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wartime stretchers, hiding as fences

London's Stretcher Railings

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Kennington · Oval
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Fences around south London estates made from recycled WWII air-raid stretchers, a free and poignant reminder of the Blitz.

Getting there. Around housing estates in Kennington, Oval and parts of south and east London.
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Kennington · Oval
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The lowdown

Look closely at the metal railings around many south London housing estates and you will spot a curious detail, kinks bent into the steel at top and bottom. These are not ordinary fences but recycled air-raid stretchers, made by the thousand during the Second World War for civil defence wardens to carry the wounded during the Blitz.

With railings scrapped for the war effort, the surplus stretchers were repurposed as fencing afterwards, and many still stand today. It is free to spot them once you know the tell-tale shape, a quietly moving everyday memorial to London's home front woven into the streets.

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The insider tip

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The giveaway is the curved feet and the wire-mesh look of the railings, the bends that once kept the stretcher off the ground. A campaign works to preserve them, so once you spot one you will notice them all over the area.
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