WW2 History Trail in Hong Kong by Graham G. Matthews In Hong Kong This walk traces the battle for Wong Nai Chung Gap on 19th December 1941, perhaps the bloodiest day of fighting in the short but brutal struggle for Hong Kong during World War II. I have followed the […]
Yearly Archives: 2013
95 posts
Myself and two friends decided to investigate the canal between Napton and Priors Hardwick which formed part of the Oxford Canal Stop Stop Line. De-bussing at Napton we headed for the towpath at Bridge 113 and headed South to Bridge 114 at Chapel Green and here on the west side […]
WW2 Defences beside the River Mole After an early morning visit to Dorking my wife and I decided to take an interesting riverside walk close to the Surrey hills, this by a strange coincidence would take us by some remaining WW2 defences! Starting at the bottom of Box hill and […]
A Walk Along Chesil Beach Abbotsbury Open Machine Gun Emplacements & Defences NGR: SY5665984083 & SY5666484097 During August 2006 I was kindly given a tour of some of the remaining defences in Dorset by Graham Matthews our previous PSG Web-master. Visiting Chesil beach at Abbotsbury was on the route and […]
A very clean and intact type 22 saw daylight again on 1st June 2010. The Pillbox had lain very much overgrown and hidden from view at the rear of the site of the old village hall at East Stoke near Wareham, Dorset. Graham had been given the chance to uncover […]
February 2010, A type 24 emerges from the undergrowth. On a cold and wet February day a keen PSG team tackled one of the most overgrown pillboxes to date, this time it would reveal what we believed to be the best surviving bullet proof FW3/24 on the MOD land at […]
A Hampshire 8 Sided Pillbox re-discovered. PILLBOX: S0011186 (Extant) A forgotten and unusual pillbox re-appeared again late October 2008 when myself, Tim Burt and Philip Riley met to carry out a project uncovering a part of Odiham’s hidden wartime history. During 1940 there was a possibility of airborne troop and […]
As part of the Maiden Newton at War Weekend members of the Pillbox Study Group carried out a restoration of a Type 22 Pillbox on the edge of the village.
March 2008 saw myself and PSG member Tim Burt meet up to work on an overgrown Type 24. I had worked on an adjacent example at the beginning of January 2008 and as an on going project it enabled me to show PSG members a ‘cleaned off’ example during […]
Early in January 2008 I completed a relatively easy task exposing a fine collection of dragons teeth that had become virtually hidden by many years of undergrowth. Set on the sloping south bank of the Basingstoke Canal at Crookham in Hampshire, they once formed part of the aldershot west defence […]
I had been given permission by the landowner to carry out a study on the Vickers machine gun emplacement earlier in the year but had decided to leave until the winter months for the leaves to have fallen. Armed with spades, broom and various other tools, myself and fellow PSG […]
Restoration Of The Tulk‘s Hill Observation Pillbox When you have been married to a ‘Pillbox Spotter’ for as long as I have then you will understand that `concrete-itis` is just part of life`s rich tapestry and that it`s quite normal to drive around the countryside peering over hedges! If you […]
Revealed, a long hidden Hampshire Pillbox. On a bitterly cold day during January 2007, Graham Matthews and I spent a morning giving a ‘makeover’ to an unusual shell-proof pillbox near Hook in Hampshire. The wartime structure had lain shrouded in undergrowth for the past 30 years or so, and could hardly be […]
Study & ‘Makeover’ Of A Shellproof Pillbox The pillbox is on private land near to the GHQ line at Crookham in Hampshire and is one of only two of this design. During January 2006 the landowner very kindly allowed me to carry out a study and survey of the unusual […]
Restoration Of The ‘Dorset Round Type’ One-Off Design Pillbox At Sy 7600-9060 Initial Thoughts Whilst travelling around the Dorset countryside in the mid-1990’s as a ‘Field Researcher’ for the Defence of Britain Project, I stumbled across a unique Pillbox, the type of which I have not seen replicated at any other location in […]