22 April 1944

22 April 1944 Channel Islands Sea Defence diary

Weather: wind from 270°, 3 metres per second. No. 2 gun of 5./1265 unavailable owing to an unserviceable upper carriage.

Construction, Naval Artillery Battalion 604, Batterie Mirus: Würzburg set work and reworking of cartridges at all guns continued. Anti-aircraft-landing stakes driven in at Rundbucht. Epa–Seipa installation, road at No. 2 gun and Düsseldorf anti-aircraft position continued. No. 3 gun camouflaged; water bunker at No. 1 gun worked on. Two 7.5-cm positions remain suspended for lack of cement.

Batterie Steinbruch: doors for searchlights A and B complete except fittings and hinges. Searchlight A camouflaged jointly with the camouflage firm. Infantry positions, anti-aircraft positions and battery grounds developed and camouflaged. Work on 7.62-cm gun positions suspended for lack of cement.

Batterie Lothringen: earth removal in front of the old fire-control post continued. Power cable laid from the E-bunker to the fire-control post [source bunker designation retained]. General camouflage continued. Outside workers began installing heating in the new fire-control post. Work on the 7.5-cm position suspended for lack of cement.

Batterie Strassburg: splinter-proof second 7.5-cm position and splinter-proof shed for 7.5-cm ammunition continued. Brown House demolition and infantry-position camouflage continued.

Naval Artillery Battalion 605, Batterie Annes, Organisation Todt: earth already placed over ammunition bunker I removed again because water still seeped through despite its new roof. Asphalt coating is now to cover the roof and the upper metre of the walls. Work stopped on three days that week because workers were taken to other sites for concreting. Painting begun in ammunition bunker I and gun bunkers II and III; camouflage and levelling continued.

Battery work: splinter-proof storage for searchlights continued. Searchlight Anton's generating set moved into the new position; rubber coupling pieces fitted to Bruno's generating set. Another accommodation barrack demolished. Guns camouflaged against aerial observation. Communication trenches at the fire-control post excavated and camouflaged. Position trenches and camouflage and levelling of bunker entrances continued.

Batterie Elsass: no Organisation Todt work. Battery wire obstacles and reserve fire-control post continued; machine-gun position developed; further shelter holes made. Searchlight Bruno position, J.'burg [source abbreviation], constructed; light- and heavy-mortar positions built; elevated observation stand demolished; rangefinder camouflaged.

Artillery command post: construction finished. Naval radar: work suspended for lack of material. Battalion headquarters: infantry-defence installations developed.

Roll 2422, scans 0823–0824, original pages 37–38.