Today,at my maws for my tea we were talking about a reletive of mine whose career as a Doctor was complicated by the WW2 and his various postings,anyway when at home on leave he mentioned to my grannie that he would be spending a bit more time in Greenock on duties at the big gun at Millars farm,I have seen a few mentions of this online with no adequate location.Phone calls to rellys this evening have not been concusive in that one says that the site was on top of Whinhill(And was heavily camouflaged) the other talks of the area behind upper Strone/Maukinhill(greenock that is as opposed to the riverbank opposite).Both are not too far apart but are perhaps a bit away from the decoys and whinhill battery.The surmise is that this was an independant big gun.Away from the batteries. Any Takers out there on this fine evening.
Had a quick nosey around the usual resources to see if there was any hint of a listing, but nothing emerged.
From what I've read, I can't see any reason for a "big gun" to be located somewhere in the area of Whinhill, especially with the HAA battery confirmed there.
What would it be firing at?
So far inland, it would have to fire over 5 miles miles before its shells would reach the approaches of the Firth of Clyde toward the anchorage, and there'e no inland target.
The known big guns were located at the coastal batteries, and left over from World War I, and their shore side locations gave them the maximum range out to sea. These were located at places such as Portkil, Arhallow, and Cloch Point.
This is not, of course, to suggest that there wasn't something at Millars Farm - wherever it may turn out to be - but without a reason for siting a gun there, what it was may also remain a mystery.
Note also that a big gun of any sort would really have wanted a proper emplacement, and the installation of a proper holdfast to which it would have been secured, and this would almost (and the almost is important) certainly have been documented by a survey or museum by now.
But that doesn't mean they didn't miss it
I didn't even have any luck with the farm name, or variations. One site only provided a link, apparently based in Port Glasgow, but when I tried it, it was dead
Dare I say, it could also be misinformation, circulated at the time to divert spies away from out old friend, Signal City.
I have some pics which we have been gifted relating to "big guns" on the coastal batteries, so I'll try and get them in to the relevant Main Site articles.
Unfortunately, although their quality is good (and the info with them too) the format is a bit if a fiddle for me to deal with quickly, but I'll try and do it soon.
The 12 pounders "in the hills above Gourock to protect the boom", could someone have decided there was a need for a QF battery to cover the area off Greenock at some point and some guns brought in.
The military tend to see a danger, usually after something happens elsewhere, so bring in a particular type of resource then change their mind. In 1941 a Chain Home Mobile was diverted to Auchenbouthie Farm near Kilmacolm whilst on its way to Oban because CinC Rosyth wanted radar cover between the Clyde and Forth. It was only for three months though main problem was getting telephone lines from the GPO for the site.
A 12 pounder wouldn't really qualify for the description "big gun" though, being only a 3-inch barrel, and fairly short too.
The Cloch battery would have covered the boom and approach, and that did have "big guns on a hillside" - 6-inch guns.
They were moved to Cloch from the Portkil battery.
There is an undocumented command and observation post on the hillside - we documented back in 2007, but held the info back as some of the location info was unclear.
I've added the gallery of images to the Cloch Battery page today, so these can be seen more clearly, as they lost in the undergrowth.
I hope to have some pics of the guns added to the page later today. These date from the time when the guns were moved from Portkil to Cloch.
The 1930s pictures may be delayed. After working out how to extract then from the original document they are embedded within, this morning I seem to have forgotten one vital step in the procedure and can only get little low resolution metafiles instead of full images.
Email discussions with D. Eadie of RCAHMS did suggest that the building atop the hill which we have down as an observation post, may have had a strange conical aerial on top of it. Since further information from historian suggests the presence of a secret experimental radar station in the area these could be one and the same.
DE also identified a strange circular shape, still identifiable today, on the hill to the SW of the building. Could this have been a gun emplacement and could the experiments have been to do with radar control of gunfire?
Looks like the 1931 pics will be along a little later - provided I don't get diverted and try an work out WHY they are such a problem.
While I may well be missing something obvious, I'm having to extract them, then pass them through copy and paste in both Word and then Excel before they arrive as usable metafiles. Without this pantomime, the images are distorted and have both their resolution and colour coding trashed - but the application of the two transfers seem to correct all the errors.
It's all very odd, as I've never come across images that needed more than one step to recover them once they could be placed into the Windows clipboard.
Hopefully I can get them all processed now, together with the period handwritten notes made on the back, and up for review this afternoon.
The main guns in the Cloch battery as well as the other ones over the other side of the Clyde were for engaging any large warships that came in range. They would have difficulty tracking a fast moving small vessel like a E-Boat and perhaps submarine hence the QF battery which was probably the function of the 12 pounders.
Was the inspection point at Cloch? If so they could have acted as the inspection battery by being trained on any foreign vessel being inspected.
Coastal batteries were a bit like the nuclear deterrent, most were never used but could have been needed if they had not been there.
I presume you have read that there was no actual minefield in the Clyde even though one was "advertised" under international law.
