Technologically, there was also an arms race to achieve superiority, especially at sea. 3 Politically there was a competing sense of national pride and a sense of world mission and destiny the French felt a need to heal the sores of failure during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 through a renewal of actual and perceived greatness, while the British were driven by an imperative to maintain and extend their prestigious and dominant position which had grown since the end of the Napoleonic Wars. The defensive responses in the county during the later 19th century had derived from concern about France, Britain’s super-power contender in Europe. Yet tantalisingly much survives, whether as surface traces or as buried archaeology. With important exceptions they have, therefore, left a less obvious physical presence and, after a hundred years have, other than in some local folk memory, become largely forgotten. However, many were fieldworks or otherwise of a transient nature and, following the end of the conflict, much of the ground they occupied was restored. During the Great War there was a vast elaboration of new defences along the coast and across the landscape. In Kent the resultant creation of defences deposited a legacy of forts and batteries in concrete, brick, earth and steel. Moreover, an atmosphere of national anxiety and a perceived need to be resilient against possible threats did no harm to vested interests, such as the arms manufacturers, warship builders, the construction industry and their profits. 2 Increasingly, this topic also became of interest to the public, stimulated by the appearance of, for book and newspaper publishers, a lucrative war-scare and invasion literature, symbolically begun by the publication of Chesney’s Battle of Dorking in 1871. There was also provision for passive air defence.įor decades before the Great War the possibilities of a Continental conflict and an invasion of Britain were, with prudent geopolitical and strategic concern, a preoccupation of successive governments and the heads of the armed services, Kent being seen as a probable avenue for a landing and conquest. 1 These comprised: (i) land forces, coastal gun batteries and anti-invasion fieldworks (ii) naval forces, minefields and anti-submarine nets as well as (iii) air forces with airships, interceptor and bomber aircraft, backed by ground-based anti-aircraft guns. The defence of Kent functioned as the sum of its land, sea and air elements. Kent was also an important corridor for the transit of troops and supplies to the Western Front as well as being a place, among others, where troops were encamped and trained for service overseas. Added to this, the skies over Kent were crossed by enemy aircraft intending to attack British targets and so the county became a vital countering zone for defending air forces. Kent and the South-East were significant during the war not only because of their vulnerability to invasion arising from their closeness to the Continent on which the main land war was taking place but because of the presence of surrounding and connecting vital sea lanes which had to be defended at all costs. This has been stimulated by the work of the Defence of Swale Project, managed by Kent County Council and supported by the offshore wind farm London Array as well as by English Heritage. Only as the centenary of the start of the war drew near, have the home defence arrangements for the county become prominent. With Alan Anstee, Simon Mason, Peter Kendall and Richard Taylorĭespite the national importance of Kent’s defences during the Great War these have been a neglected and less understood historical theme. IF THE KAISER SHOULD COME: DEFENDING KENT DURING THE GREAT WAR
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