Preparation for Invasion

By May 1940, Poland, Denmark and Norway had fallen under the might of the German military machine and the British Expeditionary force was in retreat at Dunkirk.  In the same month Secretary of State for War Anthony Eden announced the creation of the Local Defence Volunteers (LDV), later to become the Home Guard.  Britain was preparing for invasion and with that in mind, on the 27th of May 1940, the Home Defence Executive was formed under Commander in Chief Home Forces, General Sir Edmund Ironside.

Britain’s strategy was defence in depth and came in three phases.  A first line of defence or coastal crust was created, typically scaffold and barbed wire entanglements placed at low tide, behind which mined beaches, concrete anti tank cubes and fortified coastal gun batteries awaited.  Piers, likely to aid a potential invasion were partially dismantled.  The next line of defence was aimed at holding up the enemy advance and denying access to major arterial routes.  thousands of miles of anti tank ditches were dug, bridges were mined and pre-existing barriers such as canals, rivers, and railway embankments were fortified.  Finally there were defensive anti tank islands, usually around towns and defended villages, many with their own garrison of troops, these strategic nodes where designated with the letter A, B or C depending on how long they were expected to hold out against enemy attack.

 Leeds Liverpool Canal Defence Line

Merseyside and Lancashire came under the jurisdiction of Western Command, responsible for anti invasion preparations throughout Wales, parts of the Midlands and North West England.  The regions canals became part of a network of stop lines running from Liverpool to Lancaster. The Leeds Liverpool Canal formed a natural barrier stretching from the salt marshes of Hesketh Bank in the north to Bootle docks in the south and in 1940 the Directorate Of Fortifications and Works (FW3) set to, building pillboxes and other hardened field defences along it's length at major bridges and other strategic crossing places.

There were 6 basic designs of pillbox for rifle and light machine gun. However many adaptations were made to the standard plan to suit local conditions and materials. In places pillboxes were disguised as buildings or out-buildings, and in others, existing houses, barns and even garden walls were fitted with loopholes and adapted as gun emplacements.

 Defence through Deceit

From the late 1940's the major industrial cities of the Northwest became targets for enemy bombing raids. In July the same year a National Decoy Authority was formed under the jurisdiction of Colonel John Fisher Turner. It's aim was to devise urban lighting simulations and dummy fire sites in order to mimic the light given off by furnace doors, Inefficient black out precautions and the airfield lights of taxiing planes. At other sites pyrotechnics simulated the effects of incendiary bombs and larger Special Fire (SF) sites could, from a pilots eye view, replicate the burning carnage of docklands and other industrial infrastructure. These decoys were known a 'Civil' sites and were given the prefix letter 'Q', a practice borrowed from the Navy 'Q' ships, Warships disguised as merchant craft. QL denoted a light site, and QF a dummy fire site, the larger SF sites were also given the name 'Starfish' sites. During the Second World War Liverpool was ringed by as many as 14 decoy sites.

The demolition of defence lines and decoy structures began soon after the end of the war and only a fraction of them remain today. However a few still remain as testament to the ingenuity and determination of the people who stood guard over Britain more than 60 years ago.