WW2 British Home Guard Club

[Flying10uk]

This home made club "appeared" just after WW2 in the state in which you see it here and it was made by my grandfather during WW2, I believe, from a spade shaft. My grandfather was a member of the (uniformed) Home Guard as well as being a member of the Civil Defence and going on patrol as an Air Raid Warden. There is some circumstantial evidence to suggest that he may also have been a member of the top secret Home Guard known as the "Auxiliary Units", but this has never been proven. This would have been the British Resistance had the Germans invaded in 1940. The U.K. was the only country in Europe to set up a resistance organisation before the Germans invaded. This club is perhaps the strongest piece of evidence that he was indeed a member of the Auxiliary Units because it is known that they did use studded clubs, similar to WW1 trench clubs.

This is the first time that this club has ever been publicly seen, outside of my family. My father did ask grandfather what the purpose of the holes were for in the end and his obviously silly reply was "I swing the club so fast that it gets hot and the holes are to keep it cool.". My grandfather never said any more than this as to the purpose of the holes in the end. On close inspection one can see the imprint of washers in the wood and, not shown in the pictures, I can make out the imprint of threads in the bores of at least 1 hole. The purpose of the holes was obviously to accept threaded studding which was held in place by washers and nuts. My grandfather must have thought it best to remove this before letting the rest of the family see it, post WW2.

It is a horrible thought of the damage that a studded club, such as this would have been originally, to another human being but we were at total war facing a powerful foe. I have no intention of replacing the studs.

The traditional police truncheon is shown alongside for comparison purposes.

Information

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[browningautorifle]

That sort of club was a direct descendant of the trench raid clubs of WW1. These guys were the ones to have used them too so they would know. They built them from memory.

[Peter Laidler]

Those holes and their positions look to me like it was made from the rear leg of an old kitchen chair - where the stringers were glued. Seen plenty of 'em in my time.....

[Flying10uk]

The wood could have come from a chair and the ends do taper away very slightly which I hadn't noticed before. The information that it started life as a spade shaft is 3rd hand information via my father. My grandfather died before information concerning Auxiliary Units was declassified but he did seem to know much about how an invading German army would be resisted if they had invaded.