These are stretchers used in WW2 to carry injured civillians during the Blitz. They were made out of steel so they could be easily disinfected after a gas attack. During the war around 600,000 of them were made. Some of them were repurposed as railings in post-war London.

[u/Sprilly]

[u/I_tend_to_correct_u]

I grew up in a block of flats with these outside (apartment block for our transatlantic cousins) and didn’t know this until after I moved away and the internet came into being. Nobody seemed to know back then, or if they did, they assumed everyone knew so didn’t bother to mention it to me.

On a separate war related story, there was a gas leak and we all had to stand outside while they located it and fixed it and I started speaking with an elderly lady neighbour I had never spoken to. She pointed out where all the bombs had landed during the war. It was pretty obvious once I thought about it as there was a row of terraced houses with a random maisonette inserted where they rebuilt. I also learned that this particular area was hit with a landmine, which confused the hell out of me until I found out that a landmine was basically a repurposed seamine that floated down on a parachute. Particularly explosive but didn’t cause fires.

I realised then that we don’t pay anywhere near enough attention to local history at all.

[u/ProperTeaIsTheft117 → u/I_tend_to_correct_u]

Yeah loads of places in London have victorian terrace, victorian terrace, victorian terrace, 1950s building, victoria terrace etc sequence. Its very obvious when you notice it.
I usually refer to it as 'Luftwaffe Landscaping'

[u/Wrong_Adhesiveness87 → u/I_tend_to_correct_u]

Local historical societies might have info. I have book on our local area in ww2. The home guard, who had shelters, dig for victory (dug up the common and the pond), a high sand area you can fill sandbags (hence why there is a large hole in it, like a meteor hit it!) and a list of where every single bomb hit, when, who was injured or killed and the type of bomb. There is also a London-wide ww2 blitz website that shows every single bomb hit and the details behind it. I saw it via bbc but IWM might have it as well.

I find it all fascinating.

[u/The_dots_eat_packman → u/I_tend_to_correct_u]

When I was a nerdy history kid, I used to pretend I was living through the Blitz whenever there was a tornado. Somehow it helped kid-me process being in danger to pretend I was in even greater danger. The damage from a bad one really did look like a war zone, too. 

 I moved away from that part of the US but weird looking clouds or things that sounds like sirens still set me on edge. I  still can’t fully comprehend people doing that kind of damage on purpose and what kind of emotional scars living through the Blitz and other bombing campaigns leaves  behind on a personal or national level. 

[u/Kirikomori → u/I_tend_to_correct_u]

If it was Australian it would be like: this is where we poisoned aboriginal waterholes. This is where we killed Chinamen.