Wartime Re-enactments, ex-Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends - Time to say "Goodbye"?

I too find it amazing that all these events can be successful, but I think we underestimate how may different interests people have, and how little interest you might need to turn up just for something to do in some cases.

As far as kids events go, there are always new families growing up so the supply of kids wanting days out will never dry up. As for enthusiast galas, I tend to go to 2 or 3 a year depending on interest. I like to go to galas with locos I've never seen before, even more so if it's a railway I haven't visited, and I suspect that's true of many people, but that's going to be different for everyone. For instance every time the NYMR does a GWR gala I'm sure loads of people in that region visit for the novelty of seeing something GWR. Whereas for me living in GWR land a more local LNER gala would be much more likely to draw my interest.

And for all these wartime weekends, for many people that is a hobby in its own right. We turn up to heritage railways every weekend to help run/restore them, they travel around the country going to all these events.

Basically, there are enough people to keep all these events afloat - when you think that there's nearly 70 million people in this country and you only need a couple of thousand to make an event successful it's not that surprising after all.

 

I'm not sure I agree with this. Enthusiasts may want a more "real world" experience, but for general public they still require a specific draw, and my feeling for young families is that this is a character-based event. I know of many many families where the ONLY time they go to a steam railway is to attend either a Thomas, Peppa Pig (urgh) or Postman Pat event. Indeed the only time my wife has independently suggested we go to a railway (and it was a glorious moment in our relationship) was for a Thomas event with our little boy. Wizard/Magic events seem to be taking this gap a little now, capitalising on the popularity of Harry Potter, whilst being vague enough to avoid undertaking any licencing negotiations or payments.

Are you a reenactor? This is quite an unusual term in the UK and definitely not one widely known outside the community

 

Also insulting to us genuine reenactors who spend a fortune on kit, spend years researching, and happen to like railway based events as it combines two hobbies. I also happen to currently be teetotal due to epilepsy so the beer tent part also doesn't apply.

 

[QUOTE="SpudUk]


Are you a reenactor? This is quite an unusual term in the UK and definitely not one widely known outside the community[/QUOTE]

I did it a good 10+ years back and have friends who do it. The group I was part of was very short lived and did like a dozen or so shows before most of us went their separate ways. I did a bit of farbing with some others for a couple of years before job offers and life also broke up that group.

Going to revive it a bit this coming weekend at Statfold at war.

 

Me too, was with the SK for 12 odd years and dabbled with other periods but ended up having a family and weekends are way more valuable now!

For what it's worth I do agree with you on the farbing at WWII events, the number of SS officers apparently freely riding on railways in the UK is ridiculous

 

I think it was a light hearted stab at some who attend these WWII events, I wouldn't take it personally. Although for what it's worth I recognise JayDee's caricature all too well!

 

Can't make even a lighthearted comment these days without offending someone.

Having been in that world and having assisted in keeping several beer tents afloat alongside other reenactors and farbs alike it's more common than not!

I have also been assured our own beer tent in our new big Marquee will be stocked ready complete with live music well into the evening at the SBR. This is our first "go" are a war weekend and a lot of us are looking forward to it!

 

Do war reactors have arguments about authenticity and what colour their helmets should be? Is there someone who says that all re-enactments should be 10 minutes at most because most people don’t want to see all of WW2 re-enacted.

Perhaps because I live in a city where deportations and mass executions took place (just by the local playground there is a memorial to victims of an execution) I don’t really ‘get’ it. I did have the dubious pleasure of sitting on the bus opposite a neo-Nazi. So for me any lessons learnt have been forgotten and I don’t really think playing at being a Nazi is a good thing.

That said, I like gardening and that can be just as bad when it gets to competitions etc etc I think every hobby has its hardcore. I wouldn’t hang around outside the perimeter of Heathrow taking photos of the same planes, but then I wouldn’t spend my days on the end of a platform taking photos of the same unit.

