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Streetly sandpits question

Paul D

master brummie
Hi, does anyone know where exactly the location was for the sandpit at Streetly was? The reason I am asking is the Shenstone car club held their car tests there in 1946. Thanks.
 
There were some sandpits just by the the waterworks on Chester Rd at the back of Bourne Farm adjacent to the railway and Branton Hill Lane.
 
The Home Guard had a firing range during the war, located up Little Hardwick Road on the left hand side as you go away from the Hardwick Arms. I witnessed some target practice there as a young boy in about 1942. I remember it as a sandy, desolate place with, in particular, a sort of cliff face against which old jerricans were placed as targets; these rapidly glowed red hot as a machine gun pumped tracer bullets into them.

I never knew this place as a sandpit but my memory tells me that it must have been. What happened to it after the HG no longer had any use for it, goodness knows.

Please see the map in this link: https://www.staffshomeguard.co.uk/HomeGuardingPages/06Bstaffshg.htm

Chris
 
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Here are three local blokes involved in Home Guard training in the Streetly area. I can't be certain but based on my own recollection and the provenance of these two images. I think it is very likely that they were taken in the place which I'm talking about. A pity that there isn't more information in the backgrounds but there does seem to be something like the cliff face I mentioned previously.

Chris
 

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There is an article on the Staffordshire Home Guards website written by a Captain Harry Myers where he states "training took place weekends at the sandpit in Little Hardwick Road. The Old Veseyans Rugby Football Ground is now located at this site" This is a very interesting website worth going onto with maps and articles by members of the Home Guards and their stories, especially if you live in Streetly as I do. Cannot fathom out how to highlight the article and website. Hope you can find it.
 
Thanks for the reminder, Katie, and the kind words; I had forgotten that there was a mention of the sandpits in my website.

A slight correction. The mention comes, not in the article by Harry Myers (my father, in fact) who was writing in late 1944/early 1945 long before the Old Veseyans appeared in Little Hardwick Lane, but in the memoir of a then teenaged boy who acted as a messenger for the Home Guard in Streetly. The article is here: https://www.staffshomeguard.co.uk/D14ReminiscencesStreetlyMemoir.htm

These are the relevant words:

One of my recollections is that the main activity and training was at the weekends especially at the sand pit in Little Hardwick Rd and also at what I remember as the 10 acre field right at bottom of the same road: this was used for practice in constructing dugouts and slit trenches and lessons in camouflage. The Old Veseyans Rugby Football ground is located there now. It was in this area that my cycling prowess came in handy as bringer of rations! Even by the flexible standards of the Home Guard I suppose that my being about 12/14 years old during this period was considered a little too young to be a full member of the Home Guard; but this did not prevent my being used in an auxiliary mode.​

I think this could be interpreted as saying that the OVs now occupy the ten-acre field, rather than the sandpits. I am not too familiar with 21st century Streetly, but doesn't the OV ground lie on the right hand side of the road going from Streetly? I think the sandpit was probably a bit further back and on the opposite side of the road. Isn't the crem around there now?

Chris
 
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That's the good thing about the BHF, you read something that you think you might know something about, research it and find out things you did not know about. I found the website very interesting, still have some reading to do. Cannot however throw any light re the sandpits, obviously it is a sandy area as there is the sand quarry in Branton Hill Lane and this shows up on the google map, as Morturn points out. Yes the OV ground lies to the right, they had a fire about 5/6 years ago and the hall had to be renovated, the crem is on the left hand side and has grown considerably over the past 10 years or so. I have lived in Streetly for the past 45 years, Little Hardwick Road hasn'tchanged very much in that time, Chester Road is also very much as it was except for the fact that most of the garages have disappeared and flats built in place of them. I shall look forward to delving further into your website and let's hope someone remembers something about the sandpit.
As it happens one of my best friends at school was a Valerie Myers, a name you don't very often come across.​
 
l had an aunt who lived in Sandy Lane no75 Pheasey estate, and when the family went to visit...Sunday tea etc...the other side of the road were sand pits and we were forbidden to go and play there....l know they are not there now....when some one mention sandy pits streetly l thought maybe it was these sandy pits...Streetly was close enough...Brenda
 
This link shows the exact location of the Little Hardwick Road sandpit we have been talking about. (Click on one of the little blobs on the map for further information - there is quite a bit of other interesting Streetly information contained as well).
https://blackcountryhistory.org/collections/getrecord/WAHER_MBL1353/

The description states that the sandpit was established after WW2 but this almost certainly incorrect; it was there prewar and may, or may possibly not, have been operated during the war years.

Does any of this information give you any clues, Paul D?

Chris
 
On the subject of Streetly, if anyone from that area hasn't already seen them, there are some nice aerial photos on the Britain From Above website taken in 1926 and 1947 . Unfortunately the camera was pointing away from the marked spot of the Sandpit. The railway bridge at the junction of Foley Rd East/Thornhill Rd shows in the (low res) photo in the link here https://www.britainfromabove.org.uk/image/epw015114
The low resolution photos can easily be seen but sign-on to the site is needed to see the higher resolution photos but it is easy and free.
 
Thanks everyone for commenting, I have read all the posts. Does anyone have any recollections of car events there. It was a long time ago though.
 
Hi, does anyone know where exactly the location was for the sandpit at Streetly was? The reason I am asking is the Shenstone car club held their car tests there in 1946. Thanks.

Paul you mentioned Shenstone, south east of Shenstone are some gravel pits, still operating today, the A38 to the right, in the area travelling north, also in the area is the M6 Toll Road, I remember car events taking place, think in the early 70s the area was bowl shaped and still seen from the A38, think i went there once but what a sight, that's why i look as i pass,
 
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