NHER 27701 (Monument record) - Site of World War Two air raid shelter and gasometer

September 2005. Norfolk NMP.
A World War Two air raid shelter and a post-medieval gas holder are visible as earthworks and structures on aerial photographs (S1) to (S5), centred at TG 5264 0617. The gas holder, which is shown on the Ordnance Survey 1st edition map (S6), is visible on the earliest consulted aerial photographs of the site taken in 1940 (S1). It appears to still be relatively intact on aerial photographs taken in 1941 (S2) but by 1944, (S3) and (S4), only a shell is visible. The gas holder may have been damaged or destroyed in a bombing raid; the gas works which it formed part of, which predominantly lie immediately to its south, were an important target for enemy bombers (S7). It may then have been reused as, or replaced by, an emergency water supply tank; although larger, it is very similar in appearance to other water tanks mapped at Great Yarmouth (e.g. NHER 27360 in the market place). Its structure is clearly visible on oblique aerial photographs of the site taken in 1948 (S8) and (S9); it was not removed until after April 1965 (S10). The air raid shelter is first visible on aerial photographs take in March 1944 as an elongated earthwork mound. This probably covered a surface or semi-sunken structure. A small structure at its southern end probably marks its entrance. The shelter may have been used by workers at the site or even by guards and/or firewatchers at the gas works; both of Great Yarmouth’s gas works were provided with a guard of men from the Home Guard (S11). The shelter was levelled after the end of the war.
S. Tremlett (NMP), 30 September 2005.