BELTRING- THE GLOBAL VILLAGE FOR THE MILITARY HOBBY

The new expression in popular jargon "going large" certainly applies to the 2000 War and Peace Show.

The 2000 event was bigger, better and certainly broke new grounds. Importantly it also raised the profile of what can be perceived as a fairly quirky hobby with the public to an all time high.

In it's first attempt at a 5 day show, the 12 months of hard work since just days after the 1999 event proved a major success. Rex and Brent had spent a considerable amount of time effort and money improving the infrastructure and re-designing the access road systems to make life on site more pleasant for the 13,000 plus souls who make the Hop Farm their home for almost a week. There is no doubt that the new road routes reduced the dust, congestion and increased safety.

With every hotel and guest house in the area fully booked up with visitors to the event, many from the USA and Australia, those who left it a bit late to book were forced to stay up to 30 miles away or camp on site. Those who camped -and there were many more than usual enjoyed the extra showers and toilets on site- yes there was a pump problem with the waste on the Sunday, but it was beyond anyone's control and didn't have a tangible effect.

Historically, "selling" the show to the public has always been far tougher than to us military hobbyists. This year we were helped considerably by the generous sponsorship of the Kent Messenger Group. The package, whilst not cash, provided us with publicity we could never ever afford to buy, in all their publications and even our own TV adverts on Meridian. The public came into the show in their thousands, with attendances breaking even the most enthusiastic predictions. To avoid congestion, Brent introduced a Park and Ride scheme which drastically eased the strain on the Hop Farm car parks.

As around 800 of the 3,089 vehicles that actually attended coming from Europe, we negotiated a very favourable rate with Norfolk Line to help our European entrants, visitors and traders have more money to spend when they got to the show. Norfolk Line moved over 600 of our European vehicles across the channel, including an 8' wide 8x8 ZIL rocket launcher rig, which all the other ferry companies had refused to take. Everyone who travelled with Norfolk Line enjoyed the luxury of their brand new, giant superferry at a very low rate. There were more American and Canadian visitors than ever before, plus visitors from all over the world, including Europeans, Australians, Japanese, our IMPS man in Thailand , Gavin Broad and the much applauded duo from Moscow who drove their WW2 Gaz all the way to and from Beltring.

As one longstanding trader who well remembers the years when 150 vehicles was a big show, put it "Its got such an incredible, carnival like atmosphere- a giant global gathering of people with a common interest… anything military."

The arena events were an outstanding success, with thousands gathering to watch from the banks, plus several thousand more, who for the first time, filled all four sides of the arena.

Arena controller Andy Mitchell said "we have to produce exciting entertainment that is informative and of course safe. When you see thousands of people watching and applauding, it's very satisfying". He is absolutely right and spent a long 5 days keeping the arena action running. Every time we had a slight gap , Barry Knee, who seemed to be living in the arena, and his friends with an Abbott and a Rapier, gave delighted children rides in their tanks and did some entertaining "live" firing demonstrations. We can't thank you enough for your generous and seemingly endless help Barry, in keeping it all alive.

With a captive audience, Alice Bullock brought the Raffle prize jeep into the arena each day to boost ticket sales, assisted by her willing group of army cadets. And what a delighted winner we had - the family from Whitstable who came for a fun day out and went home with a jeep - that's got to be a recipe for our long term success.

Our daily battle re-enactment was introduced by Jim Dowdall, the stunt arranger from Saving Private Ryan. He gave the crowds a fascinating insight into how the film was made and what its like to be blown up, set on fire and shot - several times a day…and get paid for it. The delighted crowds watched the re-enactors put on a very polished battle, with massive vehicle support including Carl Brown's just finished multi-bank engined M4A4 Sherman, David Russell's stunning Churchill plus a plethora of German vehicles, armour and soft skins. With some gas firing .50 calibres, the crowd enthralled at the amount of pyrotechnics used midway through the fire fight, the mighty 18 ton Famo half track of the Wheatcroft Collection recovered the "knocked out" Panzer IV from the Cadman stable whilst the Allies were held at bay.

