It was certainly a fact that most of the metal collected was entirely unsuitable for the War effort, which was (I think) mainly concerned with building planes, and manufacturing bombs.
Personally, I don't know what they did with the unused metal, but it seem highly logical that it was dumped at sea, rather than admit that a war-time government got it wrong.
The railings certainly weren't returned to their original owners, and I agree that it was an act of vandalism that the streets of the country must still regret.
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As I said, there are not many original railings left today, because most people believed they were helping their country, but I did notice that the Belvedere School has some of its original railings.
It looks like churches were exempt, as St Luke's and Great George Street Congregational (to name but two) retained their railings.
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