Original Item. One-of-a-Kind. This is a tremendously scarce mounted piece of the Imperial German Zeppelin L-32, which flew 164 times, including 77 reconnaissance missions over the North Sea, with several unsuccessful attempts to attack English coastal towns. Brought down on 4 May 1916 by anti-aircraft fire from HMS Phaeton and HMS Galatea, she was destroyed by Royal Navy submarine HMS E31 off Horns Reef.

The board measures 5⅜ x 5⅜ x 13/16” and has a small metal ring at the top for hanging. A cross-shaped piece of the Zeppelin has been embedded in the middle of this board, with its recovery spot recorded on the sides.

ESSEX
SEPTEMBER 23RD 1916
ZEPPELIN L-32 V.T.
SNAILS HALL FARM
BILLERICAY

After some research we’ve found that Snails Hall Farm, South Green, Billericay was the location where, on the night of 23/24 September 1916, a fire-damaged enemy Zeppelin (L32) fell killing all the crew on board. An eyewitness account of the aftermath by John Maryon whose father occupied the farm reads:

“I was given 5 days’ draft leave, which I spent at home.  During the weekend a Zeppelin was brought down and the debris fell into one of our fields.  There were the [entire] crew of 26 men (all dead and mostly burned).  They were put in our adjacent barn, with a lane running hard by.  It was here I saw a disgraceful scene.  Thousands of people had come down by all means of transport, and they were standing 5 deep in the lane outside the barn, wherein lay the German dead.  The front rank had torn the boards off the barn to get a better view and a brisk trade started with the R.A.M.C. and the sightseers for parts of the airmen’s furlined clothing.  This was being cut off by the orderlies laying out the dead, in exchange for money.  My father had about 4 acres of potatoes, which were overrun and looted, and 9 acres of barley trodden flat, and for the remaining year of my father’s lease, he was mending fences to keep his cattle in.  Long after the war, he received a derisory sum in compensation from the government."

“And the next week I went to France on my nineteenth birthday, hardly recovered from my crippling illness …”.  He spent a year away, fighting at Passchendaele.

“I returned from this to my home in Billericay, to find my father was out of his farm, it having been sold over his head, with vacant possession.  In fact he had notice to terminate his year lease soon after the farm had become a shambles from German aircraft and attendant crowds the year previously.”

This information was gathered and posted by Andrew Smith in 2016.

We have also found a film recording of the wreck of the zeppelin which can be viewed here:

This is a phenomenal piece of WWI history and a great opportunity to find a genuine piece of a WWI Zeppelin that was brought down over Britain.