Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

The Drop Redoubt was a key element of the Western Heights fortifications. The inner and outer sides of the ditch surrounding the fort are faced with curtain and counterscarp walls. These are lined with brickwork to a height of 9.86m, laid to English bond in a battered face. (location accurate to the nearest 1m based on available information)

Monument Types

• CURTAIN WALL (Disused, Post Medieval to Modern - 1805 AD? to 1945 AD?)
• SCARP (Disused, Post Medieval to Modern - 1805 AD? to 1945 AD?)

Full description

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Summarised from report:

The Drop Redoubt was a key element of the Western Heights fortifications. Occupying the eastern end of the ridge and dominating the town, port and seaward approaches, it is essentially a pentagonal fort designed to control the land front as a self-defensible work but was also linked to the linear defences that guarded the Heights as a whole. The major phase of construction, during the war with France, was between 1804 and 1816, although work had begun from c1782.

The inner and outer sides of the ditch surrounding the fort are faced with curtain and counterscarp walls. These are lined with brickwork to a height of 9.86m, laid to English bond in a battered face, with drainage gulleys built into the stone capping courses. The majority of the building work was likely in place by c 1805-1808, though there were many later additions to the curtain wall, including the insertion of a number of Caponiers. (1)

An early plan dating to 1811 shows the form of the ditch, including the scarp and counterscarp walls of The Drop Redoubt Fort after the completion of the Napoleonic works at the there. It is clear from this that the ditch and associated walls remained the same (in plan) throughout the subsequent use of the fort. (2)

A later plan dating to 1860, shows the interior features of the Drop Redoubt Fort, alongside the layout of the Ditch, Scarp and Curtain walls, immediately before any alterations were made. (3)

<1> English Heritage, 2000, The Western Heights, Dover, Kent. Report No 3 The Drop Redoubt: A 19th-Century Artillery Fortification (Unpublished document). SKE13677.

<2> Major W H Ford, Royal Engineers, 1811, Plan Shewing the Appropriation of the Ordnance Lands on the Western Heights Dover 1811 (Map). SKE51523.

<3> Unknown, 1860, Drop Redoubt, Dover, Plan, Sections and Elevation Shewing Proposed Alterations And Additions (Map). SKE51528.

Sources and further reading

Related records