WHY ARE SO MANY EXPLOSIVES FOUND IN CANAL?
Grenades, bombs and other explosives have been dragged up by magnet fishers from the Grand Union Canal and River Soar in Leicester at least a dozen times in the past year or so. But why is there so much ordnance lying about in Leicester’s main waterway? Dan Martin has discovered a few possible explanations
THE ARMY JUST LEFT IT LYING AROUND
IT does not exactly explain how the munitions ended up in the water, but it appears the military was not overly careful with its surplus munitions after the end of the Second World War.
A newspaper report from 1949 complained about “tons and tons of dangerous ammunition parked by the roadside between Nottingham and Leicester”.
It said: “For mile after mile there are shelters open at both ends, only protected by flapping sheets of tarpaulin or canvas, in which are piles of rusting shells, boxes of small arms ammunition and, most dangerous of all, boxes of grenades of various types.
“It speaks well for the obedience of country children that the juvenile population of Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire has not been decimated at this time.
“The continued presence of so much lethal material in places where there is not the slightest difficulty in getting it gives rise to the intention that the military have no intentions of moving it at all.”
DUMPED SOUVENIRS?
When peace comes soldiers can rarely resist returning home without a few mementoes.
Historian Austin Ruddy said Leicester lads might have initially thought it a good idea to come home with a bag full of weaponry, but changed their minds when faced with an angry wife or mother.
He said: “There have been quite a few reports of magnet fishers pulling grenades out of the Soar several times in the last few years.
“The usual scenario is that these were First World War bring-back souvenirs that veterans or relatives suddenly got cold feet about and dumped them during a nervous night stroll.”
AVOIDING THE BOSSES’ ANGER?
There is another theory about the large quantities of munitions in the Grand Union Canal to the north of the city based on what workers in a factory in the Soar Island area did.
It was said that workers faced having their pay docked if they produced faulty or substandard products.
Therefore any items that did not make the grade were quietly tossed into the water to dispose of the evidence.
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