Johore Battery

Johore Battery
Part of World War II Singapore Defenses
Singapore

One of Singapore's 15-inch coastal defence guns elevated for firing
Coordinates 1°21′55″N 103°58′47″E / 1.365167°N 103.979667°E / 1.365167; 103.979667
Site information
Open to
the public		 Yes
Condition Reproduction
Site history
Built 1939
In use February 1942
Demolished February 1942
Garrison information
Garrison None

Johore Battery was an artillery battery in Changi, Singapore. It consisted of a set of three large naval guns installed by the British in the second half of the 1930s, to defend the approaches to the Naval Base at Sembawang.

History

Five 15–inch guns were installed in Singapore: three in Changi and two in Buona Vista. The three guns in Changi formed the Johore Battery. It was called the Johore Battery because the sultan of Johore gave King George V £500,000 for his Silver Jubilee in 1935. The British used £400,000 of the gift to install to guns in Changi, which in 1942 was used to shell Johor Bahru at that time still under Japanese military occupation.

Built by the British in 1939 for the defence of Singapore, the Johore Battery is a gun emplacement site consisting of a labyrinth of tunnels. The tunnels were used to store ammunition to support three large guns that could fire 15-inch shells.

The guns were the largest installed outside Britain during World War II. They were destroyed before the surrender of the British army and the tunnels were sealed up after the war. The location remained a secret until the Singapore Prisons Department rediscovered them in April 1991.

Today, replicas of the large gun and 15-inch shell sit at the Johore Battery.

See also

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 3/16/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.