North Sutor, Coast Battery
Coastal Battery (Second World War), Gun Emplacement(S) (Second World War)
Site Name North Sutor, Coast Battery
Classification Coastal Battery (Second World War), Gun Emplacement(S) (Second World War)
Alternative Name(s) Cromarty Defences; Fort North Sutor, Site No. 1
Canmore ID 170751
Site Number NH86NW 9.06
NGR NH 81947 68912
NGR Description NH 81947 68912 and NH 82000 68962
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/170751
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- Council Highland
- Parish Nigg (Ross And Cromarty)
- Former Region Highland
- Former District Ross And Cromarty
- Former County Ross And Cromarty
NH86NW 9.06 81947 6812 and 82000 68975
Two World War II gun-emplacements for 6-inch guns. Information to follow.
These two World War II coast battery gun-emplacements are situated adjacent to the World War I 9.2-inch gun batteries. The emplacements are set in covered structures and were armed with 2 x 6-inch Mk.VII guns on Mk.V mountings which were installed in May 1940. These guns were replaced in April 1943 by 2 x 6-inch Mk.XXIV guns which were not removed until November 1956.
J Guy 2000; NMRS MS 810/10, Vol.2, 80, Vol.3, 45
Note (29 July 2013)
Two 6-inch gun emplacements were built next to the First World War 9.2-inch emplacements. Each gun was placed within a gun house and both reused and adapted the 9.2-inch magazines (The National Archives WO 78/5192).
The north east gun house (no. 2 gun) had a new shaft for the ammunition hoist made in the NE wall of the magazine allowing direct access into the SE corner of the new gun house. The doorway and windows providing light into the shell store may have been blocked at this time. The arrangement within the magazine may have been changed. The original hoist shaft into the 9.2-inch gun emplacement became an emergency exit with a covered hatch. The same arrangement was done at No. 1 gun.
A crew shelter and gun store lie attached to the NE side of the gun house. When operational the rear of the gun houses was covered in camouflage netting. The access road to the rear was painted with a camouflage pattern as visible of a vertical aerial photograph (106G/UK/751, flown 31 August 1945).
The south-west gun house (No. 1 gun) had a similar arrangement, but lies downhill from the earlier gun emplacement. The new access to the magazine was by a shallow ramp down into the former First World War shell store, in the NE wall. Shells and cordite were delivered down into the magazine using a small crane, still in situ, behind the former 9.2-inch emplacement. Attached to the SW side of the gun house was the crew shelter, officers room and gun store.
In both cases the access to the magazines has been filled in with debris from the demolished camp site. Internally the gun houses had an access in the rear wall, and had ready lockers for ammunition in the external wall of the gun pit. The roof structure is a complicated structure, possibly indicating rebuilding when replacement guns were fitted in 1943. In both gun houses there is camouflage paint still visible inside the upper roof level. In front of the 6-inch gun pits the concrete aprons have small boulders placed into it for camouflage and similarly on the part of the roof. Also in each apron are two large metal hoops, of unknown purpose.
Plans for a third gun at the site as late as 1943 did not get beyond the planning stage.
Information from RCAHMS (AKK) 29 July 2013.
Field Visit (15 March 2019)
Two covered gun emplacements, introduced by the Army during the Second World War, are situated immediately adjacent to two First World War emplacements (NH86NW 9.02) on the crest of a rough gorse- and grass-grown scarp that falls away to the SE. Each was armed with a 6-inch gun and they mirror one another architecturally, with both being equipped with their own crew shelter and underground magazine. The latter were the same as those built in the First World War for their predecessors, although they were modified for their new role.
The emplacements are positioned about 68m apart, the more westerly being sited on a rock-cut terrace immediately SW of its First World War counterpart, while the more easterly is immediately NE of its First World War counterpart. Both guns were secured in circular pits measuring 7.6 in diameter within reinforced cast concrete walls 1.73m in height and between 0.2m-1.54m in thickness; and they are fronted by a gently falling moss-grown apron of reinforced concrete measuring up to 4.7m in length, although that associated with the SW gun is heavily obscured by gorse. They are camouflaged with a scattering of natural rocks embedded in the surface, while chevrons at their outer edges help break-up their outline. In addition, a pair of iron hoops, which were possibly intended to tie down netting, are set amidst the rocks.
