Description

The monument is a coastal artillery battery built in 1915 and in use until 1918. The battery complex covers an area of 1.7 hectares. It comprises four concrete gun emplacements, a magazine with connecting trenches and banks, and the concrete bases of an accommodation camp and engine house or searchlight hut. The battery was sited to protect the western approach to Scapa Flow through Clestrain Sound and has good views to the N, W and S, overlooking Clestrain Sound to the island of Graemsay and Hoy Sound. It is situated 300m inland from the coast at around 15m above OD.

The four gun emplacements face W and are arranged in a line over a distance of about 60m N-S. They each measure 8.7m internally within concrete walls about 0.7m thick. All four emplacements are of open barbette type with chamfered edges to the parapets. The N emplacement has a ready-use ammunition locker, while the other three all have bolt holes to attach the lockers. A double-ended magazine is situated around 24m to the E and was safely accessed from the gun emplacements by two curving trenches which are still visible. The magazine measures 14m by 11.7m and is half-buried, with the entrances visible in the N and S. Associated features include a large rampart-type feature running along the front of the emplacements and, to the rear, the footings of two buildings probably representing the accommodation block and engine house or searchlight hut.

The scheduled area is irregular on plan to include the remains described above and an area around them within which evidence relating to the monument's construction, use and abandonment is expected to survive, as shown in red on the accompanying map.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Statement of Scheduling

The monument is of national importance as it has an inherent potential to make a significant contribution to our understanding of the past, specifically, the network of defences constructed in the First World War to protect the key British naval harbour of Scapa Flow. Upper Sower battery is notable for the survival of intact gun emplacements and a magazine in good condition, displaying the smoothly-finished concrete construction characteristic of WW1 coastal batteries. After the sinking of the block ships in Burra Sound in 1915, Upper Sower battery provided important artillery cover over Clestrain Sound, which was by then the only navigable western channel into Scapa Flow. In conjunction with the surviving underwater site of the Clestrain Hurdles, the battery forms a key surviving element of the defensive network for the naval anchorage. Photographs of the coastal battery in use in the archives of the Ministry of Defence add to our understanding. If this monument was to be lost or damaged, it would significantly affect our ability to understand the nature and scale of the efforts made to defend Britain against enemy naval threats in the First World War and diminish the association between Orcadians today and their ancestors who lived and served in the Great War. These monumental concrete structures are a tangible and powerful reminder of one of the defining events of the 20th century.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Sources

Bibliography

Other Information

RCAHMS records the monument as HY20 NE76.

References

Dorman, J 1996, Orkney coast batteries, London, 13, 40.

Stell, G 2010, Orkney at War: Defending Scapa Flow. Volume 1, World War 1, Kirkwall, 88-89.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland