Coastal Defences, Norfolk

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rockfordstone

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I've not posted in a while, so bear with me. Haven't seen this one on here in a while so thought I would share.

Over the weekend I headed up to Norfolk with a friend with the intention of doing some landscapes, but knowing there were some decent coastal defences still in existence we decided to incorporate them into our journey.

When war broke out, Norfolk was seen as a potential site for invasion so the beaches were fortified. In this particular area, pill boxes were erected, the beach was mined and gun emplacements were installed on the cliff top. The RAF also operated a radar station, whilst the army requisitioned a number of the homes in the area.

My pictures are not as great as some of the others that have been posted of this area, but hopefully you will find them interesting.

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Pill box in a landscape, part of the reason we went up there

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another one on the edge of the field, one of a number around this particular area

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I tried to get a few of the inside, but the lighting was a poor, so i tried to be creative instead

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Pill box with lighthouse in the background. This one didn't have much protection in comparison to the others, which makes me think it was more of a lookout? given where it was, i imagine it was a lot further away from the sea when it was constructed

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another landscape

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this one by the lighthouse was a lot more fortified

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obligatory 2 for 1 shot

we didn't get to the pill box on the beach because the tide was quite far in, so we moved up the gun emplacements.

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spigot mortar bases with the gun enclosure behind. we spotted 3 of the mortar mounts, so this point must have been fairly heavily fortified at the time.

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pill box at the gun position

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one of the gun emplacements, positioned to hide the cock grafitti

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wide shot of both positions

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one of the old gun mounts with some of the bolts in place

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not sure what this is, but it was inside the underground of the gun enclosure. im guessing it is a light switch or socket

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one of the underground chambers, i'm guessing due to the gap to the right with a ventilation hole this was more of a shelter rather than a protective bunker. Sadly that was the only usable shot I got from undergound.

We did find the other entrances to the underground system, but with the light starting to go and our intention to go photo Happisburgh Lighthouse at sunset we made our way away.

A nice little mooch around, and maybe I'll go back and get in the other tunnels.

Hope you enjoyed
 
Nice set mate been the tunnels a few times and was going to go the other week but never got time.there is three sections of the tunnels to get in
 
thanks mate, we went into one, and could see the access to the others, but with our coats on they were a bit tight to have a go at. definitely one to return to.

it was you photos that inspired me to go looking for them :)
 
Nicely recorded. The pill boxes are located in wide open land so if Gerry decided to land here the soldiers would have a clear line of fire.
 
Well glad you liked it.them photos are beautiful.nice colours in them
 
A superb set of images on an area I know very well, you have captured the 'vastness' of the landscape very well. Having relatives living in the area, I first 'explored' the defence lines in 1954 - there was still a lot of barbed wire lying around back then.
 
Smashing photos Rockford. Don't think they're not great, they're way better than many people (including me) can do.

PS: The light switch thing is a 'cutout' for an incoming electricity supply.
It might have been quite cosy in there in the winter with one of the mod-cons.
 
PS: The light switch thing is a 'cutout' for an incoming electricity supply.

It is actually a fused termination/distribution box for 2 core, steel-wire armoured, heavy duty supply cable. It is missing the two ceramic fuse (wire) holders, that clipped into the two ceramic bases and the cast iron lid. The steel wire armouring is unravelled for 3 or 4 inches and these ends are fastened in the 'bee hive' shaped top piece. A sod to install without a good pair of wire cutters.
 

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