The Defence of Britain Archive is a remarkable online resource. The purpose of the Project was to record the 20th century militarised landscape of the United Kingdom.

Whilst you can search the database on the site, the best thing to do is to download the Defence of Britain kmz file and then open that up in Google Earth.

Zoom into North Shields/Tynemouth and you have an amazing overview of the defensive structures in place during WW2…pill boxes, roadblocks, barrage balloon sites, heavy AA/rocket batteries. Click each node for further information and the occasional photo. It’s fascinating. Hint: switch off un-needed GE layers…it can take some time for the DOB layer to load…the data is UK wide.

Enjoy.