Here are photos of the manufacturers’ marks stamped on the metal by companies authorised by the Home Office (“HO”) to supply sheets of corrugated iron for Anderson shelters. For marks found on corrugated iron in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa see this document.
Merino stamps have been found in the UK, in Australia and on an incomplete Anderson shelter sent out from the UK to be shown in The Ditsong National Museum of Military History, Saxonwold, Johannesburg, South Africa.
I am grateful to Ash Hawkes for sending me the first two of these detailed Phoenix photos taken inside a shelter near Dover, and to Richard Allman for sending me the third image taken from a shelter which was rebuilt on an allotment in Plymouth:
The Globe mark was owned by Gorse Galvanising of Llanelli, South Wales.
This rather fetching Emu was found in a shelter in Storridge on the Worcestershire/Herefordshire border:
This Star and Crescent mark is particularly interesting because it includes the word GALVANINED – which at first appears to be a misprint of GALVANISED. However, I am grateful to Harry Coates who has explained that, although galvanised is the more familiar UK spelling of the word, it has sometimes been spelt with a ‘z’ in the UK – for instance in an article by Leeds Galvanising. But why substitute an ‘N’ for a ‘Z’? The answer – again from Harry Coates – is that printers of all sorts often improvised when it came to letters (such as the rarely used Z) that were not available for block printing. And because the word is written in an arc, the typesetter would have thought it acceptable to use an “N” instead of a “Z”:
The Swallow – Extra Best mark consists of two concentric circles, the outer being 8 1/2″ diameter. Between them, in capital letters, are the words SWALLOW (at the top) & EXTRA BEST (at the bottom). Below the circles are the familiar H O initials with a crown between. In the middle is a picture of a rather elegant swallow flying right to left wings spread. The Swallow mark was found in Ipswich, and in South Africa:
This mark was found on corrugated iron in an allotment in Buckhurst Hill in Essex:
These marks were found by John Sneddon in Bargeddie, Glasgow. They consist of the word “Griffin” and the shape of a griffin head with a crown above it, but the word below is very faded:
This mark has been found on corrugated iron in Kettering and Norfolk. The words above appear to be ‘British Make’ and those below are Target Brand:
This was found on anti-incendiary corrugated iron in Norwich:
There seem to be two different versions of the Dolphin mark. The one on the left was found by Kathy Heel in a private shelter in Newbridge, South Wales. The original owners of the house were very wealthy and the shelter was probably built for the manager of the Newport and Abercarn Steam Coal Company.
Kathy also sent me the photo of an advertisement by the Pontnewynydd Sheet and Galvanising Co Ltd, the manufacturers of Dolphin brand corrugated steel, whose address is shown as Pontypool, England. This is because Pontypool was in the county of Monmouthshire whose international status was ambiguous until 1972 when it was firmly allocated to Wales.
Any ideas anyone? These marks were found on corrugated iron on an allotment in Edinburgh. The owner suggests that they may be a sun ray and a crescent moon.
