Landships II

TinCanTadpole · Legend

HMLS Excellent at Whale Island

MK1 Nut · Hero

Here you are, the houses and foreshore before the motorway went through.

That gate is still annoying me as I know it from one of my books, and I'm pretty sure it was moved so where ever it is now won't help place it.

-- Edited by MK1 Nut on Sunday 19th of February 2012 11:59:04 PM

James H · Legend

This is absolutely new to me. Note the modification.

MK1 Nut · Hero

Grrr... �that first photo is annoying me, I'm Pompey born and I know I have seen that gate somewhere... although it may have been in one of my local history books. I also think it may have been moved after the war, which happened a lot during the rebuilding of Portsmouth. So I will have to dust off some books.

The second photo I am sure she is running a circuit of Whale Island and the houses in the background are those of Tipner before the mootrway went through there.

Helen x

Lothianman · Colonel

How about the houses at the Portsea Island end of the Whale Island Way, specifically those on the NE side of the first corner immediately after the�bridge? I looked it up on Google Maps to see how that area looks now, and spotted some houses that looked promising ... the ones with the two light blue dinghies on the open ground opposite.

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Portsmouth&hl=en&ll=50.815585,-1.089937&spn=0.001749,0.005284&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=13.313739,43.286133&hnear=Portsmouth,+United+Kingdom&t=h&z=18

The view from Google Street View is pretty limited as it doesn't go far enough onto MoDland,�and that bus in the photo isn't helpful, but the similarity is very tempting, especially if one allows for the odd chimney being taken down with a conversion to c/h.

I'm actually astounded we have a likely match, given what happened to poor Pompey at the hands of the Luftwaffe and the Town Planners! And the motorway builders.

This would be entirely consistent with a dim notion that I have of reading, or hearing, that HMLS Excellent was not allowed 'ashore' much (I seem to remember it was confined aboard the 'stone frigate', as�the Navy liked to call its shore bases,�after inadvertently squashing a motor car on one of its first or only shore runs ...).

Not a Pompey type myself (unless a father in the RN counts),�just a Scot who loves visiting the place and exploring its history ... and last but not least, thanks to the original poster, these are really interesting photos.

LincolnTanker · Commander in Chief

I thought that HMLS Excellent was covered earlier but I can't find a post�

Here's a link that has some history

http://www.memorials.inportsmouth.co.uk/others/excellent/tank-mk4.htm

James H · Legend

We had a stab at it a while back. This post was a first attempt to fathom out the Mk IV & V. You can see the thought process painfully taking place.

MK1 Nut · Hero

Ok so I'm an idiot!

I was getting confused with one of the olc City Gates that got moved around.

That gate is the Old Maingate for HMS Excellent/Whale Island. It was on the shore side, and if this link works you can still see the same houses in modern guise in the same place.

If you look at the birdseye view, you will notice the old position of the brige, the bare ground the tank sits on is still there but now has a fence instead of a hedge, and the houses with their new look but still in the same position.

Tank Position ground view�

Tanks photo position

Hope these links work.

Helen x

MK1 Nut · Hero

Lothianman wrote:
How about the houses at the Portsea Island end of the Whale Island Way, specifically those on the NE side of the first corner immediately after the�bridge? I looked it up on Google Maps to see how that area looks now, and spotted some houses that looked promising ... the ones with the two light blue dinghies on the open ground opposite.
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Portsmouth&hl=en&ll=50.815585,-1.089937&spn=0.001749,0.005284&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=13.313739,43.286133&hnear=Portsmouth,+United+Kingdom&t=h&z=18
The view from Google Street View is pretty limited as it doesn't go far enough onto MoDland,�and that bus in the photo isn't helpful, but the similarity is very tempting, especially if one allows for the odd chimney being taken down with a conversion to c/h.
I'm actually astounded we have a likely match, given what happened to poor Pompey at the hands of the Luftwaffe and the Town Planners! And the motorway builders.
This would be entirely consistent with a dim notion that I have of reading, or hearing, that HMLS Excellent was not allowed 'ashore' much (I seem to remember it was confined aboard the 'stone frigate', as�the Navy liked to call its shore bases,�after inadvertently squashing a motor car on one of its first or only shore runs ...).
Not a Pompey type myself (unless a father in the RN counts),�just a Scot who loves visiting the place and exploring its history ... and last but not least, thanks to the original poster, these are really interesting photos.

�Oops just noticed you were talking about the first photo... I'm having a real dumb in the head night.� confuse �

Helen x�

Gwyn Evans · Legend

The naval officer walking in front of the tank is one Lieutenant A. Menhinick RNVR, the chap responsible for getting the old tank moving. Later in the war he worked for the wonderfully named Department for Miscellaneous Weapon Development, or DMWD, aka the "Weavers and Dodgers". Achievements (apart from helping to save this Mark IV)�included trialling radio controlled versions of both the LVT1 and LVT2.

Gwyn

-- Edited by Gwyn Evans on Monday 20th of February 2012 11:28:41 PM

-- Edited by Gwyn Evans on Monday 20th of February 2012 11:31:04 PM

Lothianman · Colonel

Helen

Many thanks for those comments and for that site of aerial photos - it looks fascinating, and I have bookmarked it to explore. I've got quite a few of the local history 'Portsmouth Papers' and they do give some sense of local geography as it used to be, so this will be fun.

