British Army dump - PIC HEAVY! - Highly unusual and rare finds!

[RRPG]

A great day digging at the British army dump permission last Sunday, with 12 people in attendance from the WW2 RRPG.

Things were going along quite normally for the first hour or two, when Karen uncovered some very strange brass divider strips and starter tabs. They looked like Vickers cloth belt strips and tabs, but were chunkier and bigger. It wasn't until David found one in immaculate condition that, after a quick bit of a spit and a rub, revealed the starter tabs to be Vickers .50cal tabs, dated 1941!!!!! We soon realised that the 'seam' of these was really quite substantial and we recovered a HUGE quantity of them. Not only that, but after we had all dived into Karen's hole to dig the seam out, (after suggesting the 'men' should dig the rest out), we discovered a huge stash of brass Long-Lee butt plates beneath the cloth belt bits.

Added to that the crazy awesome weapon parts that were coming out.........Lewis spade grips, Lewis trigger grips, P14 grenade discharger cup adapter, Lee-Enfield bits galore and loads of Flintlock 'locks' The list of awesome finds goes on.

50cal vickers cloth belt starter tabs.....rarely than rocking horse poop!

The cleaning of finds from Sunday's dig is well underway. I have also discovered I had one very unusual Vickers 303 cloth belt starter tab. Not seen one like this before. The Bren oil bottles have come up nicely, as have the Lee-Enfield butt discs. The three badly damaged oil bottles are all American made 'Noera' bottles. Not tracked the weapon they are from down yet. The butt plates are all from the Long Lee, and all are marked. Usually they are marked with the unit information, but one is very curiously named!! All the 50cal Vickers belt starter tabs are marked exactly the same, so all dated September 1941.

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Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[Peter Laidler]

The butt marking discs would be ideal to interpret for the regimental markings. We know that they're original. As would the tangs of the butts.

[mike1967]

The butt marking discs would be ideal to interpret for the regimental markings. We know that they're original.

There is a LL in there Peter !

[Gil Boyd]

Interesting on that butt plate R.OSGOOD not many of them about from WW2, I wonder if it could have been owned by Gunner 1531635 R. Osgood of the Royal Artillery?

[Peter Laidler]

There is indeed Mike, that's what prompted my reply. As I said earlier and several times previously. The letters LL don't appear in any of the Equipment Regs from 1900 to 1944 or even as amendments as in the cases of SALOP (as an accceptable alternative to Shrop or SHROP - for Shropshire Yeomanry or KSLI and HANTS/Hants or HAMPS/Hamps being acceptable for Hampshire - spelled Hamshire in the ER's!!!!!)). But nothing else. I presented my documentary evidence...................

[browningautorifle]

Three Thompson oilers in there too...

[RRPG]

Thanks for the comments guys

The butt plates with the long tongue are all from the Long Lee, and we have deciphered all the unit markings, (lots of different units..... King's Own Scottish Borders, Royal West Kent, Royal Marines, etc... etc....) It has been speculated that, the plate with 'R Osgood' was actually a sharpshooters personal weapon, hence why his name was on it rather than the unit.

The Thompson oilers are the first we've found at the site, as are the Vickers 50cal belt bits. Never seen them before and were rare, until we recovered that lot!