Needles Battery 

Solent Landmarks  Needles battery  The Main Features The Guns 
 
A Quick History 

The battery was one of Palmertson's famous follies. Coastal fortifications built in the 1860's to counter a perceived French threat. 
When the battery did get to engage the enemy it was not to be the French but the Germans in the Second World War 
 		   
First ever AA gun mounting in Britain The birth place of a new weapon. 
The circular plate is the site  of the first ever use of an antiaircraft gun in Britain. An experimental one pounder "pom pom" gun was mounted here and fired against a kite towed by a ship. 
A new form of gunnery against a new threat.
 
A Time Line Guns to rockets
The Victorian years 
The battery is built 
1861-63 Needle point battery is built with 7 "RBL 

1873 Guns replaced with 9"RML  

1889-92  Empacements built at water level. 

1893 New needles battery built,armed with 9.2" BL guns

 The original specifications 
  • Cost: £6,958, 
  • Guns: Six 7" Armstrong RBL,
  • Manning:1 officer,2 NCO, 21 men
Geography, Both a friend and an enemy 
The chalk ridge on which the fortification is built gives it a natural defence from the sea and a dominating position. It also gave the military engineers continuos problems. Fissures opened up, banks collapsed in heavy rain, ground was unable to support concussion from guns, observation positions subsided or became undermined by cliff erosion. 
 
The World Wars 
The battery in action 

1913 First british AA gun is tested at the site 

1914 Batteries are manned during the First world war 

1918 Batteries placed in care and maintenance  

1939 Batteries manned during second world war 

1940 signal station built 

1941 Radar Station built 

1945 Battery placed in reserve

 Wartime Action: When the main threat came from the air 
  • 9/2/43 Air raid:AA guns damaged a German fighter 
  • 23/5/43 E boat engaged but not hit
  • 24/12/43 E boat engaged but not hit
Radar A mixed blessing 
The radars installed enabled the guns to engaged targets at night. Both the E boat engagements resulted from radar detected targets. 
However the radars made the battery a possible target for German parachutist attempting to capture the equipment. The headland had to fortified against attack with ditches, barb wire and trenches. 

Training for D-Day 
In the second world war the area around the battery formed an intensively used training area .Troops fought mock battles, low flying aircraft attacked canvas targets and ships fired shells into the hills.  
 
20th Century 
New uses 
1954 Guns scrapped 

1956 Black knight space rocket Programme 

1975 National trust obtains headland. 

1981 First phase of restoration completed

 A major task 
Nowadays the area around the Needles battery makes a popular visitor attraction. This is only as the result of a large amount of work by the National Trust and volunteers to remove much of the debris and ruins left by military occupation. Many of the more modern structures erected by the space programme had to be removed to leave the original batteries in their current restored condition.
 
 
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