Bomb disposal called to wartime mortar shell found in South Molton field

Bomb disposal experts had to be called in after a South Molton farmer unearthed an unexpected and deadly looking ‘crop’ in his field.

Richard Burgess was planting at Whitechapel Moors yesterday (Tuesday, April 22) when his machinery turned over a foot long mortar round from World War Two, bringing work to a halt.

Police were called and the specialist team of Royal Navy divers from Bravo Squadron were sent from HMNB Devonport to assess the device.

The Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) experts confirmed it was a 4.2 inch illumination mortar round that had already been expended took it away with them.

For Mr Burgess, it is not the first time this particular field has yielded 80-year-old wartime fruit.

He said: “We found one about 15 years ago on the same spot. I think they said it was a phosphorus type for flares, not explosive. They were saying they find them on Saunton Sands quite regularly too.

“We were strip-tilling, which saves ploughing everything – if they are explosive, as you can imagine it’s a bit worrying for a tractor driver!

“The Home Guard did a lot of training around this area during the war.”

An MOD spokesperson said in a statement: “We can confirm that a team of Royal Navy Divers from Bravo Squadron, based in HMNB Devonport, were called out to a suspected item in South Molton in North Devon yesterday.

“The item (an expended 4.2inch illum mortar) was assessed and then moved from the site for disposal.”

Above: The illuminating mortar round had a 4.2 inch calibre and would have been used to light up a battlefield when fighting at night. Credit: Chris Burgess

Mr Burgess’s son Chris added a little more to the history of the site. He said: “The area was moorland up to the 1980s and very close by, perhaps 500 metres away, was a quarry used by Home Guard as a rifle range.

“We’re not sure if it was common for a local home guard but Bishop’s Nympton and maybe South Molton area too had a very valuable four-inch mortar tube – this shell was probably smoke or an illuminating flare due to the shape of its sides.

“Whitechapel also had a group of American soldiers here just before D-Day, I think just communications rather than infantry, so perhaps US troops stationed locally also used the home guard ranges for practice.”

Chris added that when the family moved to the farm in 1973, the old gamekeeper who still lived there, Mr Rawlings, had been a lieutenant in the Home Guard and survived the Somme during World War One. He also had two sons who both fought in and survived WW2.  

Saunton Sands and the surrounding area of Braunton Burrows was used extensively to train American and other troops in the run up to D-Day, where they practised disembarking from landing craft and held live fire exercises.

The area was known as the Assault Training Center and thousands of troops moved through the region in rotation to complete the training course.