1. APPLEDORE & THE ROYAL MILITARY CANAL
THE TWO WORLD WARS
Dr. Martin Watts

2. Royal Military Canal 28 miles of barrier

3. The Great War Invasion – Kent Organisation
Central Organising Committee – Maidstone
Lord Harris & Lt. Gen Stopford
Local Emergency Committee – Romney Marsh
F. W Maude – Mayor & Lt Col Gogarty (Commandant, School of Musketry, Hythe)
Military takeover on announcement of State of Emergency

4. Invasion – Early Instructions
October 1914 – Government Instructions
No unauthorised exodus
Owners to await orders for destruction of transport, food stores, horses and stock that cannot be moved.
Germany not part of Hague Regulation which prohibited compelling of inhabitants to disclose army information – inhabitants urged not to inform themselves of dispositions and movements.

5. Invasion – Scheme for stock
Army required count of stock to be cleared and the time it would take.
Scheme drawn up to clear the Romney Marshes and place the cattle and sheep in the upland west of the line Rye-Tenterden-Headcorn and south of the railway Ashford – Tonbridge
This scheme withdrawn when the estimate of time required was 10 – 14 days.

6. Invasion – 1916
1916 -Stock owners warned not to remove stock without orders but to prepare for doing so.
As use of bridges denied Emergency Committee requested temporary bridges but both Home and War Offices refused to pay.
Instructions for destruction of stock issued – with compensation. Method low velocity bullet with carcass and entrails intact – uneatable in “a few hours”.

7. Invasion 1916 – ‘K’ Paper 16 August
“Army council have informed Home Secretary that they have decided that, in the event of a hostile landing that it will not be desirable that… … the civil population be removed. Adopted on military grounds in view of the changed conditions now prevailing.”
Home Office

8. Invasion – Haig’s Order April 11 1918

9. Invasion
“ No able bodied man unless provided with a government permit will be allowed to leave the marsh except the special constables told off to guide the women and children to safety. All other able bodied men, whether they be specials or not will be needed to help the military on the spot.” F. W. Maude 3rd May 1918.

10. Second World War Maidstone, Canterbury & Dover not considered targets
Phoney War – false sense of security
Dunkirk –heightened risk of invasion
Dunkirk – reality & effect of morale upon people of East Kent
LDV – Home Guard

11. LOCAL AUTHORITY CIRCULARS:
Civil Preparedness
LOCAL AUTHORITY CIRCULARS:
Air Raid Precautions
Gas attack
Civil Defence advice & appeals
Child evacuation from Gravesend, Northfleet & Rochester
Public & Private shelters subsidised by government

12. Military Preparedness
Expansion of Airfields
Early Warning and Observer Corps
Dowding’s System CHAIN HOME
Coastal Artillery – Dover, Dymchurch, Eastchurch, Folkestone, Gravesend & Sheerness
AA Artillery – Later along Royal Military Canal to counter VI Doodlebugs
Pillboxes
Anti-tank defences

13. Appledore Pillbox

14. Royal Military Canal

15. RMC - Enfilade

16. Royal Military Canal
Defensive canal used for transport and smuggling whilst drainage for Romney Marsh
Appledore to Warehorne Bridge NT then commandeered in 1940
Pillboxes, slit trenches added manned by 31st Independent Brigade Group
Operation Sea Lion- German airborne objective on first day