The Nab Tower

 

The Nab Tower

The Nab Tower with the original red lantern and steel cladding, before 2013
                                            Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

The Nab Tower was designed by Guy Maunsell or G. Menzies, choose your source accordingly, and was the first of eight towers intended to be located in the Straits of Dover. The Admiralty’s objective during the First World War was to close the English Channel to enemy ships and protect it from German U-boats. The proposed towers were to be linked with steel nets and each one equipped with two 4-inch guns.

By the end of the war, only one steel and concrete cylinder had been built and it sat on dry land in Shoreham Harbour on a honeycombed concrete base of eighteen compartments. (A second tower had been partially built, but it was demolished in 1924, six years after the end of the war. It took nine months to disassemble.)

In 1920 two or five tugs, according to the source of your choice, towed the tower to the Nab Rock, four miles off the Isle of Wight at the approach to the eastern Solent. The Nab Rock was marked by a lightship which had served its purpose since 1812. The tower was to replace the lightship. Once in position the eighteen compartments were flooded so that it sank to the seabed, where it has remained ever since, at a slight but noticeable angle.

During the war a pair of Bofors guns were installed to provide some defence to the Solent and saw active service, shooting down several enemy aircraft. The lighthouse also served as a Royal Navy signal station until some years after the end of the Second World War.

This is not the Nab lightship, but LV 78 that used to be anchored off Calshot Spit and is now a museum ship in Southampton.

The lighthouse was manned by lighthouse keepers until 1983, when it was automated and a helicopter pad built on the tower. In 1995 the lighthouse was converted to solar power. It is monitored and controlled from Harwich, in Essex.

In 2013 – 2015 renovation was commissioned by Trinity House, which has had responsibility for Nab Tower since 1929, though it only acquired the freehold from the Ministry of Defence in 1984. The external casing of steel had corroded badly and was replaced with concrete. The helicopter pad was removed and the height of the tower was reduced from 27 to 17 metres.

Image courtesy Hurst Castle

 The iconic red lantern was taken away and is now on display at the Lighthouse Museum Rooms at Hurst Castle. The museum is maintained by a group of volunteers known as the Association of Lighthouse Keepers. 

A new light with a range of 12 nautical miles was installed, which flashes once every ten seconds, as well as a new fog signal, which sounds one blast every thirty seconds.    

                                                      Hurst Castle 

                                    Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

Hurst Castle was built by Henry VIII between 1541 and 1544 and was a formidable artillery fortress. Charles I was imprisoned there in 1648.                       

Nab Tower in current condition
Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons