NHER 61549 (Monument record) - Second World War military feature in vicinity of Grimes Graves

February 2017. 'Brecks from Above' and Breckland National Mapping Programme.
The earthworks of Second World War military features, probably related to training, have been recorded by ground survey (see inside back cover of English Heritage Guidebook (S1)) and are visible on 1940s aerial photographs (S2)-(S3) and on imagery from a lidar survey flown in 2015 (S4). They comprise a variety of short trenches and banks, pits, and an indeterminate embanked structure surrounded by barbed wire (at TL 8159 9001). This structure, and a series of three short banks 80m to its east, appear to have been levelled, while many of the other features still survive as earthworks. The English Heritage Guidebook (S5) describes the pits and trenches on the edge of the flint mine earthworks as being Home Guard foxholes, dug as defences against an airborne invasion. This may be the case, but like contemporary earthworks to the north (NHER 61500), the remote location of the site and the rather disorganised appearance of the earthworks suggests a training function as well as, or instead of, a defensive one. Most of the features have been mapped by extent, rather than individually. It should also be noted that on the 1940s photos several of the Neolithic flint shafts excavated prior to 1939 appear to have been recently disturbed, indicating that during the war they too may have been used as ready-made pits/trenches. The features lie within the designated area for Grimes Graves (see NHER 5640).
S. Tremlett (Norfolk Historic Environment Service), 20 February 2017.