Brean Down - one of the lost islands of Somerset

Brean Down is a headland, which juts out into the Bristol Channel at the eastern end of Bridgwater Bay.  It is composed of carboniferous limestone and is a continuation of the Mendip Hills (as are the islands of Steep Holm and Flat Holm).  It is 1.5 miles long by 0.25 miles wide.  The highest point is 97 metres above sea level and this is marked by a trig point. The name Brean probably comes from the Ancient British word briga, meaning hill.  

Brean Down became an island when the sea level rose after the last ice age.  Then over many centuries sand dunes built up to the south and the flood plain of the River Axe extended and joined Brean Down to the mainland. I've not been able to find out when this was but the land connecting it to the mainland is all less than 10 metres above sea level.

Brean Down has been occupied for different purposes for thousands of years:

•  Neolithic people lived and farmed there.
•  Bronze Age people lived, farmed and buried their dead on it.
•  A hillfort was built on it by Iron Age people.
•  A temple and a settlement were built on it in Roman times.
•  In the post Roman period people buried their dead in a cemetery on it.
•  From the 14th to the 18th centuries it was managed as a rabbit warren.
•  In Victorian times a fort was built at the western end and work on a harbour was started   in 1864 but never completed.
•  It was fortified during the Second World War.

Brean Down is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI).  Rare plants found there include white rock-rose, dwarf sedge and Somerset hair grass.

Looking west down Brean Down 

Looking north east from the trig point across Weston Bay towards Worlebury Hill and Weston-super-Mare

In the 17th century the Wyndham family bought Brean Down from Glastonbury Abbey.  They thought about building a harbour on the sheltered northern side, which would have been accessible even at low tide, but nothing was built.  In the 1840s plans for a harbour were revived. However nothing came of these plans either.

In the mid 1850s two rival schemes for a harbour were proposed.  Both centred around the existing port at the mouth of the River Axe at Uphill.  Both included floating jetties and short branch lines either to the Bristol & Exeter Railway at Bleadon or to the Somerset and Dorset Railway at Highbridge.

In 1861 the marine engineer Sir John Coode published a feasibility study for a harbour at the western end of Brean Down, rather than at Uphill.  He proposed that a railway line should be built along the length of the harbour wall and then along the north side of Brean Down to the eastern end where it would enter a short tunnel.  The line would emerge on the south side of Brean Down and join the Bristol & Exeter Railway just south of where it crosses the River Axe.  

In 1861 the Bristol & Exeter Railway registered the Brean Down harbour scheme with Parliament and the Brean Down Harbour Company was incorporated.  Its chairman was Sir John Eardley Wilmot.  Work began on the harbour wall in November 1864 and continued until December 1868 when the contractor, Mr Chaplin, died after an accident.  There was a lengthy investigation into the accident and no one could be found to replace him.  The half-built harbour was badly damaged in a storm in 1872 and was abandoned.  The harbour project was revived again in 1887 but the application to Parliament was rejected in 1889.

In the 1850s concern grew in Britain about the strength of the French Navy and it was believed that war between France and Britain might be imminent.  Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston, became Prime Minister for the 2nd time in 1859. Palmerston and his Secretary of State for War (Sidney Herbert) established a Royal Commission on the Defence of the United Kingdom in 1859 to examine the ability of Britain to defend itself against an attempted invasion by a foreign power and to advise the British Government on the remedial action required. 

The Commission reported back in 1860 and recommended the building of forts to protect naval bases and other strategic locations around the coasts of Britain and Ireland.  In the Bristol Channel Brean Down, Steep Holm, Flat Holm and Lavernock Point were to be fortified in order to protect the ports of Bristol, Avonmouth, Cardiff and Newport.

