How do I remove this brick structure?

[wembleee]

The 1930s semi we bought last year has this old brickwork on the lawn. Not sure what it used to be, or how deep it goes, but I'm wondering how best to remove it. We would want to turf over the area afterwards. Any advice?

Sledgehammer to break it up, then working with a strong pick to dislodge it.

It'll be hard work, but imagine the nice soil for turf underneath!

I would do some exploratory digging down the side to give yourself an idea of depth. If it's a couple of bricks deep then sledgehammer and pickaxe. If it's very deep you are probably going to have to dig it out.

Before you smash it, scrape away the soil around it and dig enough to see if there is something underneath, such as a drain.

@PigletJohn, good point about the drain. When we were renoving some rotten decking nearby and replacing it with a gravel patio we found this pipe which runs towards the brick structure, so do you think it may be an old rainwater drain or something?

Another photo of the pipe for scale.

On this image I've drawn a line where we saw the pipe and also circled the brick structure so you can see how they line up.

It could well be a soakaway for rainwater

In a rural area it might be a septic tank.

Thanks. Not rural (phew!).

In your "another photo" the wall shows efflorescence suggesting a long-term leak.

could have been a stand for an oil fed central heating oil tank? We had similar with pipes still in place.

So I guess that means we can't remove the ugly bricks

In your "another photo" the wall shows efflorescence suggesting a long-term leak.

Thanks. It's s garden patio wall and I think the horizontal effluescence probably lined up with the soil (originally) and more recently the rotten decking that we removed, so that may explain it.