Mire End

NT08NE 114.00 05501 85883

NT08NE 114.01 NT 05421 85190, NT 05457 85940, NT 05500 85952 and NT 05548 85949 Magazines

NT08NE 114.02 centred NT 05704 85863 Military camp

This World War Two anti-aircraft battery is siuated 300m E of Mire End farm at the top of a slight rise. The battery is constructed of brick and concrete and consisted of four 4.5 inch gun emplacements, command post, magazines and a guard room. There are the remains of further possible magazines in the vicinity. The site has been purchased by a developer who has plans to build houses on this site.

J Guy 1994; NMRS MS 810/3

An arc of four gun-emplacements (NT 05449 85881, NT 05482 85913, NT 05526 85915 and NT 05561 85883), are situated around the command centre. Immediately to the N are four magazines and about 175m to the E is the accommodation camp for gun crews and support staff.

All the brick and concrete gun-emplacements have ready-use ammuntion lockers, some still with the wooden racks surviving and crew shelters, though it is not known whether the holdfasts survive underneath rubble that has been deposited within the gun positions.

The brick and concrete command centre is set within the arc of emplacements. The building retain many of the internal compartments, though some demolition had occurred to part of the structure.

The site is still enclosed within much of the original boundary fence

The battery is viisble on RAF vertical air photographs (58[A] 386, Pt.1, 5456-5458, flown 21 May 1948), which clearly show the gun-emplacments, magazines and accommodation camp.

No radar platform and ramp with Gl-mat could be seen on the photographs, though a Gl Mk II is noted in June 1942 in the Public Record Office documents (WO 166/11169) . The War Office documents also show that between 1942 and 1943 the gun armament was changed from 4.5-inch to 3.7-inch static guns and by 1945 the battery had been disarmed. Designated 227 Battery in 1940 this was changed to 541 Battery by 1942.

The battery, magazines and remains of the camp are all shown on the OS 1:2500 scale digital map.

Visited by RCAHMS (GS), February 1998.