Needles Old Battery built
Old Battery built | 1861-63 | Period: Victorian
Built to guard the western end of the Solent from enemy ships, the Old Battery is a spectacularly sited cliff top fort overlooking The Needles Rocks.
In 1885 a tunnel was dug towards the cliff face from the parade grounds and in 1887 an elevator down to the beach was completed. The original guns were replaced in 1893 by six 9-inch rifled muzzle loaders which took a team of 9 men to load and fire. These guns fired projectiles weighing 116 kg. Early searchlight experiments were conducted at the site between 1889 and 1892.
Admission tickets to The Needles Old Battery are available from the Ships Stores onboard or when making a ferry booking online.
Also in this Period:
- Queen Victoria Dies
- Marconi experiments with radio waves
- The Tennyson Monument unveiled
- Royal National Hospital for Diseases of the Chest opens
- Julia Margaret Cameron takes first photo's at Dimbola
- Cowes and Newport join the railway age
- Needles Old Battery built
- New Needles lighthouse planned
- Sailing race around the Isle of Wight won by America
- Charles Dickens writes David Copperfield
- Victoria and Albert buy Osborne House
- UK's first theme park opens at Blackgang Chine
- Work starts on St. Catherine's lighthouse
- Algernon Charles Swinburne