Location Report

By Joe Mander

St Martin’s Hospital

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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By Liam Heatherson

Coalhouse Fort

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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By Liam Heatherson

Prisoner of War Camp 116

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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By Joe Mander

West Thurrock Pillboxes

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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By Liam Heatherson

Canvey Bus Museum

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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By Joe Mander

Mid Wales Hospital (Talgarth Asylum)

Talgarth is a small, quaint market town in mid-Wales and as of 2011 was home to less than 2,000 people. Driving through the narrow country roads you’ll eventually get to two large concrete gate posts – the original entrance to the former Mid Wales Hospital, known as Talgarth Asylum. Due to increasing demand on other…

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By Joe Mander

Thanet Air Raid Shelters

Across the country hundreds of air raid shelters were built at the outbreak of World War Two, both above and beneath the surface with the majority built across the South-East. We’ve visited two shelters, one by the coast and the other down the road in Broadstairs. We haven’t published the location of these shelters to…

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By Liam Heatherson

Castle Point Council Nuclear Bunker

We have been fortunate enough to be given the opportunity to document a nuclear bunker built in the basement of Castle Point Borough Council’s offices. It was initially built for emergency planning during a nuclear war, but has been equipped more recently to handle environmental disasters or terrorism. In the late 1980s, plans were drawn…

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