6,000 of these wagons were built at the close of the Second World War especially for service on the war ravaged French Railway system. Unlike contemporary British mineral wagons they had no end doors and their side doors were of the cup board type more in line with Continental practice. Despite this the French did not like them and they were returned to work on BR from 1950, stripped of some of their Gallic fittings, until the middle 1960s. Thereafter many were sold to private owners for internal use. Transfers for 1950s and 1960s periods are provided.