Presumably HMLS Excellent would have had to drive south down along the road beside the dockyard wall and then past the Dockyard gates and the Gun Wharf and the present site of the football fields to get to Southsea, if not to squash too many more motor cars? It's a fair distance to do every morning and hard roads wouldn't have been great for tanks without any suspensions. But the chap does seem to know what he is writing about in the link from the Excellent museum, and he does say it had a number of breakdowns!

James H · Legend

Mr. Tim Backhouse, of the Memorials in Portsmouth site, has very kindly supplied the following information:

"The gates are from HMS Excellent. They straddled the entrance to Whale Island until they proved too narrow for later vehicles, and now stand next to the original parade ground. I attach a photograph. I can't currently identify the exact location of the (wartime) photograph as it's plainly not the entrance to Excellent or on the island. Tipner is a possibility."

Mr. B has also been kind enough to indicate the Southsea Presentation Tank that was cannibalised in order to get Excellent on the road, and would be grateful for any information about the vehicle. Not my strong suit, so I said I'd put it to the men. http://www.memorials.inportsmouth.co.uk/southsea/tank.htm

As regards the colour scheme, Excellent appears in the 1985 TV documentary Soldiers - A History of Men in Battle, still in running order, and driven by David Fletcher. By this time she is a sort of Olive Green, whereas she is nowadays brown.

MK1 Nut · Hero

Hi James,

I am 100% sure that I have the location of the first photo of the tank next to the gate to HMS Excellent... correct.

The gate was on the Tipner side with a small strip of land before the old bridge on to the island.

Anyhow why I've logged on...

All this talk of the Portsmouth tanks reminded me I had a photo of the Southsea Tank I cut out of the local paper. It has been sitting inside one of my books for a year now waiting for me to remember and show it here. Ooops!�

I've worked out its position to be either on the left or right of Pembroke Road adjacent Pier Road, facing in the direction of Castle Road.

Southsea Tank Position.

Helen x

�

MK1 Nut · Hero

Oh poop! forgot the photo.� confuse

tanks3 · Major

Hello Helen

Any chance of a better resolution scan of your picture? I can send my email by PM

Thanks

Tanks3

Gwyn Evans · Legend

Me too please!! This photo is completely new to me.

Gwyn

James H · Legend

Stumbled across some most interesting photos of Excellent.

a) Driving onto Whale Island, 1940

b) On Whale Island, 1968

c) February 1970

d) Handover to Bovington, May 20th, 1975

Maybe some memory-jogging for Helen.

MK1 Nut · Hero

James H wrote:
Stumbled across some most interesting photos of Excellent.
a) Driving onto Whale Island, 1940

b) On Whale Island, 1968

c) February 1970

d) Handover to Bovington, May 20th, 1975
Maybe some memory-jogging for Helen.

�Oi, flippin cheek! I'm not that old!!!!�

In 1975 I was 8, many blissful years before tanks entered my world. Mind about that time I was probably sitting watching 'Sailor' on telly with my Dad... so one type of ships was a part of my life. :)

I believe those photos came off the Tank Museum site, found them on their just recently and promptly forgot to mention them... my memory gets no better.� confuse

They are though really nice photos.

Helen x

James H · Legend

Beg pardon, H. The intended meaning was that you might recognise locations, not recall events . . .

MK1 Nut · Hero

No probs James, I knew what you meant, just having fun. :)

I've done a little digging and I have placed the Tank's display position as near as possible on a modern map. Despite my protestations, I have visited Whale island a number of times over the years and recognised the south side of the island.�

Thankfully Multimap enables the viewer to look from different directions, as it meant I could find the workshop with a building with a chimney next to it. Finding them enabled me to just follow the line of trees back along what is now the all weather football pitch to roughly the right position. The little white block to the left of the tank, is I believe one edge of the top of the steps up from the pitch.

My best guestament is it sat where the footpath on that side of the road now runs... the tarmac in front of the tank being the old road. The island has seen a large amount of demolition and rebuilding since those pictures were taken, it was amazingly lucky finding the buildings still there. Oh and Multimap still being about, as Google maps really didn't help this time.

Tank Position

�

Hel x

MK1 Nut · Hero

A photo I have not seen before came up on a local history Facebook page. It shows the HMS Excellent Tank on part of it's tour/rampage around Pompey during the War. It apparently took out one of the school gates in Doyle Road. :)

Helen x

�

James H · Legend

Fantastic.

vollketten · Lieutenant-Colonel

Not to resurrect an old thread but I didn;t want to make just a new one for this.
But this vehicle and the history behind it is mentioned in The Wheezers & Dodgers: The Inside Story of Clandestine Weapon Development ...
By Garald Pawle from pages 78 to 81
http://i.imgur.com/dvxZEsd.png
http://i.imgur.com/1Rqt1Nz.png
http://i.imgur.com/ffPp2nj.png
http://i.imgur.com/sk93EOx.png

Gwyn Evans · Legend

I think the title is actually "The Secret War". Anyway, for those unfamiliar with this slightly bizarre unit of the Admiralty, their official title was the Department of Miscellaneous Weapon Development, shortened to DMWD, hence the nickname.

Gwyn

Tonys · Field Marshal

Wonderful story!! Could only happen in the UK.

Had that book half a century ago, but don't remember this bit - getting too old.

chopsm1 · Lieutenant

Victoria Barracks, built in 1888 alongside the older Clarence Barracks and demolished in 1967, The surviving building being the Portsmouth Museum, the central tower was hit by a bomb during WWII.

John

-- Edited by chopsm1 on Sunday 25th of September 2016 07:57:45 AM