The Department for Communities (DfC) Historic Environment Division (HED) recently published their report from the four-year project to carry out a “systematic survey of 20th century Army, Navy and Air Force defence facilities in Northern Ireland”. The report was commissioned by the HED in 2020 and the contract was awarded… Read More »NI Defence Heritage Record Survey Report 2020-2024
After visiting the rare and remarkably preserved dual Tett Turret in the village of Docking in Norfolk, I have now made available some of the 360-degree images taken on that trip to form a virtual tour of the site. If you’re interested in the use of 360-degree images and videos… Read More »Tett Turret Virtual Tour
Tucked away in a forest on the southern coast of the Moray Firth, is the remains of 80-year-old pillbox camouflage; possibly the only example of this type left in Great Britain. The pillbox has been draped with fine galvanised wire netting, onto which camouflage materials would have been laid or… Read More »Wire netting on camouflaged pillboxes
In a memo dated 7 December 1941 from the Commander-in-Chief, Home Forces, he defines the two roles that coast artillery searchlights (C.A.S.L.) fulfil. Each role was provided with a different type of light. These are: Observation lights This type of light was provided to detect hostile vessels. They could have… Read More »Coast Artillery – Searchlight Types
Public knowledge and understanding of Second World War British pillboxes is often incomplete. Constructed in their thousands after the withdrawal from Dunkirk, their effective widespread usefulness endured only for a few months, but 8 decades later they are sometimes all that remains of a vast defensive network. In this first… Read More »A gentle introduction to pillboxes (Video)
An Irishman, employed on the underground fuel-storage tanks at Scapa, was accustomed, when in drink, to express I.R.A. sentiments of considerable violence, and investigations show that the Birmingham Police already suspected him of having organised a bomb outrage. This was alarming, for his work at Scapa gave him access to… Read More »The Irishman
The latter part of 2023 involved two discrete activities; I was doing some research on prefabricated Second World War accommodation structures, and I also spent a week in Cornwall. I was pleasantly surprised when one evening these two events coincided. While wandering the shell of what I identified as an… Read More »Everite Bigsix
Happy New Year! On the face of it, 2023 was an uneventful year, and it seemed to pass in record time. But a review of Flickr and YouTube reminds me just how much I was lucky enough to see. In my unguided, directionless quest to tour relics of Empire and… Read More »2023 Review
On 21 July I published a video documenting the current state of the operations site at the old RAF Saxa Vord radar station. Within the first 3 weeks, the video has attracted 24,000 views and gained my channel over 500 new subscribers. What has been most heartening has been the… Read More »Saxa Vord video success!
Deep in a cavern along the Northern Defences in Gibraltar is an unassuming piece of graffiti. Written in pencil, and dated 1968, a soldier named McCULLOUGH left his name and regiment indelibly on the Gibraltar rock. The regiment was the Royal Ulster Rifles. The date is significant, because not long… Read More »A Ranger’s mark in Gibraltar