Fortifications Of The Isle of Wight - Project Page

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  • Project Name: Fortifications Of The Isle of Wight
  • Field Researcher:Bluebottle
  • Faculty: Faculty Of History, Philosophy and Spirituality
  • Start Date: March 2011
  • End Date: 10 August 2011
  • Assisting Sub-editor:Tufty

Articles In The Project

This project could potentially be split into 3 smaller projects:

  • West Wight
  • East Wight
  • Solent Sea Forts

Conversations And Related Articles:

Back-Up Copies

As the author I plan to make a copy of the entire project for their own safe-keeping. This is because it is the project pages themselves that are subbed (not copies, as is the case for Edited Entries), so in the unlikely event of the Sub accidentally deleting a page, I have a back-up.

The Story Behind The Article

Part of an ongoing project to write about all the castles and forts in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, from pre-historic to modern times.

I grew up on the Isle of Wight and so visited quite a few of the forts. Especially as my grandfather was very fond of the forts and co-wrote several articles and books about their history.

I hope that writing this will help the forts become greater appreciated. It is true that without the guns, many of these forts are empty gun emplacements and look like concrete walls. They aren't pretty and therefore are neglected and ignored. Realistically, even if the National Trust wanted to, no tourist is going to pay to see 19 forts, many more or less the same. Even if they had their weapons restored - who would pay to see the same sort of gun 19 times in 19 different places? Yet it should be possible to restore and open to the public one or two really well.

My related articles On Castles Of The Isle of Wight and Hampshire that are intended to form part of the extended project:

Other articles in the project but not written by me include:

I have encountered two main problems when writing about the forts. Firstly, their description does involve adopting a lot of technical language. I hope that by providing a glossary as part of the overview this is resolved without me having to include the same footnotes in every article.

The second difficulty is one of trying to describe the sites' layout. No matter how well you can try to describe something there is no substitute for a diagram or photograph. I have therefore included links to diagrams at the Palmerston Fort Society's website, which is not something I would normally do, but I feel that this is the best thing to do in this instance. Similarly I would love to include a map of exactly where the batteries are, but this is perhaps not possible.

Select Bibliography

  • Sprack, P, Cantwell, A, Garry Mitchell - Solent Papers 1: Spitbank and the Spithead Forts
  • Sprack, P & Cantwell, A - Solent Papers 2: The Needles Defences
  • Moore, D - Solent Papers 10: The East Wight Defences
  • Sprack, P & Cantwell, A - The Needles Batteries
  • Sprack, P - The Sandown Bay Defences article in Fortress Magazine 7
  • ? - The Needles Old Battery
  • Sprack, P & Cantwell, A - Puckpool Battery
  • Sprack, P & Cantwell, A - Freshwater Redoubt
  • Saunders, A - Fortress Britain: Artillery Fortifications in the British Isles and Ireland
  • Lambert, A - Warrior: Restoring the World's First Ironclad
  • Searle, A - Isle of Wight at War, 1939-1945
  • Hyland, P - Wight: Biography Of An Island
  • Medland, J - Alum Bay And The Needles
  • ? - Shipwrecks Of The Wight
  • Lane, M - Piers Of The Isle of Wight
  • Drummond, M and Robin McInnes, R (ed) - The Book of The Solent
  • Williamson, D - Mariners Of Ancient Wessex
  • Sadden, J - Portsmouth: In Defence Of The Realm
  • Cruickshank, D - Invasion: Defending Britain from Attack
  • Rigold, S - Yarmouth Castle
  • James, J - Hurst Castle
  • Coad, J - Calshot Castle
  • Wheeler, R - From River To Sea: Marine Heritage Of Sam Saunders
  • Wheeler, R - From Sea To Air: The Marine Heritage Of Sam Saunders
  • Tennyson, Alfred Lord - The Complete Works Of Tennyson
  • Fleming, Ian - Moonraker
  • Temple Patterson, A - Portsmouth Papers 3 'Palmerston's Folly' The Portsdown & Spithead Forts
  • ? - A Short History of Fort Victoria
  • Mitchell, G & Moore, D – Articles on the Spithead Forts in The Redan.
  • Hulke, M - Doctor Who And The Sea-Devils
  • Various Websites referenced in the articles, including:
    • The Palmerston Fort Society website. During the writing of these article, this was undergoing a change of domain name from palmerstonforts.org.uk to victorianforts.co.uk.
  • Site visits where applicable

Admittedly these references have not been listed a proper manner, as they are listed by memory, but should give an indication.

Previous Project Experience

Here is a list of my previous University projects:

  1. Piers Of The Isle of Wight, UK
  2. Anglo-Saxon Isle of Wight
  3. Dinosaurs of The Isle of Wight
  4. Isle Of Wight Shipwrecks
  5. Isle of Wight Radar During The Second World War - Part of Project: Radar.
  6. Halloween: Being The Adventures Of Michael Myers
  7. Yorkshire's Castles
  8. The American Beatles Albums
    9. - The American Beatles Albums: Project Page
  9. Beatles Biopics - Coming Soon! Beatles Biopics - Project Page
  10. The Animated Asterix Films
    11. - Asterix Project Page
  11. Walking The Isle of Wight Coastal Path: Part 1 - Introduction
    12. - Project Page

Was that any help whatsover? Am I trying to show off? Or wanted to list them all generally somewhere and thought that this was as good a place as any? You decide!


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