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Anti-Aircraft Battery & Museum
Tom Baker visited a remarkable example of British World War Two heritage found on Cornwall’s Lizard Peninsula
“Wars are not won by evacuations.” Winston Churchill’s speech, famously delivered following the evacuation of the BEF from Dunkirk, compelled the British Government to become cognisant of the unthinkable notion that, for the first time in millennia, an invasion force might once again land on its shores.
Such a notion was embraced as fact by those tasked with preparing the country’s defences – Hitler’s Nazi hordes would attack, in large numbers, and seemingly at any moment. As southern England transformed into a prepared battlefield, the necessity of protecting Britain’s infrastructure, cities and military sites from an aerial onslaught also became apparent.
In late 1940 and early 1941, the government initiated a national project to protect vulnerable areas, including cities and airfields. Each of these Gun Defended Areas possessed a surrounding ring of two or more light or heavy antiaircraft batteries, and were manned by men and women from the Territorial Army, Royal Artillery and Auxiliary Territorial Service. Heavy anti-aircraft batteries, utili…
