http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=51.611212&lon=-1.442594&z=20&r=0&src=msl

The Grove one also has the buildings associated with the firing positions which is an unusual survival from those I've seen.

reddwarf9 · May 10, 2008

Thanks for the info guys, yes batroy that grove wall looks just like the one I saw. It was too overgrown on that side to poke around really and light was failing and I wanted to have a peek at St Marys which was why I'd stopped there in the first place

Kaputnik · May 10, 2008

glad this has been posted up, as it may answer something that was puzzling me about something i saw at an airfield at Wymeswold, a huge wall, banked with earth, and strange buildings which i thought were for parking vehicles in parallel to the wall. a small 'office' type room at either end of the long building, will have a dig about when i next go there! very overgrown and in an unused part of the site, will put pics up when i get chance.

Foxylady · May 10, 2008

Really nice example, Redd. I'd love to have a look around one of those...particularly like the sunshiny side. :mrgreen:

Look forward to seeing the Wymeswold one, Kaputnik.

Kaputnik · May 10, 2008

this is the earthed up wall, the thinner top section looks very similar to the top pic!

this is the strange 'parallel to the wall' building which i thought was for parking....

the office type room, one at either end of the 'car-port' shaped building....

would this long building have been used for firing into the wall from, or would that have been done from the other side of the wall? (confusingly the wall seemed to be banked with earth both sides) obviously aircraft couldn't have emptied their guns into the mound from the building side, any ideas? wish i'd looked around this area more now! it's a place i'll be back to often though

reddwarf9 · May 11, 2008

Yeah that wall looks very similar although not quite as good condition, there were no buildings at all close to this, had a look on google earth and theres nothing close on the airfield on other side of the road either.

Bryag · May 11, 2008

Bishop is spot on. It is indeed a firing butt. The plane would have it's tail jacked up to simulate horizontal flight, and it would fire into a target in front of the Butt from a predetermined distance. This would allow them to align the guns with the sights of the planes. I have seen a few of these now at different airfields, but I saw a very different one yesterday (report to follow soon)

Here is one at RAF Tain

Here is one at RAF Banff

As stated the business end is the filled side, however there are a few stray shots on the Banff Butt!

reddwarf9 · May 12, 2008

Thats some great info and pics, thanx everyone

Kaputnik · May 12, 2008

that banff one looks a beaut, seems to be in great condition

sellers · May 14, 2008

Yep, definatley a firing butt. Spent a whole day last year covering that site, so have a few pics at hand. It is one huge site

Bryag · May 14, 2008

Kaputnik said:
that banff one looks a beaut, seems to be in great condition

Yeah it is, it just looked the business in that field of lush green grass. I have a full set on RAF Banff, and I will post them as soon as I can whittle the number of pics down to about 40 :lol:

batroy · May 15, 2008

Here's my photograph of the one at RAF Oakley for the mix. This is the rear and is also banked with earth. The business end is on the other side and covered with undergrowth.

It's more usual for the rear to be bare as with the Banff one in the pictures above, I can only speculate that the Oakley one has the extra banking because some of the buildings associated with the bomb store are not far behind it.

batroy · May 15, 2008

One thing I don't quite understand from these ranges comes from the one at Stanton Harcourt. It's in what appears to be a former gravel pit, significantly below the level of the road - indeed so much so that to reach it you have to scramble down a bank and with 50+ years of mature trees surrounding it it has become nearly invisible from the air and from the surrounding land. In the case of Stanton Harcourt I couldn't see an obvious way that they could have got an aircraft down in front of the range, apart from being in a pit it's close to the perimeter and faces away from the airfield. Were they all used to adjust the weapons while fixed to the aircraft?

Flash earth of the Stanton Harcourt range here:
http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=51.734372&lon=-1.40629&z=19.6&r=0&src=ggl
I have a photo of one end of it on my www site but the undergrowth made it difficult to get a proper shot.

Bryag · May 15, 2008

batroy said:
One thing I don't quite understand from these ranges comes from the one at Stanton Harcourt. It's in what appears to be a former gravel pit, significantly below the level of the road - indeed so much so that to reach it you have to scramble down a bank and with 50+ years of mature trees surrounding it it has become nearly invisible from the air and from the surrounding land. In the case of Stanton Harcourt I couldn't see an obvious way that they could have got an aircraft down in front of the range, apart from being in a pit it's close to the perimeter and faces away from the airfield. Were they all used to adjust the weapons while fixed to the aircraft?

Flash earth of the Stanton Harcourt range here:
http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=51.734372&lon=-1.40629&z=19.6&r=0&src=ggl
I have a photo of one end of it on my www site but the undergrowth made it difficult to get a proper shot.

Was this ever an airfield? From the aerial photography there is no evidence to support this. There are no remains of runway, and these are visible from the air even on airfields that have no trace on the ground. The surrounding terrain would also suggest there has never been an airfield on this site. If you have found a similar structure, it is likely to be on a smaller scale and would be a rifle firing butt or it could be for light artillery, but it is very unlikely to have been for aircraft. Do you have a photo for reference? One with a person in it for scale would be good.

EDIT****My apologies, I have just done a little research, and it appears that lake now occupies the site of both of the smaller, and much of the main runways (apparently dug for gravel.) As for the firing butt, I cannot comment on it's location, given the change to the rest of the site. Perhaps the surrounding land has been built up so much???****EDIT

batroy · May 16, 2008

Bryag said:
Was this ever an airfield? From the aerial photography there is no evidence to support this. There are no remains of runway, and these are visible from the air even on airfields that have no trace on the ground. The surrounding terrain would also suggest there has never been an airfield on this site. If you have found a similar structure, it is likely to be on a smaller scale and would be a rifle firing butt or it could be for light artillery, but it is very unlikely to have been for aircraft. Do you have a photo for reference? One with a person in it for scale would be good.

EDIT****My apologies, I have just done a little research, and it appears that lake now occupies the site of both of the smaller, and much of the main runways (apparently dug for gravel.) As for the firing butt, I cannot comment on it's location, given the change to the rest of the site. Perhaps the surrounding land has been built up so much???****EDIT

That was my initial reaction too, as far as I knew it had always been a gravel pit

The southern end of the main runway survives, it's to the left of the range site with a load of quarry buildings on it. Otherwise the hangars survive as an industrial estate and the technical site survives as farm buildings. The turret trainer is a tractor shed. For the curious there's a report on my www site.

As far as I could see the range sits in a prewar gravel pit rather than the surrounding land having been built up because it's lower than the road which is unlikely to have changed over the years. It's in really dense undergrowth, I must return to the site, maybe in winter, to try and find the original range access.

RAF Morpeth Wall?

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