Wehrmact fuel drum

Last Thursday I was visiting a local village "Brocante" sale here, in France.
I was surprised to see a 1944 dated Wehrmacht 200 litre fuel drum forsale. It was in very good condition, and I suspect it may have originated from Chateaudun air base; which is a few kilometers away.
I did not buy it, as I'm more interested in the Allied equipment. The asking price was 200Euro, which seems a bit steep for a village brocante.
Attachment 139583

Nice piece. Something that one wouldn't expect to have lasted in the open like this. I expect it's been hidden away for 80 years.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by browningautorifle

Something that one wouldn't expect to have lasted in the open like this.

---

Sort of similar with my "original" German Jerry can which was "sourced" from a West African market in mid 1980's and is now part of my Jerry can collection. A relative was working out there and decided to drive back to the UK when his contract ended. He needed an additional Jerry can to the cans that he already had but didn't have time to go to the market himself where they were sold, some distance away, and so got a local colleague to go but asked him to be sure to buy a fairly new Jerry can. The chap came back with just about the oldest Jerry can that it was humanly possible to buy.

The only issue with it was a very slight leap/leak on the rubber seal on the cap.

Interestingly one of my other Jerry cans in my collection, an early post war British can, appears to be made by the same German maker.

Interesting piece as well.

Here is the post war British Jerry can made the same German maker as the WW2 German can, Brose & Co, Coburg. Interestingly the company appears to be still going strong today.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by 30Three

Last Thursday I was visiting a local village "Brocante" sale here, in France.
I was surprised to see a 1944 dated Wehrmacht 200 litre fuel drum forsale. It was in very good condition, and I suspect it may have originated from Chateaudun air base; which is a few kilometers away.
I did not buy it, as I'm more interested in the Allied equipment. The asking price was 200Euro, which seems a bit steep for a village brocante.
Attachment 139583

---

There's a lot of those drums and perhaps jerry cans as well on some island in the northwest Pacific. Evidence of long range German flights to Japan during the war. I forget which island, but photos were posted on the Net years ago.

I see on looking just now that there is a good deal of debate online as to whether such things were possible. https://feldgrau.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4093

I wouldn't put it past the Germans to have established their own bases somewhere in Siberia; it is a vast area and in those days as isolated as anywhere on the planet. For example communities of "Old Believers" who fled there before WWII lived undiscovered until overflights in the 1950s.