In 1862 four acres of land at the western end of Brean Down were requisitioned from the Wyndham family.  In 1864 Lieutenant Robert Vetch was given the task of constructing the Bristol Channel forts.  Brean Down Fort was completed by 1870 but was not equipped with artillery straightaway.  It was partially concealed on the seaward side and the landward side was protected by a dry moat.  By 1872 a garrison of 51 soldiers were living there.  Seven 7" cannons were installed by the late 1870s.  These were located in three batteries:

•  West Battery - this had 3 cannons and 2 underground magazines
•  North West Battery - this had 3 cannons and 2 underground magazines
•  North East Battery - this had 1 cannon and a magazine

There were also barracks, a guard house, a master-gunner's quarters and an officers' mess.  

Both Viscount Palmerston and Sidney Herbert died before work began on Brean Down Fort. By the time the fortifications were completed, the threat from the French had diminished. The island’s heavy guns were never fired in anger.  

In July 1900 a soldier called William Haines fired his rifle into one of the West Battery's magazines, in an apparent attempt to kill himself, and it exploded and destroyed the battery.  After the explosion the fort was decommissioned and the guns were sold for scrap in 1901. In 1909 Brean Down Fort was handed back to the Wyndham family.  Harry Cox was warden of Brean Down for the Wyndham family from 1909 until his death in 1949.  He was a keen naturalist and he lived on Brean Down, firstly in a tin shack located to the south of Fiddlers Point and later in a stone house near the hillfort.

In 1910 part of the fort was converted into a café , which was run by Mr R. Waterman.  The fort was not used during the First World War.  In the early 1920s the Wyndham's leased the fort to Joseph Chamberlain, who opened it as a café, which was run by Alfred Meredith and his wife. Many visitors arrived via the Uphill Ferry or on boats from Anchor Head or Knightstone Harbour in Weston-super-Mare.  The Merediths closed the café in 1936.

Brean Down Fort was refortified in 1941-42.  Two gun positions were built: one on the site of the ruined West Battery and the other over part of the North West Battery.  They were armed with 6" ex-naval guns.  Two Coastal Artillery Search Light posts were built - on on the western tip of Brean Down and the other on the cliff top to the south of the fort. The Victorian barracks were reused as a cookhouse but the windows were partly blocked to give protection from blasts.  The officers were accommodated in the former Master-Gunner's quarters.  12 Nissen huts were built in the old quarry on the east side of the Victorian fort and used as barracks.  A battery of 6 Lewis guns was built on the north side of Brean Down, close to the Iron Age hillfort.

Experimental weapons were trialled at the fort by the Admiralty Department of Miscellaneous Weapons Development and the short length of launching rail, which can still be seen, is evidence of these trials.

At the end of 1943 Brean Down Fort was downgraded to "care and maintenance" and the guns were removed in 1945 and the land was returned to the ownership of the Wyndham Trust.

Axbridge Rural District Council bought most of Brean Down (except the fort) from the Wyndham Trust in 1954 and then gave it (147.5 acres) to the National Trust. Weston-super-Mare Borough Council bought the fort from the Wyndham Trust and they considered various future uses for the fort e.g. a casino or a centre for youth activities but all were rejected. In 1958-9 parts of the fort were dismantled and the rest of it was cleared of miscellaneous debris and undergrowth by groups of volunteers. In 1973 Weston-super-Mare Borough Council offered the fort to the National Trust but they wouldn't accept it because they didn't want to pay for its repair and maintenance, so they sold it to Axbridge Rural District Council for a nominal fee.  

 In 1977 the army were brought in to blow up the roofs of the two Second World War gun emplacements, as they were in a dangerous condition.  In 1983 a Manpower Services Commission team were employed to make the fort buildings safe. 

Various councils and organisations produced reports and plans for the future conservation and development of the fort over the years.  Between 1994 and 1997, Sedgemoor District Council (the successor council to Axbridge Rural District), the National Trust and English Heritage worked together on an application for a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to restore the fort and convert the buildings into a museum, holiday accommodation a café and a shop, but the National Trust withdrew their support at the last minute and the application was rejected in March 1998.

