Forbes' Batteries are a pair of
artillery batteries
In military organizations, an artillery battery is a unit or multiple systems of artillery, mortar systems, rocket artillery, multiple rocket launchers, surface-to-surface missiles, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, etc., so grouped to faci ...
in the
British Overseas Territory
The British Overseas Territories (BOTs), also known as the United Kingdom Overseas Territories (UKOTs), are fourteen dependent territory, territories with a constitutional and historical link with the United Kingdom. They are the last remna ...
of
Gibraltar
)
, anthem = " God Save the King"
, song = " Gibraltar Anthem"
, image_map = Gibraltar location in Europe.svg
, map_alt = Location of Gibraltar in Europe
, map_caption = United Kingdom shown in pale green
, mapsize =
, image_map2 = Gib ...
.
The batteries are casemated.
Description
The Forbes' Batteries are on the eastern end of the
Northern Defences. These batteries had five guns arranged on two levels.
There is
a famous quarry behind the batteries which shares the same name.
This complex group of fortifications is located at the end of Princes Lines and was named after Lt.
George Forbes RN, ADC to
Prince George of Hesse-Darmstadt
Prince George Louis of Hessen-Darmstadt (1669 – 13 September 1705) was a Field Marshal in the Austrian army. He is known for his career in Habsburg Spain, as Viceroy of Catalonia (1698–1701), head of the Austrian army in the War of the Spani ...
, third Earl of Granard (1685-1765) who took part as a midshipman in the attack of 1704 and who fought on shore in the siege of 1727.
[
In 1727 the battery mounted two 6-pdr guns. In 1761 the British constructed Upper and Lower Forbes' Batteries.][
Upper Forbes' Battery has two fine magazines, one brick and one stone, built against the cliff wall. Above the two batteries is Forbes' Lookout. During the Second World War a 40-mm Mark 3 gun on a mobile mounting was placed in Upper Forbes Battery in 1942 and remained there until December 1944. A Second World War iron cupola cantilevered out from the rock face housed a searchlight.]
References
{{Fortifications of Gibraltar
Batteries in Gibraltar