PillBlogs: Monday 24/6/40
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Pillboxopedia is a jargon-busting tool of terms relating to UK anti-invasion defences of World War Two.
Anti-tank ditch
Ditch designed to hinder movement of tanks and AFVs. Ditches could be entirely artificial or existing ditches or natural features such as rivers, might be dredged, shaped and revetted to improve their effectiveness.
Cubes
Anti-tanks blocks, popularly known as dragon's teeth. Not to be confused with smaller blocks known as pimples, cubes can be upwards of 1m square. Many examples in Sussex have apexes or chamfered edges, leading to them being incorrectly recorded as coffins.
Pillboxopedia is Copyright © 2008 Peter Hibbs. The text and images must not be used to create derivative works.
Posted: 24 June 2010 at 20:45
A recent foray out into the field lead to the discovery of some grafitti on some dragon's teeth that provided some excellent dating evidence of a defensive line that included a section of anti-tank ditch.
The dragon's tooth in question has been uprooted and the vegetation covering it almost caused me to miss the date that had been etched in the wet cement, presumably on Monday 24th June 1940. This text is particularly valuable as I have yet to find documentation relating to the construction of this line.
The text was not very clear and it took some work to confirm that the word was indeed 'Monday'; I poured some of my dwindling drinking water (it was a hot day) over the top to help highlight it.
I actually found this grafitti back in March but decided to leave posting the details until today, it being the 70th anniversary that the Royal Engineer or civilian contractor working on these cubes decided to leave their mark.
Unfortunately I didn't have time to investigate the anti-tank ditch but hope to go back again, probably once the vegetation has died down in the winter.
- Pete
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Hibbs, Peter PillBlogs: Monday 24/6/40 (2010) Available at: http://www.pillbox.org.uk/pillblogs/detail.asp?ID=289 Accessed: 08 September 2010
The information on this website is intended solely to describe the ongoing research activity of The Defence of East Sussex Project; it is not comprehensive or properly presented. It is therefore NOT suitable as a basis for producing derivative works or surveys!