Beachley & the First World War: The Story of a Shipyard, a Railway & the Transformation of a Rural Parish

In the early months of 1917 German U-Boats were sinking Allied merchant ships at a much faster rate than they could be replaced and Britain faced a real danger of being starved into surrender. One of the Government's responses to this crisis was to boost shipbuilding capacity by building three new national shipyards on the banks of the Severn Estuary, the largest of which was to be located on the rural Beachley Peninsula in Gloucestershire. On 3rd September 1917 the inhabitants of this quiet country parish were given ten days' notice to vacate their homes in order to allow thousands of Royal Engineers and German Prisoners of War to begin construction. The authors have painted a vivid picture of local life before the war, the impact of the evacuation on the community and the construction of the huge shipyard together with its associated housing schemes, army and POW camps. They also record, the history of the railway branch line and the numerous railway locomotives which served the shipyard.