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The 'Bombs to Butterflies' Interviews
Interviewee: Jack Abbott
Interviewees: Norman and Audrey Ecob
Date of Interview: 27.07.99
The first question we have got here is how often were the sales held - I think they were every 6 weeks?
About every 3 months.
Every 3 months?
I think there were 4 a year approximately, I may be wrong. Three months to assemble like.
Oh of course. And how many days did they last?
Usually a week. Viewing probably Monday and Tuesday and selling for the rest of the week.
Yes. And how many vehicles were sold at an average sale. We've got the auction here, this ones for three days.
Two days viewing and three days selling.
We've got nearly 1500 lots on this one. What else was sold besides vehicles?
Miscellaneous stuff. Lathes and everything you could think of. They even got joinery equipment got back from the centres, the job centres pretty well everything.
Margaret Lawson did mention something about some bales of materials.
In 1951 when I started there they had bales of materials they made uniforms out of.
Uniforms, I see.
Colossal amount of bales, every week.....
Where were they stored?
They were stored in certain buildings, D25, all over the depot
D25?
D25, HC36 there was all different numbers and quite a lot of buildings on the site.
Just stop there and look at the map and lets see ...
and I think somebody went over with a plane and took photos... and that's what started the sale people complaining about Rolls-Royces and that being smashed up to smithereens like you know at that particular time.
Right so we are not going to establish ..
No.
I know that the actual, I can remember seeing vehicles being stored outside
They got one on Asher Lane bottom gate there. Then there was one down by the farm round the back there.
What Moor Farm?
Yes. Then there was another one.
I know the entrance was off Loughborough Road, wasn't it?
Yes that's right, along the fence there on Longmoor Lane. Near D25.
So that would be near the Avenue would it?
Just round the back.
Do you know what the buyers were like?
I met one or two. Johnny Rigley, he was a millionaire.
Was he the fellow from Leeds?
He came from somewhere like Shropshire... I cannot remember the other one.. I think his son's still going, he still buys. Once we took the sales off the depot it just killed it Margaret Thatcher wanted it for her husband because he was on the Board of some car sales people and soon it went flat. The biggest mistake ever made because it was the only place in the country, only depot in the country, making money.
Did you get foreign buyers?
Yes. A bloke called King Charles. He came from Malta.
What about private individuals, did you get many of them?
I actually got a car through a chap who bought them. Yes anybody who wanted to ... I think there was probably a syndicate, you know, you buy this and 1111 buy that...
And you could end up paying over the odds! if you weren’t careful.
Lots of people were a little bit ... when it came to sales... I'm the same, if I go to a sale and I want something I'll pay for it....
Well not really (Laughter) (irrelevances). How many buyers would be there would you say on an average sale if there was such a thing?
It would vary from sale to sale ..near to thousand.
800 to a 1,000.........
Ha yes....
What happend to any unsold vehicles?
They usually went into the next sale just went on and on until they were sold. Not often you got any left over. They probably had no reserve on them a lot of them. They'd sell anything, anything. We used to sell snow ploughs, all the lot (Laughter) I've driven a snow plough round there, tanks as well, foreign buyers would probably buy them. Massive tanks, trailers....... Iow loaders.
I've got a question here which says how was the auction organised, did the auctioneer walk round the site? I've got an idea that he didn't.
He numbered them all, but he used to have a valuer come down and give a rough estimate of what the item was worth like held make the book out like and then he'd have it printed. I couldn't tell you the name of the people. Some firm.
It was Walker Walton & Hanson who did the sales.
It was Walker Walton & Hanson but the Ministry had a bloke who...
When they were selling them did the auctioneer stay in one place?
In the room, yes.
There was a lot number and Morris Minor or whatever?
You wouldn't know where the big boiler house was, it was more or less where the railway, where the museum is now. That was a massive place, probably 300 or 400 seated place, probably even more.
I've got a dismantled railway here and slopes off with a kind of road around it. So we've got the auctioneer in a room and he's selling them by lot numbers from the paperwork which was produced. How did they pay for the goods bought, was it like a cheque or they'd got an account?
Most of them had got an account. Johnny Richards he was one of the top buyers there.
And how were the, did they take away themselves or what?
Yes the majority of people took them away themselves outside Land Rover.. mainly along the perimeter road. They'd load their own or the Iow loaders would come in and load them by crane.
Did they have a certain time to get them away?
Yes there ... and then after that.. next time back in the sale.
Even though they had paid for them?
Probably only a deposit.
