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MONUMENT NO. 1102188

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A Second World War tank marshalling area, visible as buildings, structures and roads, was mapped from aerial photographs taken in 1946. Located in Moor Wood on Minehead's North Hill, the features are associated with the extensive military training area and tank firing range that covered North Hill during the war. A military concrete road leads off Hill Road at the W end of Moor Wood and provided access to the tank marshalling area, the Chain Home Low radar station, a cluster of accommodation and/or administration buildings and the tank wash hard standing area. The tank marshalling area consists of a concrete road that leads through Moor Wood to a large area of roughly triangular concrete slab hard standing, with two large rectangular military buildings and with a border on which is located five small Nissen huts. Two large concrete ramps were located inside the large rectangular building in the middle of the hard standing area, which it is suggested were for loading and unloading tanks (presumably) onto tank transporters. It may be that tanks were also transported onto/off tranpsorters, but eyewitness reports describe Churchill tanks being offloaded at Minehead railway station and then driving themselves through Minehead, destroying the road surface with their caterpillar tracks to such an extent that they had to rebuild the road from the station to North Hill. It is possible, therefore, that the building may have been used for tank maintenance/repairs. Immediately to the N of this building are located two Nissen huts, with two further Nissen huts are to the SW. The wide concrete road leads to a large rectangular building which has been suggested to have been a tank/vehicle maintenance building. To the W is a small building. Although the concrete building platforms, roads, ramps and hard standing area remained extant in 2001, the buildings were no longer visible in 1950.

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