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Cond. Condemned symbol - why/where did it come from?


Rivercider
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I have long been familiar with the symbol painted on condemned rolling stock of a white cross inside a white circle, often crudely painted, and sometimes accompanied by the abbreviation 'Cond'. Where did this symbol come from?

 

I am currently reading an interesting book 'Appledore Shipyard'  by Len Harris which I purchased last week from the superb Appledore Maritime Museum. Len worked in the shipyard, which was owned by his family, from the 1930s, and in the book there is information about the repairs required to damaged steel plate of ships found during regular inspection. Some damaged steel plate could be repaired, while sometimes the plate had to be replaced. In the book he writes 'The condemned plate was marked in chalk with a large circle that had a cross in the middle'. Was this the same symbol used on rolling stock? If so where was it first used, at sea or on rail?

 

cheers

Edited by Rivercider
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Probably pretty old and the origins are possibly lost in the midst of time. Maybe it's another of the symbols that was used for people that were illiterate?

 

They used to paint an X on your door if you had the plague and films used to be X Rated. You also see an X when looking at pavements that need slabs to be replaced. So Xs were used for a few different meanings.

 

 

 

Jason

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X, of course, was used as a 'signature' by those who couldn't read ( and had to trust that what they were signing was what they'd been told it was ! ) ............. and we all remember stories of treasure maps where "X marks the spot".

In a railway context, though, the LMS used the X-in-a-circle mark to denote 'Metro-Gauge' vehicles - so I presume it's interpretation as condemnation wasn't universal.

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I’ve also seen it used in forestry to mark trees for ‘thinning’, to be cut down.

 

Could it be an ancient as Roman? I’m thinking decimation, killing one in every ten as a collective punishment, with X being the relevant numeral - get that chalked on your breastplate by the centurion and your days were numbered.

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1 hour ago, jwealleans said:

Didn't the LMS use the same marking to indicate something different on rolling stock, at least in its earlier years?

 

There was a white X in a circle applied to horse boxes. ISTR it was something to do with them being dual brake fitted so they could work with CR vehicles.

 

I'll have a check, I think it's mentioned in the LMS Coaches books.

 

 

Jason

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53 minutes ago, Wickham Green too said:

Metro-Gauge ....... half a dozen posts ago !

 

I think you are mistaking the LMS X in a circle for the symbol on carriage ends restricting them from the Metro Lines that appeared years later (1950s?) and normally found on coaches. I'm talking earlier.

 

Why would an LMS horse box be travelling on the Metro? 

 

No racecourses in City Centre London. Besides they would be well with in the loading gauge and why didn't the GWR and LNER version that are the same size get them? The only vehicles I've seen them on are LMS horse boxes that had air brakes as well as vacuum. Look at the Hornby model, it's dual braked.

 

Other LMS vehicles carried XP or X on them to signify the brakes. A system that originated on the Midland ISTR.

 

 

 

Jason

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Dont know if its true but I read it somewhere in the US in relation to Katrina, where the US army used the same markings and an article researched its history…

 

something along the lines if it being used by the army, going back to Romans for things like census of stock after battle..

 

An “X” with the quarters used for marking notations, things like … Searched, How elements many found, How many affected and a Date. Then if the object is to be destroyed, adding the circle to make the X a target ?


For certain a condemned cross dates back to crucifixions 2000+ years ago… a skull and cross bones being a symbol of death.

 

 

 

 

 

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2 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

I think you are mistaking the LMS X in a circle for the symbol on carriage ends restricting them from the Metro Lines .....

'The LMS Wagon' page 22* : "Metro Gauge Mark : This appears to have been little used on the wagon stock ; it is illustrated in fig 3, and indicated that the vehicle concerned could work over the so-called Widened Lines of  the London Transport Metropolitan route."

 

* from 1977 edition - no doubt later editions and the LMS Coaches books have similar info - but I don't have them to hand.

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When I am replacing something in some item of medical equipment at work , I sometimes mark the old part with the same cross in circle symbol to avoid refitting that part by mistake.

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On 18/10/2021 at 15:21, Steamport Southport said:

Why would an LMS horse box be travelling on the Metro? 

 

To get to or from a racecourse etc. south of the Thames. There was a great deal of through working between the northern and southern lines via the Metropolitan Widened lines, which had a restricted height clearance.