 

I've got the impression** that most 'Railway at War' type events now (as opposed to a few years back) are British/Allied troops only with people wearing Nazi/German uniforms unwelcome or even strictly banned, the idea being just to portray some of what life was actually like in the UK at the time, rather than to portray things like 'What if germany had actually invaded?'.

If I'm correct about this I think was for the sort of reasons you have given, basically that having Nazi/German reenactors was considered to be in very dubious taste.

** My impression is based on the few such events I've attended (accidentally, not realizing what was on) plus some comments on previous threads on this forum.

 

Most reenactors play the Wehrmact proper and not the various stripes of SS. They are mostly showing "the other side" and show in the same way we talk about Ww1germans now.

Also yes they do. I was once yelled at by some git for having my wool top open in 30 c weather as I had a black t shirt underneather as at the time I did not have the undershirt. It hadn't arrived in time so I wore that instead.

Some events are going "pc" to punish legit reenactors for the crimes of morons turning up in SS gear. I feel it takes something away from those events as it is half of the story. It's a hamer to crack a walnut.

 

Personally I don't see why these sorts of events should invite "Germans" of any description if they don't want to. Surely the idea is more of a "home front" type thing anyway, in which case it's not taking anything away from the story.

 

People have been promoting the myth of the "clean Wehrmacht" since before the Flensburg Government was arrested. Unfortunately there has been enough research done since to show that it was a myth: plenty of officers and men participated in atrocities; and most knew that horrific atrocities were happening even if they carefully made sure not to learn exactly what they were.

I'm not convinced either that these events do much to show the reality of home front life. I don't think the real 1940s had twee Union Jack bunting, unlimited food and the Andrews Sisters performing hourly, never mind Churchill or Montgomery being seen out and about with ordinary people. Maybe if 10% of the visitors were taken to one side and told that their house and all its contents had been destroyed, and the cafe had nothing to serve but extremely weak tea, it might be different.

My main objection to reenactment events on railways, though, is always: the gun emplacement that the reenactors have built can't fire. If there's a battle, all those casualties (with their quick clean deaths) will get up again afterwards. The trains, on the other hand, aren't pretending. They are on a real railway, not some reenactors' mock-up, and the operating staff are all doing the job for real. Wartime events are dangerous, because they lead to blurring the boundary between the parts that are just pretend and the parts that can actually kill.

 

From Thomas the Tank Engine to Godwin's law in 12 pages… god bless the internet!

(I watched a lovely programme about one of the Goodwood festivals recently, where everyone was just revelling in the cars and the look of a bygone age, rather than arguing the toss about the Nazis. I find the latter baffling).

Simon

 

By that logic we'd best Chuck anything which didn't run prototypically on the lines saved. Shut any cafe or facility that wasn't there in the old days as it's not historically accurate and cut most services down to the two to three trains a day they actually had...

It's all pastiche educational make beleive at the end of the day. The railways provide an idealised but educational version of the railways, as do many reenactors. Also pretending the explosives and blank firing weapons used as if they Aren't also safety critical or dangerous is yourself blurring dangerous lines. Fencing off the battlefield isn't for show or so people know where to look. It's for the public's safety as much as signage and fencing on any heritage line.

 

Whilst I agree that "somebody has to play the Indians", those who choose to respectfully portray those that fought in the German army during WWII need to appreciate that they are under additional scrutiny and their authenticity, honesty with history, and respect for the unique moral situation they'e in, all have to be so much more overt and purposeful.

And, connected to that, I don't think it's "PC" (and I really hate that phrase, it's weighted with so much right wing disdain when all it really means is 'with respect and common sense') for events to not have Germans soldiers, officers or civilians when it's clearly both historically inaccurate and aesthetically jarring. Because when it does happen you have two options:

1) Ignore it - this had led to situations I've personally witnessed where SS officers have been chatting freely in a cafe with British and American soldiers, or the classic Churchill walking down the train and pretending he hasn't seen German soldiers having a ride

2) Make a point of it - which led to the incident at the Bluebell (I think) where a German "spy" was taken behind a building and executed

There isn't any place for having those portraying Nazis at railway war events in the UK, it doesn't make sense, it's confusing, and it unnecessarily opens railways up to bad PR. It's not PC, it's common sense

 

You missed scenario 3, which is to pretend it’s an episode of Allo Allo. It appears that this is often used to offset the problems raised with scenario 1.