The floor of the NE gun-pit is grass-grown and lightly covered with a scatter of debris, in contrast to that on the SW where the concrete floor and the central holdfast are clearly visible. The latter comprises a circular iron band, measuring 2.5m in diameter and 0.18m in width, displaying 28 bolts to lock the gun in place. A duct for electrical cabling which appears to have emanated from a pipe part way up the wall, crosses the floor from the WSW only to bifurcate at its edge of the holdfast, with one branch running for a short distance to its SE, while the other enters the ring. There are also two small pipes in the floor for individual cables, while a gutter associated with a grill-covered drain on the S, encircles the foot of the wall. This wall retains various small iron fixings and cable pipes, but is chiefly distinguished by a neatly formed, rounded groove measuring 0.15m in width and 0.1m in depth which encircles the pit 0.11m below its rim. This is interrupted by two large square-sectioned putlogs that possibly supported the gun platform, although that on the W in the SW pit is now plugged with concrete. Both pits are accessible via a simple passage, measuring 0.76m in width, through their N wall, but access to the NE pit was subsequently blocked with a narrow screen made of breezeblocks. A robbing trench resulting from the post-war extraction of cables from beneath its concrete floor runs out into the rear compartment of the emplacement and then zigzags as it passes out of the building to the N. Although there are traces of dark green and black camouflage paint on the walls of this gun-pit, the sidewalls of the entrances are whitewashed. Chases to either side of their upper edges indicate that they were once capped with hinged metal plates allowing a continuous walkway around the broad NW wall of the gun platform. This could be reached by a flight of whitewashed steps from the rear compartment. Small metal plates set at intervals around the N edge of this walkway indicate that a pipework balustrade originally ran around their N side, with an extension down the steps. It is clear from their spacing that the white and blackwashed brick pillars supporting the open-front of the mezzanine (see below) overlie some of these plates and this suggests that the decision to expand the emplacements to provide a wrap-around compartment to the rear and a covered housing was only taken after the concrete walling at ground level had been constructed.
The whitewashed compartment wrapping around behind the gun-pit is essentially rectangular on plan and measures 15m from NE to SW by 5.5m-5.9m transversely within brick and concrete walls 0.47m-1.5m in thickness and 2.14m in height. However, the indentation caused by the gun-pit subdivides the compartment into two roughly ‘lung-shaped’ chambers on plan with the steps forming the dividing line. Although the gun-pit and its wing walls define the SE side, the walls on the SW and NE are also built of concrete up to a height of 1.2m. Above this, these walls and the wing walls are brick-built like the NW wall of the compartment. The concrete walls house the entrance to the ramp leading down to the magazine and a series of ammunition lockers. In order to accommodate the entrance to the magazine, the lung-shaped chamber in which it is situated has been made slightly larger than its twin. The ramps are not identical, as that in the NE emplacement is considerably steeper than its counterpart. They were originally equipped with elevators, but few fittings now remain. The lockers measure 1.13m in breadth, 0.88m in depth and 0.95m in height, although those in the wing walls are 1m in depth. Each is distinguished by rounded upper corners, raised floors and white washed interiors. Electrical junction boxes spaced at intervals between them are linked to a narrow cable channel moulded into the wall above. Where the cable reaches the flight of steps providing access to the north-west wall around the gun platform it passes through a small hole, but at the entrances to the gun-pits it dips down to run underground before emerging on their far side. Access to the gun emplacements was gained by a broad opening in the NW wall immediately behind the steps and the entrance to the gun-pit, while a narrower gap provided admission to the smaller of the two lung-shaped chambers. Beyond lay a corridor, which measures 9m from NE to SW by 0.6m-1m transversely within brick walls 0.47m in thickness and 2.68m in height. This acts as a baffle and while a brick wall closes one end in the NE emplacement, both ends are open in its twin. Another entrance pierces the outer wall of this corridor, but it is staggered so as not to oppose either of those on the S.