When the Whermacht troops surrendered at the end, Second Battle Group's Glen Swallow, the man in charge of the re-enactments, selected 10 of his best German troops to go into the crowds collecting money in their helmets to help preserve the recently dedicated memorial at Hill112 in Normandy. Albert Figg, (in case you could ever forget!)the enigmatic 80 year old veteran of the battle for that windswept hill, had last year raised over £10,000 to have a Churchill tank placed as a permanent memorial on Hill 112. Albert was feted with massive applause by the crowd, due to his high profile campaign to immortalise Hill 112 he is now something of a celebrity in the region. He took the mike and told the crowd why it was important not to forget the sacrifices of his generation. So then we had a real surprise for Albert. In came the 25 Pounder field gun display team and Albert was asked to fire the gun. As an ex artillery man, Albert didn’t need asking twice! Then he cheekily told them how to do it properly!

The Vietnam conflict is brought to life by the American Infantry Preservation Society who put on a daily event called "Good Morning Viet Nam" a light hearted, but very polished, scenario about life as a grunt, with a fire fight as well. Then people were invited to visit their amazing Firebase display, complete with "Saigon bar girls" and all the trimmings. There were some stunning living history dioramas covering all aspects of 20^th century conflicts. The groups and individuals who put these together can only be admired for their efforts and dedication to detail. The educational value to our visitors, especially the current Playstation generation of children, is enormous.

Each day's arena events climaxed with the main tank display. Crowds had a unique chance to see Bob Fleming's M36 Jackson, rescued from Bosnia and still with the rubber conveyor belt cladding that was fitted to absorb shrapnel and small arms fire. Bob also bought his ex Bundeswehr Leopard and another ex Bosnian M18 Hellcat. We had an M60 MBT in action for the first time, along with a superbly restored Chieftain, it put all three of NATO's main battle tanks of the cold war together for the first time in a public display in the UK.

The hundreds of traders all enjoyed good results- as one major dealer told me "we did well at the show, but the business since we got home has been incredible all as a result of people who came to see us at Beltring" Again the new road system meant there was no driving around the stalls, keeping it a safe show.

Whilst we try to keep the show as unregulated as possible, the safety rules are there for a purpose. Most people comply with the guidelines but there are always the small number of idiots who insist on thinking they are exempt from the rules, but in the main, most managed to cope without driving around when they shouldn't, especially at night.

With 18 main food outlets, 4 bars (including the now legendary Ginger Gammon Beer tent which welcomed those who wanted to "dress up for the evening")and numerous soft drink vendors, there was no excuse for going hungry. All of these were kept very busy by both participants and public alike.

Saturday night offered, as well as the traditional Beltring entertainment, the Herb Miller Band in a sell out concert. Compared by the irrepressible Terry Elliott, it was an outstanding success. Many of the concertgoers came from the local area, again drawn in by the immense power of the KM Group. For those who may have questioned why it was not part of the free Beltring entertainment, the Herb Miller Band are a very professional full time group, who command a high fee and the event had to be presented properly with a stage and proper dance floor - or we simply couldn't have had them perform. The cost of the three marquees and staging alone ran into thousands.

As for the vehicles, with well over 3,000 to see, there was something for every taste. There has never been so many ex Wheremacht vehicles in one place, amazingly 60 years on, it is still being discovered and rescued. The accompanying pictures highlight what can only be a small selection of what attended. There were four Ford GP jeeps at play together - 5 years ago we had never even had one pre -production jeep at the show.

So what did the veterans make of it all?

One Octogenarian, who with his wife spent all five days at the show, told me " I was a Matador driver. I'd been in the army for 5 years when I was rescued from the beaches of Dunkirk 60 years ago last month and went right through the war to Berlin. Funny thing is I had never actually been right up close to a German tank, though I saw a lot of destroyed ones. I've just been looking at that Panzer IV and do you know what, those blokes dressed as Germans helped me climb up on it and have a good look. Bloody marvellous! We came a long way for this show, it's our holiday this year and we will come back next year."

If we achieve comments like that, then we are certainly doing it right.

And now for the really good news.

Such was the success of this years 5 day event, the KM Group have already confirmed their sponsorship for the 2001 event which will again be spread over 5 days , from the 18^th-22^nd July. Book your annual leave now!!

As Rex said back in the winter when questioned at a club night about what was happening at the show "Beltring - should be good"

He wasn't wrong, was he.

Don't forget to visit the photo gallery on www.warandpeace.uk.com