Rattray Head

NK05NE 17.00 0925 5832 to 0972 5821

Location formerly cited as NK 0877 5807 to 1000 5813.

NK05NE 17.01 NK 0925 5832 Pillbox

NK05NE 17.02 NK 0957 5826 Pillbox

NK05NE 17.03 NK 0972 5821 Pillbox

For other components of the anti-tank line see NK05NE 24, NK06SE 10.00, NK15NW 1.00 and NK15SW 6.00

Line of coastal defence pill boxes protecting the approach to Rattray Airfield (NK05NE 16). At least four survive, spaced along the edge of a low escarpment. Visible on air photographs AAS/93/15/G31/4-11, flown 11 November 1993. Copies held by Grampian Regional Council SMR.

NMRS MS/712/6.

Pillboxes are noted by GRC at NK 057 579, 092 582, 095 582, 097 581, 100 574, 1012 5798 and 1032 5767

(NK15NW 1).

NMRS, MS/712/9.

Rattray, pill-boxes. Air photographs: AAS/97/12/G25/12 and AAS/97/12/CT.

NMRS, MS/712/29.

This line of pillboxes forms part of an anti-tank stop line of which the major component is the anti-tank ditch that begins at the SE corner of Loch of Strathbeg at Starnakeppie with a further section to the N of the loch (NK06SE 10.00). The anti-tank ditch runs S immediately inland from the dune system for about 6,500m from the Loch of Strathbeg to Annachie Bridge (NK 1050 5315, NK15SW). The ditch is visible on several series of post-war vertical air photographs (106G/Scot/UK 107, 3002-3, flown 23 May 1946; 106G/Scot/ UK 135, 1001-5, flown 30 June 1946).

The pillboxes are situated to the W of the ditch, often at a point where it changes direction and during the war most would appear to have been surrounded by a barbed-wire enclosure. Some sections of this ditch now form part of the modern farm drainage system and are depicted on the OS 1:10000 map (1975).

It is possible that the possible canal/ditch NK06SE 5 which runs N from Loch of Strathbeg to Gallow Hill (NK 0617 6185 on map sheet formed part of the anti-tank ditch as a straight section running N from terminal of the older drain has the appearance of a wartime anti-tank ditch. (See )

Information from RCAHMS (DE), December 2001