Site of Second World War 'Diver' Site No. K13, Clacton Road, Great Holland (EHER 16984)

'Diver' site K13, now destroyed. Site of a Second World War heavy anti aircraft (Diver) battery in the Diver Strip at Great Holland. It was armed with four 3.7-inch Mark IIc guns equipped with Predictor BTL, and Radar AA No.3 Mark V when it was deployed here on 24th November 1944, and was manned by 431 Battery of 126 Anti Aircraft Artillery Regiment. It formed part of 40 Heavy Anti Aircraft Brigade deployment.

Site visit, 1996 WWII AA battery: possible DIVER site, with associated `Nissen` (or other) huts. <1> <2> <3> Jan 2010: A report compiled in 1996 from wartime documentation, lists the 'Diver' anti-aircraft gun sites in east Essex in summer/autumn 1944. Site No. K13, at Military Grid Reference M660356, is recorded on 24 November 1944 as being equipped with four 3.7 inch Mk IIc guns manned by 126 Regiment 431 Battery. <4> An aerial photograph taken in July 1946 shows the area more clearly. The site was on the E side of Clacton Road, Great Holland in a field by a sharp bend. Around 25 buildings can be seen, mainly Nissen huts and the parch marks of the four in-line gun platforms can be made out with their control huts centrally behind them. <1> It is now known that this 'Diver' camp built in 1944, was constructed on the site of two pillboxes, built there in 1940. One of these can be seen on the photograph and still partially survives (SMR 10794). However nothing of the 'Diver' site now remains and the area, but for the ruins of the pillbox, is open landscape. No new information from NRHE data transfer.