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Thursday 12 March 2015

Who Nicked Our Pill Box?

If you have known Milford on Sea for a long time you may be able to help throw light on a local mystery.

click image to enlarge
The photograph (to the left) shows two World War Two Pill Boxes on the seafront outside of The White House. The first small pentagonal pill box to the left in the picture will be familiar to many, as it still stands in the same position today. 

To the right in the photograph is the much larger pill box which give us our mystery.

click image to enlarge
The large pill box looks a substantial structure with more windows than would normally be expected. The roof also appears to have been camouflaged.

It is unclear what the purpose of this second pill box might have been? - As it would not be usual to have two constructions so close together.

Possibly, military commanders felt Milford on Sea was particularly vulnerable and required bolstered defences, but this is just a guess.

So basically, we are trying to find out 'Who Nicked Our Pill Box'?

If you know, or have any ideas on why the larger pill box was built, please drop a line to david@milfordonsea.org

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Milford on Sea Bridge

Another curiosity in the village is something all of us see hundreds of times a year, but many fewer know that this WW2 throw back is there, - or not there, to be exact.

I am talking about the stone capping on top of Milford on Sea Bridge. 

When the bridge was built it had a carved inscription reading 'Milford on Sea Bridge Rebuilt in 1929'. During World War Two, the section containing the words 'Milford on Sea' was chiselled out to make it unreadable, leaving just the inscription 'Bridge Rebuilt in 1929' as we see it today.

All local road signs had also been removed during WW2. This had been done to try to disorientate any invading troops. 

A gallant effort, but not sure it would really have held them up very much!

1 comment:

  1. This was a section post and one of three concrete defence buildings on this short section of the coast. It was not unusual for pillboxes to be so close on the south coast where the coast was facing France and where it would have been easy to land, Records for the defences on this part of Hampshire exist.

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