19 March 1944

19 March 1944 Channel Islands Sea Defence diary

Weather: wind from 225°, 7 metres per second. Two 7.5-cm guns withdrawn from Batterie Elsass (Alderney) for remounting on new carriages. Alderney radar unserviceable.

Construction, Naval Artillery Battalion 604, Batterie Mirus: infantry command post erected on the battery commander's house; machine-gun positions and anti-aircraft machine-gun control post constructed. Infantry positions at the fire-control post continued; preparations for the Würzburg set continued. Wire obstacles and camouflage at No. 1 gun; infantry positions, including camouflage, overhauled at No. 2 gun. Communication trenches and machine-gun positions improved at No. 3 gun. Further camouflage and bunker development at No. 4 gun. Armour plate mounted at No. 2 gun; bolting of No. 4 gun's armour plate begun. Splinter trench at the service barrack and Düsseldorf, Essen and Hamburg anti-aircraft positions continued. Preparations for fitting the horn ring at No. 3 gun; work on Seipa and Epa. Work on bunkers for the 7.5-cm gun and generating sets suspended for lack of cement.

Batterie Steinbruch: camouflage and wire obstacles at infantry positions continued; work on searchlight position A; water-pipe trenches for the water bunker begun. Camouflage firm completed No. 2 gun and began No. 3.

Batterie Strassburg: lining of shelter holes begun; old searchlight A replaced by a new one, with preparations for similar replacement of searchlight B. Wire obstacles at the fire-control post and demolition of the Brown House continued. P. I, II and IV set up and manned [source designations retained].

Batterie Lothringen: fire-control post developed further; dismantling and blasting at the old fire-control post; excavation for a shelter for the 7.5-cm gun; battery searchlight position continued; flamethrower installed; mortar positions complete. The Naval Artillery Arsenal worked on ventilation of the fire-control post; metre-elevation arc mounted at No. 1 gun.

The following Naval Artillery Battalion 605 construction reports are explicitly dated 6 and 13 March in the source, although incorporated beneath 19 March. They are translated under their respective dates.

Roll 2422, scans 0807–0809, original pages 24–26.