In December 1998 the National Trust submitted their own application to the Heritage Lottery Fund for a grant of £350,000 to pay for the repair and stabilisation of the fort.  They were told in August 1999 that their application was successful.  In 2000 3.4 acres at Brean Down Cove were acquired by the National Trust from MD & M Matthews.  In 2002, following renovation work, Sedgemoor District Council gave Brean Down Fort to the National Trust.

Brean Down Fort

Victorian Gun Battery and the entrance to one of the underground magazines

Second World War Searchlight Post on the western tip of Brean Down and the experimental weapons launching rail

Searchlight Post on the south coast

Victorian gun emplacement

Inside the Victorian barracks

Master Gunner's Quarters

Second World War searchlight position on the western tip of Brean Down

Second World War Battery Command Post

World War Two Battery Command Post

Brean Down Fort

North side of Brean Down looking west

Brean Down Fort in the distance showing the site of the Second World War Nissen huts in the old quarry

Lewis Gun emplacements on the north coast

Looking east from the eastern end of Brean Down

Looking north west towards Brean Down

Observation Post/Cox's New House
This building was constructed c1938-41.  It was built by the Wyndham family for their warden Harry Cox to live in.

Large concrete arrow

This large concrete arrow, which was originally painted white, was built on the top of Brean Down during the Second World War.  Its purpose was to direct planes to their practice ranges in Bridgwater Bay.

Steep Holm during the Second World War - see also Island 66

The refortification of Steep Holm and neighbouring Flat Holm began in July 1941 to protect convoy ships lying at anchor in the Bristol Channel waiting for high tide to enable them to unload their cargoes at the various ports along the Severn Estuary.

 On Steep Holm two jetties were constructed, an iron one at the Landing Beach on the east coast and a smaller stone one at South Landing. 

Remains of the wartime jetty at South Landing

Two batteries were built on the top of the island.  Steep Holm North was on the site of the Victorian Summit Battery in the north west of the island and had clear views across to Flat Holm and Lavernock Point on the Welsh coast. Steep Holm South was on the site of Garden Battery in the south east of the island, which had views over the whole of Bridgwater Bay. Each battery had two separate emplacements for 6 inch ex-Navy guns.  The batteries were roofed with “plastic armour”, which was a bituminous cement mixed with flint and granite chippings.

A rocket launcher was constructed at Split Rock Battery.  Observation posts were built at Rudder Rock and Steep Holm South Batteries.

Steep Holm South Battery

Flatholm from the Rudder Rock Observation Post

Remains of the plastic armour on Steep Holm South

Two instrument pillars were built, one at each battery.  Royal Artillery spotters mounted their Depression Range-Finders on them, which enabled them to observe targets and correct the fall of fire.  They were surrounded by blast walls.

Instrument Pill at Steep Holm North Battery

The remains of the inn and Cliff Cottage were demolished to make way for a narrow gauge railway, which was used for winching wagons of sand, cement, supplies and equipment up the Zigzag Path from the Landing Beach to the summit and across the plateau to Steep Holm North Battery.  A separate track was also laid from the South Landing up to the summit. The railway track used had been captured from the Germans on the Western Front during the First World War.  Three winch houses were built at the top of the three sections of the zigzag path.  An open winch was constructed at the top of the path down to the South Landing.  Indian soldiers with mules transported stores from ships to the summit of the island until the narrow gauge railway was completed.   The mules were later used to pull the wagons along the level sections of the narrow gauge railway.

Railway Line up the Zigzag Path

Railway Track to South Landing looking down on the Searchlight Post

Remains of the winch at the top of the path leading to South Landing

Up to 300 men were stationed on Steep Holm during the construction phase. Officers were housed in the Victorian barracks but lower ranks had to live in tents until Nissen huts were constructed. 

Four searchlight posts were built around the island: at South Landing; above Calf Rock; above Rudder Rock and on the north coast to the north east of Steep Holm North Battery. The purpose of these was to look out for German E-boats sailing up the Bristol Channel.  The top of the island was too high to allow the searchlights to pan across the sea, so the searchlight posts were built low on the cliffs.  Long flights of concrete steps had to be built to reach two of them.  There were 120 steps leading down the Rudder Rock searchlight post and 208 steps down to the post on the north coast. The posts and the steps to them were painted with zebra camouflage to disguise them.  Two Generator houses were built to power the searchlights.

