Anti-Tank Buoys - Leysdown-on-Sea, Kent - World War II Sites on Waymarking.com

WWII anti-tank obstacles (buoys) at Leysdown Coastal Park, Leysdown.

"Anti-tank buoys, upturned exposing base. Buried to prevent vehicles driving on marsh land behind coastal wall.

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"As late as November 1939, the Chief of Staff assured that with air cover and the navy at sea, ‘a full scale invasion was not a serious danger.’ Such confidence began to be eroded by German occupation of Norway and Denmark in April 1940 and of Holland in early May, from which it was initially thought that an invasion might be launched. It was shredded by the allied defeat in France and the evacuation from Dunkirk in late May/early June. Sheerness had an important role in the assembly of the small ships which were to help in the retrieval of troops from the French beaches. After Dunkirk invasion then seemed not only possible but likely, especially given the evidence of the build - up of an invasion fleet along the Continental coast where French, Belgian and Dutch airfields had been taken over by the Germans and from which attacks on Britain might be expected . General Kirke had already undertaken some modest anti - invasion works but the tempo of defensive preparation dramatically increased with the vast programme initiated by General Ironside who succeeded him on 25 th May. This required construction of a network of anti - tank obstacles, trench systems, minefields, barbed wire obstacles, concrete pillboxes and gun emplacements. It consisted of (a) a coastal crust of defences (b) in rear of this, stop lines to delay and channel an invader into prepared battlefields and (c) where roads important to an enemy converged in towns, the creation of nodal point defences or anti - tank islands, with lesser defended villages and hamlets. As part of the anti - invasion strategy, there was also the need to defend vulnerable and key points, such as air fields ( e.g. against parachute landings) and elements of the country’s infrastructure. Areas suitable for the landing of enemy troop - carrying aircraft and gliders were to be obstructed with various types of obstacles. All of these features were, in varying degrees, provided within the district. Linked with this was special security and surveillance of the coast and of key points against the possibility of the activity of feared 5 th Columnists. Numerous reports survive of the spotting of suspicious persons and a number were detained and questioned.

On the mainland the coastal crust defences ran west from Graveney securing , at the same time, access from the creeks from the Swale (perhaps including small boom defences) and, as in the First World War, there were defences along and immediately behind the north shore of Sheppey , especially on the high ground . There were Defended Localities at Swanley Farm, Eastchurch and Queenborough as well as at Kingsferry to control the crossing of the Swale. Vulnerable Point Defences existed at Sheerness, Halfway Houses and Minster, with road blocks at numerous places. Collectively, these obstructed the road infrastructure and the routes on and off the island. Barge - mounted torpedoes were deployed at Sheerness and one of the line of new coastal emergency anti - invasion batteries was built at Shellness near the eastern entrance of the Swale . The latter was also protected by another emergency battery just outside the district at Whitstable. A concrete control post for an anti - shipping minefield also stands at Shellness . On the mainland, Watling Street was impeded by a succession of blocking positions, of which major ones were the important nodal points of Faversham and Sittingbourne, which might have had more than one circuit of defences. These were joined inland by a large arc of road blocks along two grid lines, reaching out as far as Stalisfield and Ringlestone. As with Sheppey, there were a multiplicity of points of resistance covering subsidiary and connecting roads, their junctions and villages on either side of the Watling Street . Defended Localities existed at Upchurch, Hartlip, Bobbing, Bredgar, Doddington, Teynham and Oare, with Vulnerable Point defences at Newington , Iwade, Borden, Newbury, Bapchild, Newnham, Eastling, Town Place, Norton Ash, Luddenham Court and elsewhere. In varying degrees, these defences will have included road blocks, fougasses (improvised explosive devices and flame projectors) and a variety of positions for small arms and light artillery . Both on the mainland and on the Isle of Sheppey, there were blocks to deter movement along railway lines. By this period there was a lesser emphasis on stop lines and more upon the use of strong mobile forces using nodal points as tactical pivots for counter - attacking.

In the event of invading forces occupying territory there was also a covert army of Home Guard partisans whose task was to commit sabotage behind enemy lines. Secret hides for them would have been established in the district and their sites remain to be found."

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