# Lodge Hill Battery, Kent



## godzilla73 (Oct 22, 2011)

A genuinely important piece of history, this one. Lodge Hill was probably the first anti-aircraft battery ever built in Britain. Prior to 1915, all the anti-aircraft artillery in Britain basically consisted of guns sited on the tops of important government buildings. However, with the advent of the first German air raids, it was decided to build a number of AA batteries around military sites. Lodge Hill was designed to protect the Royal Engineers barracks at Chattenden and the ordnance Factories on the Isle of Grain. Visited with Newage (who definitely has some much better pictures than me!) and the Fluffster, but just haven't got round to sticking up the phots before now!

The battery buildings from a distance









The building on the left was probably the officers accommodation and still has some stand-out architectural features.....























Including this, which may have been a shower, or some kind of water facility





There are a number of other buildings as well. These next photos are from the middle one,in the main picture above where the window frames and the remnants of a toilet can be seen....

















The third building on the far right of the top pictures, is perhaps the most interesting, because it has this marvellous block glass ceiling and an original set of blast doors.

























And finally, some shots of what remains of the gun emplacements.....













Down the road a bit is a building that, on Kent History Forum, is described as the Decontamination Building. Interestingly, this is still heavily fenced off, and I presume that decontamination would be to do with ensuring that the gunners were not carry any flammable or explosive materials on or off the site. There is also what looks like an early Stanton air raid shelter near here as well. Vaaairy interesting - Newage got a shot of the inside of this, which he might post up if you are all very well behaved!














All comments and questions welcome......Enjoy!
Godzy


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## oldscrote (Oct 22, 2011)

Nice one Godzy a fascinating set of pictures. Good to see someone using KHF as a reference,saves me having to look it up all the time.Still the Flufster has been using it for awhile now,It really is an excellent resource for all things Kentish


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## Winch It In (Oct 23, 2011)

Cracking report, Looks like you lads had a quality day out.


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## outkast (Oct 23, 2011)

great report mate, we were goner do this last weekend when we visited grain fort but ran out of daylight, thanks for posting.


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## RichCooper (Oct 23, 2011)

Nice report mate.Loving the lack of graffiti.And its in great condition


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## Newage (Oct 23, 2011)

Godzilla my only mate, great set of pictures.

This is the inside of the flooded shelter.






Cheers Newage


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## skeleton key (Oct 23, 2011)

Great post indeed and so glad to see theres so much remaining 
Cheers SK


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## godzilla73 (Oct 25, 2011)

Thanks for your comments guys - it was good to do something a bit different from yer standard HAA battery. Newage, it'd be good to see that really wide shot you got of the Officers accomm. Do you think you could oblige?
Godzy


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## Silent Hill (Oct 25, 2011)

A fine report indeed. Great stuff


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## fluffy5518 (Oct 25, 2011)

Nice post Godzy boy !! Good piccies too !! Thought that i'd post a couple of mine to compliment yours (so to speak !!)
First a couple of the former glassy tiled goodliness. !!








....and a shot that was absolutely ruined beyond belief by someone (who shall remain nameless !!) wandering into my carefully planned frame !!!! I'm gonna have to go all the way back now.....


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## night crawler (Oct 25, 2011)

Great report guy's, certainly need the wet suit in the shelter Newage, Hard luck Fluffy there is always some one to get in the way.


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## godzilla73 (Oct 25, 2011)

Oh, dear. Its true, I am unmissable, and for ever getting in the way of poor old Fluffy's shots. It's usually because I have gone into mental autopilot and not really listening to anyone who might be shouting "OI! GET OUT OF THE WAY!!!"
GDZ


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## krela (Oct 25, 2011)

fluffy5518 said:


>



I love photos like this. Perfect combination of art and decay.


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