Steps down to 208 Steps Searchlight Post

South Landing Searchlight Post

Rudder Rock Searchlight Post

Generator House

Two 3,200 gallon water tanks were erected on the top of the island, one for fresh water and one for salt water.  Water was pumped up to the summit from a supply ship.
The refortification of Steep Holm was completed by October 1942.  However the ex-Navy guns were never needed against enemy ships and they were useless against air attacks.

By the end of 1943 the threat to ships in the Bristol Channel had reduced significantly, so the island was relegated to “care and maintenance” status and most of the troops were moved off the island.

After the end of the Second World War German prisoners of war dismantled and removed most of the railway winches and trolleys and demolished the wartime piers.

Further reading:

Steep Holm at war: Rodney Legg.  Wincanton Press, 1991

The Steep Holm Guide and Trail.  Published by the Kenneth Allsop Memorial Trust, 2014

Steep Holm’s Pioneers: Stan and Joan Rendall. Published by the authors, 2003

Steep Holm’s Inn - see also Island 66

In June 1830 Steep Holm was sold by William Willes to John Baker, a Somerset solicitor.  On the east coast of Steep Holm he built a small harbour around the Landing Beach, an inn just above the high tide level and a cliff side cottage higher up to house boatmen, fisherman and labourers.  Cliff Cottage and the inn were nearing completion by July 1832.  The inn was built of island stone and rendered.  It was three storeys high with a castellated roof balustrade and a small walled garden.  The lower storey was built directly against the rock face.  On the north side a large water catchment tank was built.  In October 1833 John Baker sold the island to Colonel Charles Kemeys Kemeys-Tynte.

Inn and Landing Beach

In the early 1840s John and Betty Harse leased Steep Holm for a few years.  Betty ran the inn while John farmed.

The tenancy of Steep Holm was acquired by Frederick and Mary Harris c1846.  They moved to the island with their children Emily, Mary, Frederick Henry and Rosa.  Fred Harris was an accomplished sailor and he ferried visitors to and from the island in his own boat.  Sailors waiting in the Bristol Channel for high tide to enable them to sail into Bristol or the Welsh ports also frequented the inn.  In 1851 Rosa Harris drowned off Steep Holm, aged 4½ .

In 1854, while on a trip to the Newport area, Fred exchanged his Newfoundland dog for a young Russian bear.  In 1857 the bear severely injured a young Italian governess called Ann Caroline Besozzi, who was visiting the island.  In 1858 a civil action was held at Bristol Assizes to obtain compensation for the governess.  Fred Harris was ordered to pay her £50 in addition to court costs for both sides.  He failed to pay and the following year he was called to Taunton County Court where he pleaded insolvency and the judge believed him, although in reality he had transferred all his assets to other people.
 
In 1859 there was a great storm in the Bristol Channel.  Fred Harris’s boat Mystery was badly damaged and Steep Holm’s harbour wall collapsed, which made it much harder for people to land on the island.  The wall was never rebuilt.
 
In 1866 the inn was enlarged by the building of an adjacent three storey annexe to house workers building the forts on the island.  The inn prospered from 1866-8 with all the extra resident customers.

By 1871 Fred and Mary Harris were managing the Royal Claremont Pier Hotel in Weston-super-Mare, which was renamed Harris’s.  The Steep Holm Inn was being run by Frederick Henry’s wife Ann.  In 1872 their daughter was born on the island.  She was named Beatrice Steep Holmes Anne Cooper Harris.
 
In May 1884 Frederick Henry Harris was summoned to Axbridge Petty Session Court to answer charges of selling alcohol without a licence.  He argued that Steep Holm was not part of Somerset and that in the 38 years his family had run the inn they had never been asked to obtain a licence.  The case was dismissed but the Inland Revenue appealed to the High Court and in 1885 they won.  The Harris family gave up their tenancy of the island the same year but soon after they leased Flat Holm and ran an inn there.
 
