Second World War pillbox, south of Radar Station, Debden Airfield, Wimbish (EHER 21539)

A very large, eight-sided, brick and concrete pillbox. It is an elongated shape, with two long faces, on opposite sides, and six short faces, three at each end.

Standing at the edge of a meadow overlooking a wide valley to the south is a very large, eight-sided, brick and concrete pillbox. It is an elongated shape, with two long faces, on opposite sides, and six short faces, three at each end. The overall size is 26’ 6” x 18’ 3”. There are, in total, ten loopholes through the thick walls, flared out. The apertures themselves are of the ten-inch square variety with steel side pieces. The entrance is in the north-east face. Inside, the area is split into two rooms divided by a brick cross-wall, with two walk-through openings. The most surprising feature of this pillbox is the large tree which grew – it is dead now but still in situ – out of the centre. The pillbox was clearly built around the tree, the trunk projecting out of the roof, presumably to give cover from air attack. The dead trunk is still there, chopped off at roof level. Six photos of site. <1> NRHE data transfer: A World War Two pillbox at the former Debden military airfield, Debden (sic), Essex. The unspecified type of reinforced concrete pillbox is thought to have been constructed between 1940-1941. It was reported as being still extant in the period 1996-1998. <2> Correction to the address information given in <2>: the NGR supplied is in Wimbish, not Debden Civil Parish. <3> The pillbox described in <2> above corresponds to the position of a pillbox on a plan of RAF Debden as it was in 1947. It is located to the west of a dispersal pen on the south side of the western half of the longer east-west aligned runway. Pillboxes are marked "PX" on the plan. <4>