Oh I see. They wouldn't do that nowadays, pay for it. (Laughter)
How many people worked in the auction sales department? The auctioneer for a start, the valuer?
And you had people stood at the door and made certain they got seats and all that and you had people inside making certain that the right person was found for the sale if they didn't stand up you know pointing out.
My dad did a bit of that.
That was casual labour. I don’t think there was a terrible lot of them, probably a dozen casual labour.
What about taking the money, cashiers?
Cashiers got there own cashier's box and security.
Was there more than one?
No there was only one as far as I know.
They'd got a box round here, was it cash?
Yes you went to the grill, same as a bank, you would pay or whatever.
I've got a question here, what was the most unusual thing you remember being offered for sale? (Laughter)
Probably a snow plough. As I say we went through everything. You name it they sold it.
I think Margaret's come up with parts of vulcan bomber.
Yes, lovely. In later years they even sold a bus that was in the shooting in London.
Do you mean the IRA thing.
Yes. That came up for auction.
I know Bernard said they'd sell a lump, dropped out of a plane and the parachute hadn't opened.
Oh yes. (Laughter) From a Land Rover or something like that ... lump of metal.
And a number plate?
That's about all you'd get. They even sold invalid cars you know. That was Ministry of .... control. Some of them came in a right state as well. They'd had sheep in them. (Laughter)
Can you recall any amusing or funny incidents, you have just told us one with sheep, or emergencies?
We had one lad. Land Rover in his mouth. It pulled all his mouth. We thought he was going to die.
He had what in his mouth?
A tow hook off the back of an old vehicle. I don't know what happened but he got it in his mouth somehow. Whether it flew off the back of a vehicle and caught him in the face. He was in a poor state... '
I can imagine that I've got a note here about 1951, the Ministry of Supply storage .... What was in the nissen huts, we've already asked that?
I didn't know much about the nissen huts actually. think it was more detonators and things like that. All boxes, empty boxes they came back and they had to be checked to make certain no one had left stuff in the one day
A what?
A missile.
Just been left about.
It got back; it was all hushed up. Military police came down.
What was in the hangers?
They were mainly empty boxes, waiting to be looked through to make certain that nothing had been sent back that shouldn't have been. Odd occasions Rolls-Royces... they'd say you can keep them in the hanger you would put them on hard standing.
What happened to goods cleared out of the annex?
Bits of paper and everything, just stacked, burnt I suppose. A lot of it left in, you know, it came in, it went out.
Was it a well paid job?
No really. In the 50's it was 80/- a week. One of the lowest paid jobs l’ve done for what you did. In the 50's I was on the stores side, I worked in the offices and the stores where uniform material was kept. If it was kept a long while it would just press them and make creases in them, so that they couldn't cut the cloth for the suits and we would have to destoy it.
I thought there might be champagne bottles about!! (Laughter). Did you use the canteen?
Yes.
Your wife still there was she?
My wife started there in 78
Was she just there for the sale
There was a canteen before when it was Ministry of Supply but they expanded the canteen when the sales started and they used to make all the stuff.
You've already told me you used the social club.
Yes. Same building.
You lived next door to it?
It is like a army complex, concrete building like that type of thing you1d got a single piece jutting off, single flat, double flat, and then you came round the corner it was the club. All you had to do was come out of the door, round the corner and in the club. Like the same building. (Laughter)
Did you have a separate number for the flat?
Yes
Close to the Avenue?
It was the Avenue but 22 Flat the Avenue, whatever. The bungalows ..
Everything was the Avenue wasn't it?
The bungalows, then there was.. the depot, the Superintendent of the Depot had the house. Its still there.
No. 18 isn't it? ... Tim....
.. .bungalows and he lived in the flats there.
16
final
You've shown me where the canteen was close to the Avenue?
Yes. Not far
On this top end wasn't it?
Yes some where round there. That's the railway.
There's the disused railway. Somewhere there? In amongst these sheds at the top?
There was quite a few there you see. The railway sidings more or less were there and the railway sheds were there and the boiler room.
The boiler room was in the flats themselves?
There was one up there but there was a boiler room on the side as well. There was one round at the back of the flats as well. Mrs Wilson, I think she is living in Barleylands
Yes, we’ve seen her. What did the canteen sell, could you get hot meals?
Yes, hot meals. snacks, teas, sandwiches, cakes, all the lot? Everything.
Well I think that's it then. Thank you very much. (Irrelevances)
Interviews > Interview with Jack Abbott