Mount Siloso 6 Inch Emplacement No. 1 Gun
The No., 6-Inch QF Gun Emplacement on Mount Siloso. Shells would be sent up a hoist from the magazine to the hatch at the rear of the platform. Cartridges containing the propellant charge would come up another hoist to a hatch to the side of the emplacement. The inset shows the hoist cover opened .
A square shape can be seen in the centre of the platform. This is where a small building was constructed when the fort was up rated during the 1930s. The building housed instrumentation which supported that installed in the Command Post nearby.
After the War, this building became a REME Workshop where Harold Dursley worked.
He says that, “In the autumn of 47 I was despatched with 2 large boxes of tools to Fort Siloso with lads from REME, Royal Engineers,Royal Signals and a small group of Royal Artillery tradesmen. We were told to set ourselves up as necessary to support the artillery as required. As the fitter of the group, I decided to move in quickly and set myself with a workshop,The small building was ideal. As we were not given materials, I became an expert at searching through all the old tunnels and magazines for my materials. There were plenty of old packing cases etc. from which I built a bench on which I was working when the photograph was taken”. Unfortunately, this historic building was demolished when the emplacement was restored during the mid 1990s.
Left: The door on the Shell Hoist of the No. 2 Gun.
RIGHT: The Ammunition Hoist cover for the shell hoist of the No. 2 Gun (Left-hand). Notice the water run-off around the left cover. This is to prevent rain entering the hoist and damaging the mechanism. This is probably the original cover. The cover for the No. 1 Gun is not original and probably dates to the restoration of the emplacement.