Pill Cases, Boxes

The Pillbox Row was a British military/political crisis in November and December 1939 concerning the building of pillbox defences in France prior to the German invasion. It led to the dismissal of the British War Minister, Leslie Hore-Belisha. more...

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In October 1939, during the Phoney War, when the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) under Lord Gort as commander-in-chief moved to their allocated position in the line in north eastern France, they found awaiting them an anti-tank ditch, a not very formidable array of barbed wire and, at intervals of a thousand yards, a line of large concrete pill-boxes. Alterations were required in order to house the British type of gun. There was no defence in depth and a considerable labour force of men and machinery was necessary both to strengthen and modify the existing line and to provide defensive positions in depth behind it. Hore-Belisha thought it would be helpful to recruit experienced British civilian contractors to provide the skill, the labour force and the earth-moving equipment required. Gort welcomed this initiative and studied a number of alternative designs for new concrete pill-boxes. They were rectangular edifices, far less elaborate than the vast underground fortresses built over the years to form the Maginot Line, but nevertheless capable of sheltering from bombardment reasonable numbers of men and weapons. Hore-Belisha knew nothing of the technical military requirements, but eager to help the BEF fortify its position to the best possible advantage in the short time likely to be available, he took a keen personal interest in the progress made. He did not deserve the unworthy suspicion of Field Marshal Ironside, General Pownall and others that, not content with the publicity he had acquired when Minister of Transport by the introduction of Belisha Beacons at pedestrian road crossings, he was now enthralled at the prospect of a magnificent \"Belisha Line\" to rival the Maginot Line.

In November he decided it was time for a personal visit to the British front. Ironside inquired whether he wished to concentrate on seeing the men or the defences and Hore-Belisha, proud of his reputation as the private soldier’s friend, had no difficulty in making up his mind. He also had a discussion with Lord Gort's chief engineer Pakenham-Walsh, who showed Hore-Belisha the various pill-box designs on which his engineers were working. He saw little of the defences but, however, concluded that pill-boxes were not springing up with the mushroom-like speed for which he had hoped, and he was depressed by the variety of designs with which Gort and his staff appeared to be toying. His anxiety was increased when on his way home through Paris he understood General Gamelin to say that the French were building pill-boxes in three days. Gamelin subsequently explained that what he had meant was that once a site had been prepared and the materials brought up to it, actual construction took three days. In all, the building of a French pill-box required three weeks.

Read more at Wikipedia.org