Mrs Caroline Davies and her two adult sons Harold and Wallace/Wallis rented Steep Holm in 1885. They ran day excursions and fishing and rabbit shooting trips to the island and also grew crops and raised farm livestock.  However their business was not a success and they sold their stock and equipment to Thomas Henry Waite-Hall from Glastonbury the following year.  The annexe to the inn was probably damaged by a lightning strike on its chimney during his tenancy.  The annexe was patched up but Mr Waite-Hall had left the island by 1891 and the inn was closed for the last time.

By the 1930s the inn was derelict and during the refortification of the island in 1941 the walls of the inn and annexe were demolished to make way for a narrow gauge railway.  The walls were rebuilt and the inn reroofed in the early 1980s by the Kenneth Allsop Trust for use as a wardens’ depot and store but it proved to be too damp to be of much use.

 Annexe ruins at high tide

Annexe Ruins at low tide

 Inn and Annexe ruins at low tide

Inn from the shingle spit at low tide

Dunball Island, Somerset

Dunball Island, which was also known as Dumball and the less appealing Dungball, only existed as an island for a few decades in the 19^th century.  It was originally part of what is now North Somerset. It then became an island, joined Gloucestershire and was destroyed, all in the space of 140 years.

Until about 1760 Dunball was a low lying promontory used for grazing animals in the parish of Easton in Gordano.  It was the most northerly part of Somerset.  Its position forced the River Avon to make a sharp turn to the north in order to reach the Severn Estuary.  By around 1770 the river had begun to cut a channel across the promontory, which meant that at high tide small boats could take a straight course from the Severn Estuary to Pill.  Over the next 90 years the channel, which became known as the Swash, deepened and Dunball became an island of around 20-25 acres in size.  The original North Channel of the River Avon began to silt up at the same time.

A gibbet was erected on Dunball in the 18^th century.  Gibbets were structures on which the dead bodies of executed criminals were displayed as deterrents to existing or potential criminals. The remains of Dunball’s gibbet were still in existence when the Ordnance Survey surveyed the area between 1880 and 1882. 

A 1:10,560 scale first edition Ordnance Survey map dated 1884-1887 and showing Dunball and also the Swash and North Channels, can be seen here: http://www1.somerset.gov.uk/archives/Maps/OS61htm/0203.htm

In 1857 Dunball Island was bought by Mr John Cook Hooper, the landlord of the Marine Hotel in Avonmouth for £100.  He sold it to Bristol Corporation in 1860 for £856.  Between the late 1860s and the mid-1870s the North Channel silted up and then disappeared and Dunball became attached to Gloucestershire sometime after 1875. In 1894 Dunball and Avonmouth were incorporated into the City of Bristol.

Dunball’s short life came to an end when it was destroyed during the construction of the Royal Edward Dock and adjacent Graving Dock at Avonmouth between 1902 and 1908.  Dunball was still marked on the 1904 Ordnance Survey map but by this time it was no longer an island.  It had disappeared altogether by the time of the 1912 revision map.

A 1:10,560 scale second edition Ordnance Survey map dated c1900 and showing Dunball can be seen here: http://www1.somerset.gov.uk/archives/Maps/OS62htm/0203.htm

Steep Holm's Victorian Fortifications - see also Island 66

In the 1850s concern grew in Britain about the strength of the French Navy and it was believed that war between France and Britain might be imminent.  Henry John Temple, 3^rd Viscount Palmerston, became Prime Minister for the 2^nd time in 1859. Palmerston and his Secretary of State for War (Sidney Herbert) established a Royal Commission on the Defence of the United Kingdom in 1859 to examine the ability of Britain to defend itself against an attempted invasion by a foreign power and to advise the British Government on the remedial action required.  

