Germany of the type used in
Holocaust trains (second, short variant of 1937 with
axle base) To begin with, the largely privately owned railway companies within the
German Empire in the 19th century procured wagons to their own requirements. However, after the nationalisation of the majority of private railways into the state railway (the
Länderbahnen) designs were standardised and the
Länderbahn classes emerged. The growth in trade between the various German-speaking states led to attempts to standardise their vehicle fleets. Initially wagons were produced to the same dimensions and, in 1910, the
German State Railway Wagon Association (
Deutsche Staatsbahnwagenverband) was formed. They developed standard goods wagon designs, the so-called
Verbandsbauart wagons, that were procured in large numbers by the German state railways and other private and foreign railways well into the 1920s. For covered wagons there was the Class A2 wagon with a maximum load and loading area built to a
standard template, and the large-volume covered wagon based on template A9, also with a maximum load, but a loading area. In the 1920s, wagons with interchangeable parts, the
Austauschbauart wagons, were developed for the
Deutsche Reichsbahn (DRG). They had similar overall dimensions, but were clearly built to a different design from their forebears. Once again there was a covered wagon with loading area, classed as the Gr Kassel and a large-volume wagon with loading area, called the Gl Dresden. In addition, the
Austauschbau series saw two new wagon classes being developed. The Glt Dresden was largely similar in design to the "standard" Gl Dresden, but had end doors. These vans were bought to provide sheltered transport for motor vehicles. A second, newer type of wagon was the
ferry wagon developed during the 1920s for rail ferry services to
Great Britain. This wagon had the same length over buffers as the Gl Dresden, but a loading area of only , because of its narrower wagon body constrained by the smaller
loading gauge of British railways. This was designated as the Gfh Trier. The next significant change was the introduction in the 1930s of
welding into the construction of railway vehicles. The designs of the
Austauschbauwagen were reworked to take advantage of welding technology. As a result, a successor to the Gr Kassel emerged: the Ghs Oppeln with a loading area. The designs of the Gl Dresden and Glt Dresden were also reworked whilst retaining the same loading area of ² (Glrhs). The Gfh Trier was also redesigned, but due to low demand this was not ready until 1940, and no more were built owing to the
Second World War. The next stage of development was forced as a result of the Second World War. In order to save material and labour, railway vehicle designs were simplified. As covered wagons the Gmhs Bremen appeared as a successor to the Ghs Oppeln, and the Glmhs Leipzig followed the Gl Dresden. These so-called wartime classes (
Kriegsbauart) were also welded, and had loading areas of and respectively. More robust variants of these wagon classes were procured after the war by the
Deutsche Bundesbahn and the
Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB).
Passenger use , the
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. The covered goods wagon has been used to carry passengers, especially during wartime. In both world wars,
French boxcars known as
forty-and-eights (40/8) were used as troop transports as well as for freight; in
World War II first by the French forces, then the German, and finally the Allies. The shared experience among Allied soldiers spawned groups such as the
Forty and Eight veterans organization. In addition to soldiers, the Germans transported prisoners in crowded boxcars during the
Nazi regime, and an undisclosed number of German soldiers captured by the U.S. Army died of suffocation in American boxcars transporting them from the
front-line to
prisoner of war camps in March 1945. The same transportation was used by the
Soviet Union during the 1930s and 1940s, when over 1.5 million people were
transferred to
Siberia and other areas from different countries and areas incorporated into the Soviet Union.
The UK 'Van' Historically the open wagon was the most common type of vehicle used for general merchandise traffic in Britain, with covered wagons ('goods vans') being used for specific types of goods requiring greater protection. Most wagons were 'unfitted' (i.e. not equipped with continuous brakes), the exceptions being wagons used on express goods traffic. However, British Railways' fleet modernisation during the 1950s resulted in vans being used for a much higher proportion of merchandise traffic, and the fitting of vacuum brakes as standard. The typical British goods van of this period had a
wheelbase and a payload of . The most common types were general purpose 'ventilated vans' such as Vanfits, but there were numerous more specialised types: •
Vanfits were ventilated vans which were built in very large numbers and used for almost any type of goods. •
Vanwides were an improved version of the Vanfit, built with wider doors for easier loading and unloading. Some of these eventually received air brakes and lasted into the early 1990s, by which time they were the last traditional short-wheelbase vans in regular traffic. •
Palvans were designed for palletised loads and loading by forklift truck. Whereas most vans had small doors centrally positioned on the van sides, Palvans had large doors half the width of the wagon on the left hand side of each side (i.e. diagonally opposite each other). Although palletisation was the future, these early Palvans were found to be very sensitive to unbalanced loads and prone to derailment at higher speeds. •
Shocvans and
Palshocvans (a.k.a.
Palvan Shocks) were the shock-absorbing equivalents of Vanfits and Palvans. Shock wagons were used to transport fragile goods which were at risk of being broken as a result of heavy shunting or other jolts whilst in transit; this was especially important for eggs and pottery. The van bodies were about shorter in length than the chassis and were mounted to the chassis via springs which absorbed some of the shock of sudden jolts. •
Insulated Vans (for meat),
Meat Vans (ventilated for fresh meat),
Insulfish vans (insulated for fish traffic – these had longer wheelbases so that they could be operated at higher speeds),
Fruit Vans (ventilated vans for fruit traffic) and
Banana Vans (unventilated and fitted with steam heating apparatus to warm and ripen the load, which was picked before ripening) were all specialist types for specific types of perishable goods traffic. •
Gunpowder Vans were specially constructed vans for explosives. They were shorter in length and height than standard vans, and were double skinned. •
Mogos had doors in the van ends so that cars and similar loads could be driven/rolled into and out of the wagon. •
Cattle wagons were built for livestock traffic. •
Ferry Vans were larger vans fitted with securing points for
train ferries, dual brakes (
air and
vacuum) and various other features for international use. Construction of the traditional small vans ceased in 1962 due to declining traffic and a surplus of wagons. When construction of general merchandise vans resumed around 1970, these were the air-braked
VAA/VBA/VCA/VDA family of wheelbase vans. The last mass-produced merchandise vans built for British Rail were the wheelbase
VGA class sliding-wall vans of the early 1980s. Subsequent vans used in the UK have mostly been large (usually
bogie) sliding-wall vans of continental design. == See also ==