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Concrete structures - Westleton Walks

Work still continues in trying to build up a picture of the remains of this Second War training area. Today met up with David Sims to have a probe around one of the destroyed concrete structures (after of course getting permission). I have already blogged on these structures - part of a 'replica' battlefield in order to train infantry in attacking German 'Hedgehogs'.

The purpose of the investigation this morning was to determine if these structures could ever have been manned during training or were they entirely just to replicate German fortifications? A dig in the  interior of the best preserved structure revealed it's concrete floor. The distance from the floor to the roof interior  was only 45". This would indicate that these structures were never intended to be manned.

So the conclusion from today's work is  a strong indication that Exercise Kruschen training was either entirely demonstration or "one-sided exercises". "One sided exercises", as the name suggests, involved only one side  represented by troops (in this case would have been the attacking side). The enemy would be represented by the "director" of the exercise and such exercises were  useful in training troops as the "director" could predetermine certain situations.

Image 1 and 2: The best preserved concrete structure at Westleton Walks.
Image 3: The exposed concrete floor (or raft on which the structure was constructed on).
Image 4: The excavation!





Another small step forward in matching field work to surviving documentary evidence!

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