Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery , Swanage, Dorset
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386 Coast Battery RA of the 554 Coast Regt. RA.
1 x Type 25 'Armco' Pillbox.
3 x Searchlight (Defence Emergency Lighting) (2 x removed).
3 x gun casemates (1 x demolished).
2 x Generator sheds.
1 x portable generator (removed).
1 x rifle embrasure in wall.
1 x Lookout.
1 x Machine gun post.
4 x Minefields.
1 x
5 inch gun practice gun.
2 x 4 inch. Naval Mk VII guns on Mk II mountings November 1940.
4inch WW1 Naval Mk VII on Mk II mounts.
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4inch WW1 naval guns.
Defence Lewis gun position.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Swanage Coastal Battery, an emergency battery built during the Second World War as part of Southern Command's coastal defences. The battery was commissioned in July 1940 and mounted two 4-inch naval guns. It was armed until at least May 1945 and manned by 386 Coast Battery of the Royal Artillery.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Swanage Bay
The view from the searchlight around Swanage Bay.
German Armies plan to invade Britain.
Training.
Learning the art of landing.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Swanage & the Bay
A - Searchlight.
B - Peveril Point Battery and another searchlight.
4'' Naval gun.
A searchlight instillation at Scapa Flow, Orkney Islands.
Home Guard with a Vickers .303 machine gun.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Searchlight House now converted into a viewing and sunshade for holiday makers.
Searchlight with a fixed mounting.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Searchlight House.
The view from behind with the new generation of bunker hunters checking out the view.
Happy British home defence soldiers.
Beach defence.
Searchlight crew.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Searchlight House.
The side door is the engine room, a small petrol generator would run the power via a dynamo to the searchlight in the front.
A Lister generator set like the one that may have been here powering the light.
Lister generator makers plate.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Searchlight House.
This is where the light would have sat looking out to sea.
The searchlights could shine on targets and the compass coordinates would be passed to the gun battery. They would then fire on the enemy sea target. Behind most of the beaches there were also railway guns. Kept in readiness on specially made sidings to cover large areas of sea to back up the coastal artillery.
Three 12” railway guns in training at Caterick, North Yorkshire.
Target coordinates
Searchlight Scapa Flow.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Searchlight House.
Now a very nice viewing platform.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Searchlight House today.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Plan
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
07 January 2019
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Type 25 Armco Pillbox.
Internal measurement 6ft.
Official designation: FW3/25
Shape: circular
Common name: Armco.
Proof against rifle fire
for infantry using rifles and light automatics.
Usually found with three rifle loops and a low entrance.
Walls 12'' thick and often shuttered in corrugated iron giving it a distinctive appearance. From Pillbox Study Group.
Plan of a Type 25.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Type 25 Armco Pillbox.
Plan of a Type 25.
Standard British army Le Enfield rifle.
Inside a larger pillbox.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The view from one of the rifle slits.
Plan.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Protected generator house.
A strengthened building to hold a medium generator.
Mobile Lister generator set that could have been garaged here.
Also stored would be many two gallon 'Flimsies' petrol cans.
Amps & Volts.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Protected generator house.
There would possibly have had a double steel door on the front.
Plan.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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4'' gun casemate.
The two sloping ramps each side are covered stairways down to an underground magazine.
Plan.
Plan of the casemate.
Gun room.
Steps either side to magazine.
Ammunition magazine.
Seamen loading 4inch ammunition below decks.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
17 August 2012
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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4'' gun casemate.
The covered stairway to the magazine.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
19 October 2012
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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4'' gun casemate.
This is how it was in 2012, the gun room has now been converted into staff area for the Volunteer Coastguard.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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4'' gun casemate.
he covered stairway to the magazine.
The slopping concrete is a protected stairway down to a rear magazine where a steel door would close off the top and bottom.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The second 4'' gun casemate with the battery lookout above.
The gun would have sat on a bolted hold-fast in the middle of the floor.
Plan.
4'' naval rounds.
4inch naval gun.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The second 4'' gun casemate with the battery lookout above.
Steps to the observation platform.
Observation officers.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The second 4'' gun casemate with the battery lookout above.
Observation platform.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The second 4'' gun casemate with the battery lookout above.
Compass painted on the roof. I have found this in German batterie sites as well and they were not only used in action but also a training aid to teach the guns crew where the enemy are.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The second 4'' gun casemate with the battery lookout above.
The view out to sea.
Barr & Stroud GK5 6x42 Director binocular Royal Navy.
B.R. 1534, Handbook on Minor Fire Control Instruments.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The second 4'' gun casemate with the battery lookout above.
The young intrepid bunker hunter checking it out.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
07 January 2019
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The second 4'' gun casemate with the battery lookout above.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The view across the bay.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Gun room for a 4 inch guns were 4 inch. Naval Mk VII on Mk II mounting November 1940.
Plan.
4inch naval gun.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The gunners view.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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A Mk II mounting hold fast for the gun. There would have been a ring of threads sticking up to hold the gun down.
A ring of threads to hold down a gun. How it would have looked. Mk II mounting.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Garrison BL 5in gun Vavasseur mounting.
The 5 inch gun was a bit of a failure and that is why they were only used in practice batteries. There were a few of these batteries around, one was in Gibraltar and another pivot mount found at Dunree Battery, Ireland (built when it was part of Great Britain). The gun is on a Vavasseur mounting, most of them were scrapped by 1913. I would like to thank John Guy for all his help in naming the mounting and the gun.
My original caption to the picture "This maybe a gun hold fast or a winch fitting to winch in boats?? I am more of the opinion that this was a WW1 or pre WW1 gun mounting".
Carriage Garrison BL 5in Vavasseur. Mk 2. Slide LBL.
Battery of BL 5inch in Gibraltar
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Garrison BL 5in gun Vavasseur mounting showing its position.
Plan.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
07 January 2019
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Waterside House
Just noticed a rifle embrasure set into the wall. In the summer it would be overgrown and unable to see it. There was a searchlight set in its own bunker sat in the garden.
Plan.
How it may have looked.
Standard British army Le Enfield rifle.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Waterside House
This was the billets of the battery members.
Plan.
Coastal Artillery Battery Sandown Isle of Wight.
The British soldier.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
Timothy Crabb
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Waterside House
Photos of a model has come to light of what the emplacements looked like.
Plan.
Coastal beech defence.
A cold winter.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
Timothy Crabb
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Waterside House
This shows a searchlight was placed into the gardens of the two cottages.
British searchlight in an emplacement.
Generator in a trailer but of the type that may have been used here.
A British 6" naval gun in action.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Third Searchlight demolished in 2012.
This was an open concrete position.
Plan.
How it used to look.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
19 October 2012
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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Third Searchlight demolished in 2012.
This was an open concrete position.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
16 February 2016
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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The battery position.
.The two four inch gun emplacements.
Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery, Swanage, Dorset
17 August 2012
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Swanage Emergency Coastal Battery
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