Established in 2012, the Slough Fort Preservation Trust (SFPT) was formed from a group of volunteers who all had an interest in history, and the fort. Forming a trust, the group work tirelessly to care for the fort by maintaining it and restoring it to become a public museum. In 2016, Beyond the Point attended…
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This Royal Observer Corps observation bunker was constructed in 1959 and closed with the first wave of posts in 1968 (unlike those remaining in operation into the 1990s). As a result, it has been exposed to the elements and vandals for longer and appears to have suffered an arson attack. An original bed survives as…
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Once the Second World started in 1939, Britain was keeping a close eye on the east-coast of the country to prevent any German invasion. Burnham-on-Crouch in Essex was little more than a small yacht town before World War Two however the town became much more important when Germany invaded France. With Kent and South-Essex heavily…
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Built close to Dagenham East Station, these anti-tank cylinders were built in World War Two to slow down any German tanks, should they have made it that far. The row of these concrete defences can be seen on Google Maps and spans over 80 metres, with a Type 22 pillbox at the eastern end. On…
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St Martin’s Hospital in Kent has been described as being “truly remnant of the asylums of the early nineteen hundreds” and walking around this 129 year old building you can see why. With Victorian corridors spanning tens of metres and old wards with the original sashed windows, this building has reached the end of its…
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Today, the site of Runwell Hospital is nothing more than rubble, with over 500 homes now on the site, although turn back the clock a few years and it was a fully fledged hospital. Tucked away in the Essex countryside, not far from Chelmsford, Runwell opened in July 1937 as one of the last built…
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Coalhouse Point where the Thames suddenly narrows was home to several defences since 1402, and a D-shaped artillery battery fort stood here from 1539. The fort was replaced in 1799 with Coalhouse Fort which was rebuilt in 1847 and 1860. The large moat you can see to prevent invaders reaching the fort is a technological…
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Down an unmade lane in the quaint countryside Essex village of Hatfield Heath lies what at first appears to be a set of abandoned farm sheds. This hutment was in fact Prisoner of War Camp ‘High Hall’ 116, and once housed around 1,500 Italian, Austrian, and (from 1943) German soldiers captured in the European and…
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Situated along the Thames foreshore, these two pillboxes were built around 1940 as part of a huge scheme to build almost 30,000 pillboxes across the country, but especially the south-east. Located about 530 meters apart, each pillbox sits on a corner of the Essex marshes, opposite Greenhithe. Men from the Home Guard would have been…
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See above the front of the depot in 1990 (Frank Whitnell) and in 2013 The Canvey & District Bus Depot was built in 1934, featuring contemporary Art Deco hard-edged geometric architecture. It was vacated in 1974, by Eastern National, the major primary bus service of the era – now days First dominates Essex’ streets, with…
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