A trip to the Isle of Wight : part 1

 My wife and I have just spent a very pleasant week on the Isle of Wight.  We stayed in Sandown, which in spite of its "sand, sea and sun" image, has some hidden military links as various display boards show.

The above board gives details of two forts which covered the sea front at different times and were lost or demolished.  There was a third fort, built in the mid 19th century, elements of which still exist, but are now part of the zoo.  During WWII it was the location of eight pumps which were part of  PLUTO, supplying fuel to Normandy.  A more prosaic, typically English survivor is on a local golf course link to historic england .  There were also "Palmerston Folly" forts at either end of the beach.  The northern one at Yaverland  link  is now in a holiday camp and to the one to the south link which was demolished and is now a children's park.

Visible on a headland to the north was Bembridge Fort, which is in the care of the National Trust. link  This was another of the "Palmerston Follies"and there are guided tours, but only on one day a week, which was a day that we already had something planned.

The National Trust also have The Needles Lower Battery, another of the Palmerston forts.  This is open every day and so I had a look round.  The fort is on a narrow headland and the landward approach is covered by a deep ditch.  The limitations of the site meant that when the calibre of guns needed to be increased later in the century a new battery was built further inland away from the cliffs because of fears that gunfire may cause landslides.

Model of the Fort

Battery overlooking the Solent

The fort saw service up to the end of WWII and has a tunnel to a searchlight battery down the cliff.   The first AA gun  a 1lb pompom, was installed here in 1913, There is a second battery built further back up the headland and also a missile firing range used during the Cold War.  link

Mount for AA gun added in 1913

Tunnel to the searchlight position

Not far from the Needles is Yarmouth Castle, which began to be built in 1546.  Its first garrison was a captain and 17 soldiers; with a main armament of 12 heavy guns to defend the town and also the approaches to the Solent..

A  diagram of the original castle

Two sides of the castle were protected by the Solent and the River Yar; the other two by a wet moat.  A distinguishing feature of the castle is the angle bastion which was built to cover the moat.  Further changes during Elizabeth I's reign saw half the central courtyard filled in to make a large gun platform whose gunfire was concentrated out to sea.  More details can be found here .

The next post will cover Carisbrooke Castle.