Snapper

the Vulcan is live on BBC News 24 now....

So it was you! I've got some snaps of the TNT lorries somewhere.... nice coincidence. Do you still get to the new plant? It's a lot quieter round here now the printing is slowly moving to Broxbourne. I can park without problems.... MB

This is good stuff. I've recently discovered my home street in Westcliff was damaged during a Zep raid in 1915. There is a local expert who can probably fill me in and he is a member of my local WFA. I am a member, too, but something makes me keep it at arms length a little. I have never been one for clubs etc. My first proper home in norf London, in Stoke Newington, was built in 1767 and had been a meeting place for the prominent anti-slavers. Needless to say the Luftwaffe found it and blew the top floor and the facade off. The area had a large-ish Jewish community at the time and presumably they were being fairly indiscriminate. One night my mother and her sister left a shelter in Stoke Newington High St because it was too crowded. A bomb cut the gas and water main, flooding it, causing the highest single loss of life after the Bethnal Green disaster of 1943. The same night my mother saw a policeman get decapitated as she made her way to another shelter. My grandfather, who was killed at sea in 1941, was nearly killed on home leave by a bomb which landed in Abney park cemetery in Stoke Newington. A huge chunk of grave stone crashed through the balcony window where he had just been standing watching the raid. It was kept for years and had part of had an inscription on it. My gran used it as a door stop. MB

I think I object to sweaty lycra per se, actually, old chap. It makes a terrible mess of my Tunnocks tea cakes.

We flogged yours on eBay, Tony. There's lovely. Welcome Tom. Tony's keeping a welcome in his own personal hillside. He sleeps with a signed portrait of Harry Secombe under his pillow.

It's all an anti Renault plot. Good to see some things are on the up. Shame about the car. My fleet always spread joy. I whacked the Toyota putting it in my garage (124 quid), the Iltis drains money and faith and is about to go (yippeeee), the Renault 5 drank petrol but was a fantastic drive (sorely missed) and the new Mini is a girls car, I won't drive it unless I have to. The boss does. She rules. MB

There are some classics - but the likes of Return to the River Kwai hardly stand out as essential. As an employee of the gutter press for thirty odd years I have nothing but antipathy to the modern media. Jaded, you might say. These packages are fine, but chuck the papers away... all of them. The Mail recently gave us the classic WW1 documentary series which I got by proxy. Meanwhile The Sun (where I sit at this very muinute) only worries about Pete Docherty....zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz MB

You should stick to worrying about getting a full tank of gas. It's more often than not a static exhibit. :-D

What about naval ranks for the aquatic mob? Clinkerknockers mostly... MB

Nice looking motor, Mark. Look forward to seeing it this summer. MB

I'd sniffed around other events through the mid eighties and nineties - but going to Beltring for the first time in 1998 got me started. I started doing stuff for CMV from the second issue in 2001 and am more or less still there, but have had a flat year since last Beltring thanks to a host of negatives - knees etc. Joining HMVF has made a huge difference to my life. My wife thinks I have become really sad as opposed to an......anorak (sorry). I got my Iltis in October 2003 and have not used it anything like as much as I hoped or done enough to get it up to original standard. It has just been sold (more or less). Moving on.... mb

Flippin' eck. A bit of light reading? Sounds really interesting. I keep meaning to snap some WW2 era stuff near me on the road to Chelmsford and around Southend Airport. I nearly bought a book on fortifications in Sussex the other day. It was in the Martello bookshop in Rye high street. But I've got too many to read at the moment. MB

I think a PzIV turret would look lovely in my garden. It means the swing will have to go...oh, and the shed and the pear tree, the neighbours trees, my wife and kids.....stop.

