How Maldon Home Guard set out to defend against invasion

The origins of that protection probably date back to the earliest settlers who, based on archaeological evidence, occupied the hill during prehistoric times.

In 916, Edward the Elder built an earthwork ‘burh’ fort here (intersected by today’s London Road).

The site of that fort was pressed into service during the English Civil War(s) of 1642 to 1651, and again during the Napoleonic scare of 1793 to 1815.

Maldon was a barrack town during the Great War of 1914-18, playing host to a number of regiments on transit to the Western Front.

It was during the second conflict of 1939-45, however, that the defences took on a much more complex network of emergency shielding features.

The town sat in a potential wider front line landscape, as Hitler’s invasion plan was predicated on a coastal landing and a German advance to a line between Maldon and the River Severn.

As a result, the Maldon district saw the establishment of coastal and river defences and a 'back line' that included an anti-tank ditch that ran from Mundon Creek, in the Blackwater, to Bridgemarsh Creek, in the Crouch.

Stephen Nunn (Image: Stephen Nunn)

Holes drilled for explosives under the Wave Bridge

Most importantly, there were also encircling defences around the rural villages and the main town of Maldon.

Whilst the 'stop lines' were manned by the regular army, residential defences were left to the Home Guard.

The 745 members of Maldon’s Home Guard (six platoons of ‘A’ Company of the 2nd Essex Battalion) were responsible for the protection of our town.

The entrances to Maldon have always been limited. Apart from river access from the east, the way in by land has either been via Heybridge and the Causeway to the north, via Mundon and Latchingdon to the south/south-east and the London and Spital Roads to the west.

So how were those potentially vulnerable gateways to be protected? The evidence is contained in a fascinating case study called ‘Warmen Courageous’, written by Peter Finch and published in 1951 by John Burrows.

Had the Germans successfully navigated their way through the floating boom, or gate, that was located at the mouth of the estuary and through a river minefield off Tollesbury, a section of the Home Guard (complete with artillery piece) would have manned the (still extant) concrete pillbox on East Point, Osea Island.

If a land assault had been attempted from the south and had the enemy successfully penetrated the 'back line', there was a road/anti-tank barrier made of concrete cubes, known as 'pimples', stretching from number 39 over to 44 Mundon Road, with a removable cable for access.

Beyond that was an octagonal pit with a central mounting for a 29mm spigot mortar at number 2 Wantz Road.

An attack via Fambridge Road, on the other hand, would have met with another block and cable barrier at Seeley Farm, near the Limebrook. Further up the Fambridge Road there was another spigot mortar emplacement and two ammunition stores on the cricket field of the Grammar School (now Plume Academy).

Destruction of the extensive defences at Woodham Mortimer would have still necessitated a battle at the West Station railway bridge in Spital Road, where there was a further road block, a mortar emplacement and an ammunition store.

There was likewise another barrier in London Road, near the cemetery. A break through the Langford and Maypole Road barriers would have resulted in the demolition by explosives of Black Bridge at the beginning of Holloway Road, where there was also a road block, a pillbox (in the Square) and a mortar emplacement (at Heybridge Mill).

The other route into Heybridge, via Colchester Road, was defended by a road block near Woodfield Cottages and then by another at Wave Bridge, where there was also a pillbox, more demolition charges under the bridge and an ammunition store (at the Maltings).

Stephen Nunn (Image: Stephen Nunn)

Warmen Couraeous by Major Peter Finch

Beyond the Causeway, there were barriers either side of Fullbridge, along with yet another mortar emplacement. The town must have felt impenetrable to the residents, but had the worst happened and had Maldon fallen, the ‘Auxilliers’ (our answer to a 'secret army' resistance movement) would have quickly mobilise. They had at least one hideout in the ruins of Beeleigh Mill.

Today, there is little surviving evidence of all of those defences. However, the Beeleigh hideout was rediscovered in an excavation in 2007 and the tell-tale drill holes for the explosives under Black and Wave bridges are still there to be seen.

In many ways those simple holes are a tangible link to a very bleak period in world history, but also to local dogged resilience and to a web of defences that thankfully never saw action.