20th Century Defences in Britain - An Introductory Guide

Anyone living in Britain will probably be familiar with seeing the remains of pillboxes, and other crumbling installations from the Second World War, or perhaps even older. However, I personally haven't really been able to identify what every construction was for, although I had made some educated guesses. So I was very pleased when I recently picked up a copy of this book in a secondhand bookshop. 

20th Century Defences in Britain - An Introductory Guide, was produced by the Council for British Archaeology as part of the Defence of Britain project. It explains, with illustrations and photographs, the variety of defensive remains that can still be found across the country. Pillboxes, anti-tank obstacles, coastal batteries, bombing decoys, radar stations, Nissen huts, air raid shelters, airfields and many more are described in considerable detail. 

Table of Contents

Part I - Military Archaeology: Sources and Methods
1. Sources of evidence
2. Approaches to survey
3. Materials and techniques

Part II - The Defence of Britain c.1900 - 1945
4. Early warning systems
5. Anti-aircraft defences
6. Civil defence
7. Anti-invasion defences
8. Coastal defences
9. Airfields

Part III - The Archaeology of the Cold War 1945 - 1992
Early warning, active and civil defence

This is a great handbook for anyone - like me - who wants to know what that old bit of concrete once was, and why it was placed there.  

Available from:
I think this is out of print - you could try Amazon