Battery Moltke (''Batterie Moltke'' in German) is an uncompleted

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

former

coastal artillery Coastal artillery is the branch of the armed forces concerned with operating anti-ship artillery or fixed gun batteries in coastal fortifications. From the Middle Ages until World War II, coastal artillery and naval artillery in the form of ...

battery in St Ouen in north-west

Jersey Jersey ( ; ), officially the Bailiwick of Jersey, is an autonomous and self-governing island territory of the British Islands. Although as a British Crown Dependency it is not a sovereign state, it has its own distinguishing civil and gov ...

. It was constructed by

Organisation Todt Organisation Todt (OT; ) was a Civil engineering, civil and military engineering organisation in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945, named for its founder, Fritz Todt, an engineer and senior member of the Nazi Party. The organisation was responsible ...

for the

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the German Army (1935–1945), ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmac ...

during the occupation of the Channel Islands. The battery structures include bunkers, gun emplacements and the ''Marine Peilstand'' 3 tower, which are on Les Landes, a coastal patch of

heath A heath () is a shrubland habitat found mainly on free-draining infertile, acidic soils and is characterised by open, low-growing woody vegetation. Moorland is generally related to high-ground heaths with—especially in Great Britain—a coole ...

land at the north end of St Ouen's Bay. The bunker was left unfinished at the end of the war. When completed there would have been an M132 Command Bunker as at Battery Lothringen and the main armament would have consisted of four 15 cm SK C/28 naval guns. The primary purpose of this battery would have been the defence of St Ouen's Bay in the event of an amphibious assault by the Allies, although Jersey's entire coastline would have been within range of the guns, as would the stretch of water between Jersey and

Sark Sark (Sercquiais: or , ) is an island in the southwestern English Channel, off the coast of Normandy, and part of the archipelago of the Channel Islands. It is a self-governing British Crown Dependencies, Crown Dependency, with its own set o ...

Gun emplacements

Four captured French

Canon de 155mm GPF The Canon de 155 Grande Puissance Filloux (GPF) modèle 1917 was a WWI-era French-designed 155 mm gun used by the French Army and the United States Army during the first half of the 20th century in towed and self-propelled mountings. His ...

, known as the 15.5 cm K 418(f) by the Germans, were installed at Moltke. One of the original guns can be seen there today. These guns could be fully rotated to fire in any direction. They had a maximum range of around 19,500 m. The French guns were intended to be temporary until more modern 15 cm SK C/28 guns could be delivered; these guns never arrived.

MP3 tower

The ''Marine Peilstand'' 3 tower, or MP3 tower, is one of nine planned towers, in Jersey, for use in observing targets at sea. It is similar to the other two completed towers of this type ( MP1 at Saint Brelade and MP2 at La Corbiere). The tower is at the top of a steep sloping, west-facing cliff. It has seven floors including a windowless underground floor and the walled top deck where a Seetakt radar was installed. The land-side entrance is on the third level.

Ringstände

Examples of ''Ringstände'' can be found at the battery site. These are a type of

defensive fighting position A defensive fighting position is a type of Earthworks (engineering)#Military use, earthwork constructed in a military context, generally large enough to accommodate anything from one soldier to a fire team (or similar sized unit). Terminology ...

known as ''Tobruk'' by the Allies, and are small bunkers constructed from concrete with an aperture on the top which was used to mount a turret from an otherwise obsolete tank.

Present day

In 2013, the exterior areas of the site are accessible at all times. The Channel Islands Occupation Society operates some of the bunkers as a museum.Channel Islands Occupation Society
/ref> One may visit the gun emplacements at any time. Two cannon barrels recovered from the foot of the nearby cliffs are on display in one of the emplacements. These two salvaged barrels were not originally at Moltke.

References

External links