The covered housing rising above the ground floor of the rear compartment is subrectangular on plan and measures 10.2m from NW to SE by 5.8m transversely within reinforced cast concrete, walls 0.44m in thickness and 4m in height. Its side walls, which have been constructed with differently shaped corners on the N to break-up the housing’s profile, are supported on massive whitewashed concrete beams. These rest upon the NW wall of the rear compartment, a whitewashed square-sectioned pillar that rises from each of the lung-shaped chambers and the brick walling above the wing walls. This configuration has allowed the lockers on the ground floor on the NE and SW, lying outside the covered housing, to be sheltered beneath a flat, asphalt-coated, concrete roof which also stretches over the corridor. This roof is situated at the same height as the floor of the mezzanine within the housing, which is itself supported on eight similar concrete joists which rest upon the outer wall of the corridor, the NW wall of the rear compartment and the brick pillars running around the curved walkway of the gun-pit. However, three of these pillars are now missing from the SW end of the NE emplacement. The broad, rectangular openings in the N wall of the corridor that result from the way these joists rest on the baffle are divided by stumpy columns of brick, but only some of these still remain in place. Similar, but smaller openings, are situated in the brick walls outside the housing on the NE and SW, although some have later been blocked. All provide light and ventilation, but it is also possible that they may have been intended to relieve any backward pressure on the housing that arose from effect of the gun firing.
The floor of the mezzanine, which follows a rough curve on plan, measures 1.3m-3.8m from NW to SE by 6.6m-10.2m transversely within walls 0.44m in thickness and 1.15m in height. However, its whitewashed SE edge is broken-up into a series of zigzagging angles in order to disguise its line. A canopy at its centre rises over the steps on the NW side of the gun-pit and while this feature has a tilted cap in the NE emplacement, it is horizontal in its SW counterpart. The mezzanine’s walls, which are pierced with ten rectangular apertures just below the roofline, are camouflaged with black, red and yellow colourwashes in both vertical and swirling stripes to contrast with the uncoloured concrete, while the ceiling is camouflaged with the same colours applied in an even more irregular way. Stripy colourwashes also camouflage the mezzanine externally, while the flat, overhanging roof supported on the SE by two massive horizontal beams of reinforced cast concrete is provided with a pronounced wavy edge that culminates in a peak hanging directly above the holdfast. The peaks differ from one another, with that in the NE emplacement being more pointed that that in its twin.
The underground magazines, which had been constructed at the outset of the First World War for their predecessors (NH86NW 9.02), now underwent some modification in order to fit them for their new role in these later emplacements. The use of the principal compartments was transposed, with the First World War cordite store now becoming the shell store and vice-versa. This conversion led to the blocking of the doors and windows in the old shell store, a redesign of the shifting lobby and the compartment containing the shell hoist, while the old cartridge hoist’s shaft was transformed into an escape hatch. It is possible that many of the extant internal fittings also date from this period.
The crew shelters, which are situated within bunds at the opposite end of the emplacements, are otherwise colour washed externally in green and brown. They are rectangular on plan and measure 11m from NE to SW by 3m transversely, within reinforced cast concrete walls up to 0.6m in thickness and 2.3m in height. Their flat, overhanging roofs were originally distinguished by cowls running in a line down the centre – four in that associated with the SW emplacement and three in that associated with the NE emplacement. A low wall extending the line of the outer corridor of the emplacement borders a stepped path immediately to their NW and preserves traces of a metal railing. This path provides access to three compartments in the SW emplacement: a men’s shelter, an officer’s shelter and a gun store; but to only two compartments in the NE emplacement, where it seems the officer’s shelter has been omitted. The men’s shelter next to the gun house is the largest and it is differentiated from its neighbours by a doorway and two windows that look out on to the path. The other compartments possess only an entrance and a single window. However all have been robbed of their metal doors and frames. Internally, their floors are concrete, while the walls are usually whitewashed or colour washed with yellow and black horizontal bands. The ceilings are also whitewashed and that in the men’s shelter is pierced by two of the circular vents. Additionally, metal grills in the ceilings possibly hide ducts. A stain on the floor suggests the officer’s shelter was equipped with a stove. Fixings for shelving survive in the men’s shelter and the gun stores.
A new plan of the SW emplacement was prepared in the course of this visit, but there is an unnumbered plan, partly in pencil, included in the fort record book (WO78/5192) held at the National Archives at Kew. This was possibly drawn-up before construction began. The emplacements are also depicted on two RAF aerial photographs (106G/RAF/0751/6039-40) flown on 31 August 1945, which show the success of their camouflaging when viewed from above.
Visited by HES, Survey and Recording (ATW, AKK, HLS, AMcC), 15 March 2019.
