WW1 SCREW PIQUET

Stake used to secure barbed wire defence lines during WW1 these could be 100yards deep and stretch for miles making it almost impossible for the infantry to breech.

Tanks were primarily invented just to forge these and other barriers, but before the tank, bombs were specifically designed to blow the wire apart but were not very successful.

Usually screwed into the ground this one is in a pot of concrete for display purposes.

Your comments:

• Screw pickets were widely used in WW2 for supporting concertina barb wire fences. With the Australian Army, they were still in use during the Vietnam war in the late 1960s. They have the advantage over star pickets that they can be installed silently.
  
  One feels very vulnerable in the "front lines" banging away driving in star pickets when unfriendly gentlemen are nearby.
  .......... Ross Torrington, Sydney, Australia, 23rd of April 2013
  
  
• Also used in WW2 around the perimeters of some airfields and bases in Berkshire, Wiltshire and Oxfordshire (archaeological evidence) as well as a shorter type with a double wound pigtail at the top used for securing parked aircraft against high winds.
  .......... J Harriss, Reading, 20th of December 2012
  
  

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