You've got patience, Nick. I've just bought a standard garage and managed to do £150 of damage to my Verso reversing into it. Some idiot forgot to remove the aerial. Ping. The car in front is a Toyota. My Iltis appears to be "sold", so the garage probably awaits a new toy. MB

Tony, you need to take more water with it. MB Welcome Chris. Hopefully we can solve your problem. Have you ever by chance dived on the wreck of HMS Southsea off Tynemouth? MB

Tony, you need to come to lovely Westcliff on Sea. Welcome aboard, 6x6. Look out for the new duty roster which has been delayed since the big crash of '08. Dorset will soon let you know what to do once he's stopped playing with his articles. MB

Might have been Wynford Vaughan-Thomas of the BBC MB

My old boss used to tell a humorous tale of his time doing National Service in the late 1950s. He was in the East Surrey Regiment. His lot were out on Ex digging trenches and other useful holes. On completion they had to fill them all in again and when this was done one of them found that his Sten was missing. So they had to dig out all the holes looking for the gun, which was never found. The army deducted the cost of it from his pay. MB

Old fashion War Office/Admiralty conservatism.They didn't want a load of hacks ambling around on the beach. This must have all been governed by experience from Dieppe to Anzio. The press were on ships and then came ashore on the 9th (to my knowledge). The Americans were a little more liberal, hence the likes of Cappa and others getting wet and their films cooked. I was in correspondence with a really knowledgeable AFPU enthusiast a few years back who was adament that Anglo-Canadian press snappers did not get close to the action at all. Although this was often the case early on, by the time the war had progressed to the Netherlands they were going much nearer and seeing things quite fresh after combat. Freshly dead enemy etc. I am sorry to say I am forbidden from posting images from our database due to the evils of Intellectual Property protection. I'd like to get it all collated into a book and would love to retrace Bill Warhurst's route doing a Then and Now type format. Maybe in time for 2014. But I need to be more than just an oik to my masters, or even still employed, by that time. MB

Glad you found us again Cedric. Don't worry about going off topic on cars - especially a beauty like that - nobody minds. They've been in love with my Renault 5 for ages now. So much so that Safariswing Lee bought it off me to blow it up next month. Cheers, Mark B

Cool...just what the doctor ordered.

Agreed. I was never the fast, eh Mr Swing?? We do need to keep things buzzing. But I think there have been some interesting posts since the uckfup. I just want to see everyone coming back. There were some very interesting newcomers, including Sisu from Finland who I think are a great addition. I'm sure things will come right in due course, MB

I can comment on some of these pix. The Sherman line up with the shell cases is a picture taken by Bill Warhurst of The Times. He came ashore on the 9th of June and stayed with the army until the end at Bremen and on the Elbe. I was holding the negatives of this pic series a short time ago. Warhusrt took hundreds and only a very few are missing. The picture was then issued via The British Newspaper Pool or perhaps it will have the stamp of the Graphic Photo Union, which was The Times company's photo distribution arm. Warhurst replaced Eric Greenwood who had been aboard HMS Scylla with the command centre of Admiral Vian off Sword beach. No British press photographers hit the beach on 06.06.1944 unlike with the Americans. If you ever get a chance look for the work of H Dewhurst of the Yorkshire Post. He was a class act. Bill Warhurst drove round in a jeep, wore a DRs helmet and had a very natty cigarette holder. He was a pioneer. He was often accompanied by Harold Tetlow of the Daily Sketch - a very skilled snapper. God bless them all. The shot of the Churchill is a British Official picture which will have been taken by someone from AFPU. These shots were issued out to all the allied media, hence why another appears with a caption via the long lost ACME news agency. You will not the Churchill pic caption had a library filing index on it and I would not be surprised if these came from a major regional newspaper in Britain or even from the library of one of the nationals. It doesn't look like a News of The World library picture. We only have very few of these thanks to a long derided destruction policy in the fifties/sixties. It could be from one of the lost papers - the News Chronicle or Reynolds News. My library covers the Daily Sketch, Times(s), Sun and News of the Screws. MB

Don't forget to supersize....it's all the rage, apparently.

No idea, but it is a wonderful snap. I've not seen it before. Is this part of your then and now scheme, Dorset?