The Commission reported back in 1860 and recommended the building of forts to protect naval bases and other strategic locations around the coasts of Britain and Ireland.  In the Bristol Channel Steep Holm, Flat Holm, Brean Down and Lavernock Point were to be fortified in order to protect the ports of Bristol, Cardiff and Newport.

Work began on a barracks on Steep Holm in 1866 and was completed in 1867.  The barracks were built by about 50 local men and Irish navvies under the direction of John Perry of Weston-super-Mare.  Dressed stone was transported from South Wales to build the barracks and gun emplacements.  It was winched or dragged up the cliff, along with all the other building materials needed, from a quay, which was constructed at the South Landing.  Limestone from Steep Holm itself was used for backing and infilling.

Soldiers were housed in the main barracks.  A block on the eastern side contained a kitchen, stores and latrines.  At the western end a master gunner’s quarters were constructed and some additional married quarters. Rainwater was collected from the roof and transferred into an underground reservoir behind the barracks with a capacity of 49,000 gallons.

Six gun batteries were built between 1866 and 1868 and they were armed with 10 seven ton guns in 1871.  The batteries were positioned around the island to give 360 degree coverage of the sea around the island:

•  Rudder Rock Battery at the western end of the island was named after the rock below it.
• Split Rock Battery in the south west was also named after the rock formation below it.  It is the best preserved of the six batteries.
• Summit Battery in the north west was the highest battery at 72 metres above sea level.
• Laboratory Battery in the north east was named after a nearby building, which provided a spark free environment in which gunpowder could be weighed and tested.
• Tombstone Battery in the east was so named because engineers constructing it dug up a 13^th century stone coffin lid or memorial stone associated with the ruins of the nearby Priory of St Michael.
• Garden Battery in the south east was built on what was thought to be part of the medieval priory’s garden. 

Garden, Summit, Laboratory and Split Rock were double batteries, while Rudder Rock and Tombstone were only armed with one cannon each.  All the batteries had underground ammunition stores close to them.

Two lime kilns were built to produce mortar and lime wash for the fortifications.  One was located to the north west of Garden Battery but was destroyed during the 1941 refortification of the island.  The other one at South Landing has been restored. Coal to fire them was brought from South Wales and Steep Holm’s own limestone was used.

Both Viscount Palmerston and Sidney Herbert died before work began on the fortification of Steep Holm.  By the time Steep Holm’s fortifications were completed the threat from the French had diminished. The island’s heavy guns were never fired in anger and the garrison was finally stood down in 1901.

The barracks have now been converted into a visitor centre and exhibition area.  Remains of all 6 batteries can still be seen today, although several of them were partially destroyed during the Second World War refortification of Steep Holm.  Nine of the ten heavy guns can still be seen near their original positions and most of the underground ammunition stores can be explored.

 Laboratory Battery

 Tombstone Battery

West barbette or gun enclosure at Split Rock Battery

The cannon at Rudder Rock Battery proved to be too heavy to move when the Second World War observation post was being built in 1941, so it was left in situ and the observation post was built over the top of it.  It was rediscovered in 1981 by former island warden Rodney Legg.

Displaced racer from the east barbette at Summit Battery.  The wheels of the gun carriage ran on the racer, enabling it to be moved round to face in any direction. The racer was removed from Summit Battery during the 1941 refortification of Steep Holm

This Georgian cannon was taken to Steep Holm in 1866-68 to be buried vertically in the ground, so that the mouth end could act as a pivot for the Victorian guns.  It was dug up in 1941 from Summit Battery when the island was refortified. It was left lying behind the new battery until 1986 when it was lifted into its current position outside the Barracks by a Sea King helicopter from RNAS Yeovilton.  It has found a new use as a perch for some of the Steep Holm’s many gulls. 

 Barracks

 

Restored Lime Kiln at South Landing

Further Reading:

Steep Holm at war: Rodney Legg.  Wincanton Press, 1991

The Steep Holm Guide and Trail.  Published by the Kenneth Allsop Memorial Trust, 2014

Steep Holm’s Pioneers: Stan and Joan Rendall. Published by the authors, 2003