Fortifications of Guernsey
Being in the front line of many wars, invasion was almost always a threat and the best locations for defence were being constantly rebuilt with older constructions being re-used and improved.
Castle Cornet was started in the late 13th Century on an islet accessible at low tide, outside Saint Peter Port.
[4] In May 1372 Owain Lawgoch a claimant to the Welsh throne, at the head of a free company, on behalf of France, attacked Guernsey, popularly called "La Descente des Aragousais".
Owain Lawgoch withdrew after killing 400 of the Island militia,[5] The poem of the same name refers to the Vale Castle as the Château de l'Archange, the location of the last ditch stand against the insurgents.
The report produced by Colonel Legge a year later was a comprehensive account of the state of defence, harbours and civil jurisdiction of the Islands.
Key ‡ Protected Monument [11] £ Accessible with fee ʘ Accessible Having lived with constant threats during the Seven Years' War (1754–63), threats of an invasion from France during the Anglo-French War (1778–83) resulted in additional artillery being brought to the Island and the construction of several forts, numerous batteries covering possible landing sites and fifteen Guernsey loophole towers built between 1778 and 1779,[12] The threat was real as an invasion of nearby Jersey resulted in the Battle of Jersey in Saint Helier in January 1781.
The French Revolution in 1789 added to the concerns in the Channel Islands and resulted in additional constructions and an increase in manpower.
They were supplemented with regular British infantry battalions who rotated and were increased or reduced depending on the current threat to the island.
[13]: 59 Non British units, which were not allowed on the UK mainland, were sometimes based in Guernsey, including from 1793 to 1796 French Royalists and in 1799, 6,000 Russian troops, who were quartered at Delancey.
[14]: 12 In 1796 Peter de Havilland, a Jurat was appointed superintendent of thirteen signal masts around the island, installed to give warning of approaching ships.
[31] During the Victorian era, defence improvements mainly consisted of replacing the Napoleonic cannon with breach loading heavier artillery in the 1870s and modifying forts to take a smaller number of the larger calibre guns.
War trophies of four German 13.5 cm K 09 artillery guns were displayed next to Victoria Tower until two were scrapped in 1938 and in 1940 the remaining two were buried in case enemy aircraft suspected they were "live".
During the German occupation which ran from June 1940 to May 1945 a massive building programme was instigated by Germany which saw the construction of tunnels, anti-tank sea walls, coastal casemates, artillery positions, artillery observation towers, radar units and a mass of trenches, minefields and barbed wire entanglements.
