Field Visit

Date 13 March 2019

Event ID 1096311

Category Recording

Type Field Visit

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1096311

Coastal Batteries of Scotland

Two gun emplacements, which were introduced by the Admiralty during the First World War, are situated immediately SE of a service road running SW from a junction 23.5m SSE of the North Gate (NH86NW 9.77). Each was armed with a 9.2-inch Naval gun and they mirror one another architecturally. Both installations were equipped with their own crew shelter and underground magazine and they were manned by the Royal Marine Artillery.

The emplacements are positioned about 34m apart overlooking the rough gorse and grass-grown scarp that falls steeply to the SE. No.1 gun, which is situated to the SW, has been established upon a slightly more substantial stretch of the terrace that was excavated to accommodate them; but the only trace of the sunken passage that once linked them is a rubble-filled linear hollow in the immediate vicinity of the command post (NH86NW 9.59), which is located mid-way between and co-ordinated their fire. Both guns were secured within reinforced cast concrete barbettes that are lenticular on plan and measure 6.2m from NW to SE by 4.7m transversely, but that at Gun No.2 has been partly covered on the NW by demolition debris bulldozed from elsewhere on the site. Each barbette is surrounded by a raised platform 2.2-3.7m broad, topped by a chamfered parapet 0.42m in height, which in its turn is fronted by a gently falling apron of reinforced concrete measuring up to 13.3m in breadth – although this is now largely obscured by vegetation. Both parapets exhibit clusters of sockets at intervals around their rims, some of which still retain short metal posts with perforated eyes near the top. In the centre of the barbettes is a flat-roofed, concrete canopy supported on four short legs that dates from the Second World War. This protects an escape hatch from the underground magazine, but the shaft was originally constructed to allow cordite from the magazine to reach the guns. The roofs of the canopies slope gently downward to the NW, while an opening on their SE was originally closed with a pair of sheet metal doors. However, only one remains in place and that is attached to the canopy in Gun No.1.

The magazines for both guns are buried beneath the barbettes. Although they form part of the original Naval arrangement, both magazines were incorporated into the neighbouring covered emplacements that were introduced by the Army in the Second World War (NH86NW 9.06). During the First World War, access was by a flight of steps that descended a stairwell to the NW of the barbettes, but these stairwells are now almost wholly buried under rubble and the magazines can now only be reached by ramps from the later emplacements. A simple metal derrick, which still remains in place above the stairwell behind the SW barbette, is a rare survival. The magazines comprise two principal compartments: a store for the shells and another for the cordite, but only the magazine associated with Gun No.1 was accessed on the date of visit. Its shell store, which is rectangular on plan and measures 6.75m from NE to SW by 4.02m transversely and 2.75m in height, is situated in the NE part of the complex. A door (now blocked by rubble) originally provided access from the stairwell, while two windows looking out on to this lit the room from the NE. However, the windows were blocked-up when the compartment was converted to a cordite store for the Second World War emplacement. The walls are rendered with cement and there are fittings on the floor for shelving around the walls. The shell hoist was reached from the S corner of the room, where it was situated in a small lobby connected to the cordite store. This lobby also provided access to another where the cordite hoist was situated directly below the gun. This shaft was converted into the escape hatch in the Second World War and now contains a metal ladder running up to the centre of the barbette. The cordite store in the SW part of the complex could only be entered originally from a door in the stairwell that is now also blocked-up. This originally led into the shifting lobby from which a door provided admission to the room. Like the shell store, it is also rectangular on plan and measures 5.78m from NW to SE by 4.02m transversely and 2.75m in height. Clusters of vertical wooden buffer batons are attached at intervals to the cement rendered walls and also on the walls of the lobbies. They measure about 1.7m in height and 0.1m broad and have penciled numbers at their apices, although these figures do not follow a logical sequence. It may be recalled that the arrangement of the guns in these emplacements follows that adopted by the Navy on their warships, where similar batons were used to line the magazines - the intention being to keep the cordite away from heat when the engines lay near, or from the cold and damp where a wall was close to the hull. Just as the configuration of the guns were brought over wholesale, so also quite possibly the magazine fittings - the numbers perhaps being added to the batons at the time of a dismantlement, in order to make sure that they all arrived safely at their new destination. Fixings on the floor again relate to the method of storage. Two rectangular openings in the NW wall held electrical safety lights behind glass, while the aperture of the ramp leading up to the Second World War emplacement emerges from the wall on the SW just above floor-level. The floors and ceilings of the whole complex are whitewashed, as only the shell store originally benefitted from natural light.

Little is to be seen of the crew shelters, as they are largely buried under demolition debris, although parts of their flat, grass-grown roofs are visible.

A new plan of what remains of the SW emplacement was prepared in the course of this visit, but contemporary plans and sections are held in the National Archives at Kew (WO78/5192: 3/19, 4/19, 6/19, 16/19), in addition to an unnumbered plan showing the later modifications sketched out for the Second World War battery. The emplacements are also depicted on two RAF aerial photographs (106G/RAF/0751/6039-40) flown on 31 August 1945.

Visited by HES, Survey and Recording (ATW, AKK, HLS, AMcC), 13 March 2019.