NHER 61518 (Monument record) - Second World War training activity on Hockwold Heath

January 2017. 'Brecks from Above' and Breckland National Mapping Programme.
An extensive area of Second World War training is visible on aerial photographs (S1-S7) and on Lidar data (S8-S9). Some components of this site have been identified on the ground and recorded individually (NHER 60129 and NHER 60130). The nearby site of Weeting Hall (NHER 5637) and Park was requisitioned and occupied by the military during the war (NHER 61476) and the heath was probably used by the troops stationed there for training purposes.
The site consists of an extensive spread of weapons pits and short practice trenches, which have not been mapped individually. Although they are widely spread across the site they are more concentrated in the area immediately to the north and south of the Hockwold road. Some of the more substantial training features (although not all) have been mapped individually and these include gun emplacements, spigot mortars and practice trenches. Some of these have been dug into earlier banks running across the heath (NHER 61539). To the south of the Hockwold road is a circular loop of track, which presumably lead to a military structure of some sort, although it is not in situ on any of the available aerial photographs.
Also constructed across parts of the site but most extensively to the south of the Hockwold road are linear arrangements of short trenches. The cross-shaped arrangement of the southern ones suggests that they were dug as anti-glider obstacles, although the location, combined with the fact that some of the nearby arable fields contain them also, (NHER 61475 and NHER 61540), would suggest that they were dug as part of training exercise and not to perform a defensive function.
S. Horlock (Norfolk Historic Environment Service), 31 January 2017.