World War One Audit of Surviving Remains
Date 31 May 2013
Event ID 961129
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type World War One Audit of Surviving Remains
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/961129
Dundee, Stannergate military seaplane station saw longer service in the 20th century than any other seaplane base in Scotland. It was established prior to the beginning of the First World War, in the spring of 1914; the seaplanes (and possibly even one of the seaplane sheds) of the short-lived Port Laing (Rosyth) seaplane station in the Firth of Forth were transferred to Dundee. The seaplanes at the base undertook patrols and anti-submarine operations in the North Sea. At the end of 1916 eight Short Admiralty seaplanes were based at Stannergate.
The station occupied two adjacent sites. On the shore the seaplane sheds and technical buildings occupied an area of about 6 hectares, with two slipways. The station was initially equipped with two seaplane sheds, but by the time of the RAF survey of air stations of 1918 there were four. The accommodation for the station’s personnel lay in the second site, extending to about 2.6 hectares, to the north of the main railway line.
In 1918 the station also acted as an ‘acceptance station’ to which new seaplanes were delivered by their manufacturers for testing. The station had been run down by 1920, when the site was sold off.
The Stannergate seaplane station was re-established in the spring of 1940, closing again in 1944. Three of the First World War hangars are mapped on the 1940 1:2500 OS map; the easternmost had disappeared. Buildings of the base survived until the final part of the 20th century, but nothing is now visible. The area of water between the two slipways has been reclaimed.
Information from HS/RCAHMS World War One Audit Project (GJB) 31 May 2013