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I can see that X on its own would be an ambiguous mark - putting a circle round it emphasises that it's not there by accident. Related to burglar's marks? https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/dec/03/burglars-code-chalk-marks-wall - where an X and an X-in-a-circle mean quite different things!

 

 

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On 18/10/2021 at 17:44, Wickham Green too said:

'The LMS Wagon' page 22* : "Metro Gauge Mark : This appears to have been little used on the wagon stock ; it is illustrated in fig 3, and indicated that the vehicle concerned could work over the so-called Widened Lines of  the London Transport Metropolitan route."

 

* from 1977 edition - no doubt later editions and the LMS Coaches books have similar info - but I don't have them to hand.

 

There's a 1951 photo of some sort of LMS fish van in one of the Geoff Gamble Cheona Publications wagon books in Aberdeen with one of these marks. It's described in the book as a condemned marking, but not only is it too neatly applied, the van is also in ex-works crimson! I've always assumed this is the metro gauge marking.

 

Simon

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On 22/10/2021 at 07:21, Compound2632 said:

...................................Related to burglar's marks? https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/dec/03/burglars-code-chalk-marks-wall - where an X and an X-in-a-circle mean quite different things!

 

 

Don't take this personally, but those markings are absolute b*ll*cks.

.

Spent 40 years in policing, most in criminal intelligence and pro-active street crime in inner city areas.

.

Never came across those markings once in all that time, never saw them outside any properties, or appear on a crime report.

.

Only time I ever heard of them was when they surfaced every few months in the media, then our phones wouldn't stop ringing.

.

Sorry, rant over. 

Edited by br2975
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42 minutes ago, br2975 said:

Don't take this personally, but those markings are absolute b*ll*cks.

 

No problem; I don't. It's the only thing that came up when I googled "cross in circle chalk mark"!

 

Googling "condemned mark" is no help either as that just gives references to St Mark's Gospel.

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2 hours ago, br2975 said:

Don't take this personally, but those markings are absolute b*ll*cks.

.

Spent 40 years in policing, most in criminal intelligence and pro-active street crime in inner city areas.

.

Never came across those markings once in all that time, never saw them outside any properties, or appear on a crime report.

.

Only time I ever heard of them was when they surfaced every few months in the media, then our phones wouldn't stop ringing.

.

Sorry, rant over. 

I am not going to dispute your experience, but I have seen some of those markings on premises, although not, I suspect, in relation to any potential for burglary. They have been, from memory, on licenced premises and reputed to be Travellers' marks relating to what sort of welcome (or not) lies within.

 

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I learned - correctly or otherwise - from staff at Penzance Ponsandane that the "cross in circle" hand-painted onto rolling stock meant very specifically "no brakes" and that the abbreviation "COND" referred to the vehicle's fate i.e. condemned to be broken up.  The two therefore have distinct meanings.  

 

They often appear together but can be used singly one without the other.  A vehicle which has no brake when one might be expected - or which may have brake rigging visible but not operable - could otherwise inadvertently be included in a train with the incorrect brake force then advised to the crew with potentially disastrous consequences.  Until that vehicle is also condemned it may otherwise be considered available for traffic.  

 

Special rules apply to the movement by rail of unbraked stock; additional brake force must be incorporated into the train to allow for the unbraked mass and / or a very restrictive maximum speed would apply.  This occurs (or occurred as I believe all stock on the national rail network must now have operable brakes failing which road transport must be used) when condemned stock is moved from a storage location to a breaker's yard.  

 

"Unbraked" is a legend which was also sometimes seen stencilled onto freight wagons which are (or rather were) available for traffic but have no form of brake as opposed to those which have only a handbrake which requires manual operation from the lineside.  

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On 23/10/2021 at 22:22, Gwiwer said:

They often appear together but can be used singly one without the other.  A vehicle which has no brake when one might be expected - or which may have brake rigging visible but not operable - could otherwise inadvertently be included in a train with the incorrect brake force then advised to the crew with potentially disastrous consequences.

Quite probably true for modern practice, but the symbology goes back well into the days when brake force was not specifically calculated and many freight trains included substantial numbers of vehicles that fitted with only a hand brake.

 

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