Bressay, Hill Of Cruester, Anti-aircraft Battery

HU44SE 76.00 centred 48258 42725

HU44SE 76.01 centred 48196 42610 Military camp

Situated on the S slopes of the Hill of Cruester, NE of Bressay Sound is an Anti-Aircraft Battery consisting of four 3.7-inch gun emplacements, a command post, hut bases and light anti-aircraft positions. The battery formed part of the coastal defences of Lerwick.

J Guy 1995; NMRS MS 810/4, 102-5.

Hill of Cruester heavy anti-aircraft battery is situated on the S-facing slopes of Hill of Cruester above the track that leads to Heogan and overlooking the Bressay Sound.

The four concrete and breeze block gun-emplacements at HU 48219 42692, HU 48227 42719, HU 48258 42725 and HU 48283 42699, form an arc. On the S side of the arc is the remains of the heavily eroded command position (HU 48253 42696), of which only the lower courses of the brick built entrance and the foundations survive. The battery emplacements are unusual in having brick built blast walls to the rear of the arcs of ready-use ammunition lockers. The emplacements all retain the ready-use ammunition compartments with pre-cast concrete roofs.

The gun holdfasts have either been removed or are burried beneath a layer of gravel.

About 35m S of the command postion is the remains of a hut. Only the lower part of the walls survive as courses of brick and concrete which shows that corrugated iron sheeting had been used for the shuttering process.

One light anti-aircraft position was noted at c.HU 4824 1427.

The anti-aircraft battery is visible on vertical air photographs (106G/Scot/UK 97, 4050-4051, flown 18 May 1946), which show that it is unlikely the site ever had a radar unit.

Visited by RCAHMS (DE, AL), 7 October 1998