My Mum told me there was a gun battery on the Shore Fields in New Ferry- dont know when that was moved though
The gun battery at Shorefields was manned by Poles. There were a series of barrack huts erected to billet them in. The guns were removed in late 1944/early 1945 when the danger of Luftwaffe bombers reaching Merseyside had long since passed. The barracks were then used as a POW camp housing German and Italian prisoners. There was no barbed wire around them - it was an "open" prison where the inmates were allowed out to work on local farms during the daytime. Some of them even dated local New Ferry girls - as one elderly lady who lived in Pollitt Square at the time told me last year when I was exhibiting my Luftwaffe bomber pilot collection at Fort Perch Rock Museum (which I will be doing again this coming Easter Monday!).... her sister went out with one of them on a date, and her mother always said for a foriegner he was one of the "politest dates" any of her daughters had gone out with!
From 1948 the barracks were used as temporary housing for people who had lost their homes in the bombing on Merseyside. The buildings were empty in the early 1970s and finally demolished. Some of the trees that survive opposite Pollitt Square, on Shorefields, originally were planted in the "gardens" around the huts when people lived in them.
You can find out more about New Ferry and its wartime history on my website www.newferryonline.org.uk Look in the History section, and at the Photos & Memories page, particularly the 1940s page.
Here is an Ordnance Survey map extract from 1954, although I have added the position of the gun. You can clearly see the barracks on the field opposite Pollitt Square.
The map came from the excellent website www.old-maps.co.uk Just input your postcode and see all the various maps from different times available for this area!!
could someone link me the images of the Holm Lane (if any exist) and the Storeton Gunsite, please? All the links provided seem to have expired, or that I simply cannot view them.
The bases and drains of the Storeton Gunsite buildings are still present and worth a visit if you have an interest.
As far as I remember there are only aerials of Holme Lane and Storeton.
The only Wirral sites with the remains of gun emplacements are Bidston and Puddington. Puddington is dangerous to enter without permission but is by far in the best condition albeit very overgrown.
Storeton and Bidston are accessible.
We don't do charity in Germany, we pay taxes. Charity is a failure of governments' responsibilities - Henning Wehn
The Holme lane site received a direct hit from a German bomb and several crew members both male and female were killed.I believe they where buried in Landigan .
Firstly, thanks for the information. I'll be checking out the Storeton battery as soon as I can.
As far as I know, the Bidston Site is being demolished, as the area is blocked off and controlled fires are clearing away the shrubbery. Not sure about this though.
I'd like to try and find the Storeton gunsite. Could any give me an idea of where it is please? All images have expired on the thread but from what I can gather it's on Red Hill Road.
I'd like to try and find the Storeton gunsite. Could any give me an idea of where it is please? All images have expired on the thread but from what I can gather it's on Red Hill Road.
I'd like to try and find the Storeton gunsite. Could any give me an idea of where it is please? All images have expired on the thread but from what I can gather it's on Red Hill Road.
Thanks
It was not a actual gunsite but a 'Starfish Decoy System' base where they started fires in fields to make the Germans drop their bombs. There was a gunsite near Lever's Causeway.
The McKenna field in Gorsey Lane, Wallasey had lots of stuff left in the 1960s. Gun bases and air raid shelters and other underground buildings. All was swept away when the Tunnel Roads were built.Possibly bits remain for future searchers well below ground. We used to play in them.
Interesting read that Chris. There was a lot of concrete by Bidston station that they used to keep horses in and I figured it was some kind of gun site from the way it was formed. I have some recollection of being told that people in the shelters under Bidston hill could hear it being fired off in the raids. Perhaps I read about it?
Does anyone remember the anti aircraft gun they had on fort perch rock? Used to climb on and "train" it. The Artillery guys from the fort used to go into my dads aunties little cafe in Balmoral road and when the Sergeant came looking for them, she would let them escape out the back door.
I may have the location wrong but my father once told me they had dummy sites around Bidston where they lit fires to mislead the Germans into dropping their bombs on waste land. That seems a bit close to the docks and built up areas for my liking even if there wasn't as much there as now?
They had rockets on the site in the sandhills. I can remember going to that place in the fifties (sixties?) and the public toilets were old army one's. I don't think anyone ever claimed to have knocked out any German planes with rockets but must have scared them a bit all the same!
The noise tale makes sense. My Dad who landed on D Day and fought through to near Magdeburg said he'd never heard anything louder than the AA gun at Leasowe. He was in the Home Guard before he was called up.
I think the Bidston train station area was possibly an underground defensive position, it was recently cleared and you can see more of the structures now but what did intrigue me most was an ordnance survey map that I've attach a screenshot of. It clearly shows 2 air shafts to the right side of the surface structures.
There was a decoy site on Bidston moss. I and some mates used to go there to pester the german P.O.Ws who were being used to fill in the bomb craters at the end of the war.. We found that if we bought 5 Woodbines which were the cheapest cigs at the time we could for swop one fag for a german badge.
![[Linked Image]](http://i866.photobucket.com/albums/ab221/NorthernForties/Shorefields1954.jpg)
