Labrador - Background

• First known as Fort Pasir Panjang - to

• guard the western entrance of Keppel Harbour against enemy attacks

• to defend the trade in Singapore

• which was becoming prosperous and important for the British

• and more vulnerable of attacks by pirates

• Fortification of the island was planned by Capt. Collyer• Fort Pasir Panjang was one of the 11 coastal artillery forts built in Singapore• Two 6-inch guns, weighing 37 tons eachCapable of firing 102 pound shells to 10 miles• Two guns were oriented Southwards, But could swivel to face any direction

• 1935 – emphasis on protection of the Naval Base and Keppel Harbour

• Labrador’s strategic location – covering the western entrance to Keppel Harbour

Ships that visited the port included Chinses junks, Bugis and Thai boats which brought good such as earthenware, paper, flour, Chinese medicines, cloth, rice and spices. Most of these commodities were then exported in different directions and so began the island’s entrepot trade - much as it is today.

www.fortsiloso.com/ history/history.htm

• Together with Fort Siloso, these forts would prevent enemies to penetrate towards Fort Canning

• British believed the Japanese would carry attack from the South

• but they came from the north, through the Causeway and battled on towards the town

• The big guns of Singapore were not pointed the wrong way. • They were installed primarily for the seaward defence of Singapore and to protect the naval base. The fact that there was no direct naval attack proved that they were completely successful in their mission and earned their keep.

So, how effective was Labrador?

http://www.visitsingapore.com/WWII/sites.htm#

Except for two giant guns of 15-inch calibre, they had all-round traverse and could – and did fire landwards at Japanese targets in the town.

http://john.curtin.edu.au/education/cartoonpd/CartoonPD-Section2-Singapore.pdf

Terms

• Battery• Casemates• Bunkers• Pill-boxes

After the war the coastal defences were left to decay and rot

Pill boxes

Small concrete forts known as pill boxes were some of the most popular defences built along the coast.They were usually the only piece of good cover in an area vulnerable to attack. Most pill boxes comprised a small room of about ten feet square and six feet high with walls of thick rough concrete with a door, over which a sheet was often draped.They were basically a type of dug-out or bunker with look-outs and small slits for machine guns.

Each box was linked to the next by defensive ditches deep enough to stop a tank, or by natural features such as embankments, rivers and canals.

After the war the coastal defences were left to decay and rot, and many of them became overgrown.

Concrete pillboxes were built along Singapore’s eastern and western coasts as part of the British WWII defence. Installed I nthe pillboxes were machine guns, which could fire in any direction, althogh usually oriented seawards. They were positioned at strategic intervals so that their fields of fire would overlap, reinforcing each other and covering almost the entire southern coastline.

Casemates

Artillery emplacements in separate protected rooms, rather than in a battery.

A Casemate is a heavy duty structure originally a valuted chamber in a fortress. Today the military use the term for a fortified gun emplacement. In civilian use a casemate may be a tunnel cut into a rock face with armoured doors, used for storing volatile goods.

Battery

group of guns or missile launchers operated together at one place

• http://www.fortsiloso.com/history/1919.htm

• http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/southwest/series3/secondworldwar_pillboxes_defence.shtml

• http://habitatnews.nus.edu.sg/guidebooks/marinefish/text/117c.htm

• http://ourstory.asia1.com.sg/war/headline/church.html

• http://www.ww2australia.gov.au/japadvance/finalhrs.html

• http://john.curtin.edu.au/education/cartoonpd/CartoonPD-Section2-Singapore.pdf

• www.fortsiloso.com/ history/history.htm

• Singapore’s 100 historic places (2002) National Heritage Board.