For those of us, perhaps a minority, who switch that execrable programme off on sight, this gives further reasons to avoid such events.

More generally, I find war events highlight the real tension between the historical and entertainment aspects of railway preservation. The absolute accuracy of re enactors contrasts with the many historical compromises of railway operation, leaving an uneasy (to my mind) balance between the present and multiple historical eras.

I acknowledge, however, that these events can have value, as demonstrated in the review quoted in respect of the recent WSR event. My decision to avoid these should therefore not be taken as advocating their elimination, but as a personal view of why to avoid them.


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I agree entirely. I dislike them because they give a deliberately romanticised view of the past and because of the ‘normalisation’ of nazism. I think if I were a gm of a line I would look for other events to run instead. I would like to see their elimination but I wouldn’t demand it.

Your comment would only make sense if there were cars belonging to Nazis at Goodwood.

Given that Nazis at War on the line events is a point of discussion it is germane so hardly a random introduction or shoehorning in the discussion.

Looking at it in a wider context, you can do such events in the UK whereas I would imagine it would be almost impossible to do a war on the line event in Europe because the railways were so central to the deportations and to the Holocaust. I had the pleasure of talking to the daughter of a stationmaster (she is now into her mid 90s) whose station was evacuated before the Soviets invaded. They were among the last to leave and she has never been ‘home’ since that day in 1940. War on the line was a deeply unpleasant experience.

 

I generally agree with your post, but just to take issue with that paragraph - you could make a convincing argument that you have entertainment and authenticity the wrong way round. By dint of adhering to a traditional rule book to control their operational practices, the railways are working in an entirely authentic manner that is a genuine portrayal of past working practice - and that would be true even if the actual train in a 1940s event happened to be a BR Standard hauling Mark 1 carriages (other compromises to taste). Whereas the military re-enactors might have got every last button of an authentic uniform, but the very nature of having a proscribed set of rules to avoid anyone getting hurt is clearly not historically accurate, even if "entertaining". (I use the word loosely).

In other words, for the railway parts of a wartime weekend, the rules of engagement are safe operating first, and hopefully it is entertaining. Whereas the military parts are to be primarily entertaining in a safe way, but with scant fidelity to anything much that happened in a real battle.

My own feeling is that I find Germans at such events a complete anathema, and in general I'm not over keen even on events only involving allied troops. Oddly, I don't mind airshows in which German aircraft fly, but clearly that is at least representative of something that genuinely happened (German aircraft operating over the UK, and potentially in close proximity to British and American aircraft) and, against a backdrop of neutral sky, the effect is less jarring than seeing German uniforms at a station that is clearly British.

Tom

 

...what?

I'm sorry but...what?

Do you honestly think a few people in uniform are somehow making Nazism normal?

Or is it better to simply unperson "the bad guys"?

Follow that line and you can say anyone doing this hobby in any time period approving or normaliing the politics behind it.

Civil war people want to reinvade Ireland and put people to the sword because that was what Cromwell did.

Napoleonics would want to bomb Copenhagen despite it's neutrality.

Romans want to decimate people who fail or enslave them.

Utter dross.

 

The WW2 "German" aircraft you see at airshows are mostly Spanish licence built versions and in the case Bf109, almost all are Rolls Royce powered so reality is a bit lacking. The WW1 versions are all replicas, mostly with non original engines. Doesn't bother me though. I'm just happy to see them fly and admire the exquisitely choreographed aerial ballets that are the "dog fights". As for Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe personnel at a 40s event, doesn't bother me in the slightest but I cannot begin to understand why anyone would want to depict the Waffen SS.