PS A book worth getting hold of is Jeff Dorman's "Orkney Coast Batteries 1914-1956". It is obviously specifically about Orkney but a lot of information on coastal batteries.
Foxy- Could the 'circular aerial' have been a VHF Discone? I've got History of Coast Artillery in The British Army 1856-1956. I'll try and get a squint at it later.
Foxy- Could the 'circular aerial' have been a VHF Discone? I've got History of Coast Artillery in The British Army 1856-1956. I'll try and get a squint at it later.
The VHF DF sites were the small pagoda type building as here.
I don't suppose the circular shape was the earth mat for a mobile radar associated with the HAA? You can usually see the ramp but can disappear.
I do not know anything more about the aerial than above. The only way to find more would be to visit RCAHMS which I must do some time - the procedure for setting up a visit is quite complex.
I don't think it was a GL Mat. Have you looked at the pics on the page? The place has many ducts under the floor. Some of it might make more sense to someone with your background.
I do not know anything more about the aerial than above. The only way to find more would be to visit RCAHMS which I must do some time - the procedure for setting up a visit is quite complex.
I don't think it was a GL Mat. Have you looked at the pics on the page? The place has many ducts under the floor. Some of it might make more sense to someone with your background.
Getting confused about the which building had the conical shaped antenna and where the circular shape was!
It has similarities to some radar sites, [url-http://www.mbriscoe.me.uk/PAGES/Rosehearty.htm]these[/url] pictures of Rosehearty are not very good (must put up some later ones!). There was CHL there also but this seems to have been 10cm radar and the building was modified to make into an observatory. The one at Breckness is a better example but I don't have any pictures online, I will dig one out later.
It seems an odd place to have an experimental radar station.
One of the strange things about this building is that all the window lintles are made of brick and curved. I was of the opinion that it dated back to WWI but RCAHMS information says no it is WWII. Curved window tops seems to fly in the face of WWII utility designs. I have never come across another building with similar windows.
Spoke to Maw this afternoon.The "Big gun" was fired off from the general direction of whinhill during Air raids recounting one particular occasion when everyone in the area rushed to the railway tunnel at the strone(I presume near where the old upper Greenock station is situated) during an air raid.On this occasion someone(Romoured to be a german Spy )shouted train coming with the resultant effect of some fatalities due to some poor souls being trampled underfoot in the rush.Apparently the gun was firing at the incoming german Bombers.Will of course try to find out more abuot Millars farm.
My apologies for the lack of co-ordinates and the use of smileys.Was purposefully being a bit vague as I was quoting the memories of a relly which can on occasions be innacurate for reasons I wont go into,and did not want to cause any confusion given Signal city,the batteries and the decoys in the area,nevertheless I have heard these stories pre-sesco and have no reason to doubt the general story.However I will be speaking to a former resident who farmed in the "Renfrewshire heights" who is now living in Oxford and may well be able to pinpoint the location of Millars farm.Apologies once again jmb.
This is perhaps a bit of a red herring but on top of whinhill there is a radio mast now cellular of course which from memory did contain a number of concrete structures pre 1974. At that time they were used to house the radio equipment and were very old at that time.I will post the co-ordinates in two shakes of a lambs tail.
Re. The strange conical Antenna. A suggestion could be a direction finding set up along the lines of a Loop(As in Medium Wave type)although wound for HF as in Circa 2Mhz.these I know were useful for direction finding and would have looked conical.On a works visit to Norway a few years back I saw a few of these in front Gardens above Oslo presumably used by DXers or Hams but perhaps with wartime applications.
Afraid there will be a short delay in the 1930s pics, but the good news is they will arrive.
I thought I was losing my touch, until I did a quick web search on using images embedded in Word documents, and found that it was still an issue.
I left Word behind (for layout) years ago. It might be a great word processor, but as far as being a tool for composing documents that need things like photo/image layout control, it makes a great chocolate ashtray. Basically, after an image is embedded, you can't cut and past it elsewhere without problems that render it useless.
Fortunately, one of the options using old software to convert the images works fine, so I'll have another, hopefully successful, run at lifting the gun pics and getting online.
One of the handy things about these pics is that some of them include the men working on the move, so you get an excellent indication of the scale.
There's one more surprise addition to come later
They are probably some of the ones given to the RCAHMS by the RN, they were clearing out stuff at Faslane and found some boxes of old photographs. Fortunately they asked the RCAHMS if they wanted them rather just throw in the skip.
Some are some nice ones of the Sutors batteries being built in WWI.
Dunoon museum has just acquired a large brass padlock with crows foot and inscribed Ardhallow Fort. It is assumed to have been for a magazine and was dug up on the beach at Toward some years ago. How did it get there? Nobody knows.
Dunoon museum has just acquired a large brass padlock with crows foot and inscribed Ardhallow Fort. It is assumed to have been for a magazine and was dug up on the beach at Toward some years ago. How did it get there? Nobody knows.
Probably usual War Office method of disposal, makes you wonder what else is out there.
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