La Corbiere is a German WW2 range finding tower on the south western tip of Jersey, a great destination for a sunset visit. There are also extensive German bunkers here but I didn’t realise that until after I visited!
Visiting La Corbiere
The lighthouse is signposted and there is a parking area near the observation tower. When we visited there were no facilities though. The observation tower has now been converted into a self catering apartment for holiday lets – how fantastic is that!
My Experience
Following the coast road we came to La Corbiere – what a stunning place! The lighthouse and German observation tower were incredibly well placed although I’m not sure who the Germans were expecting to land on those rocks!
La Corbiere Photo Gallery
History
Overlooking the lighthouse of La Corbiere, in the southwest corner of Jersey, the Germans in 1943 built an observation bunker called “Marine Peilstand und Meßstellung 2”.
This bunker was intended to have been part of a network comprising a total of nine such bunkers, placed around the entire island to observe hostile ships. Using observations from just two of these bunkers, direction and range could be accurately and quickly calculated and this information passed to the various gun batteries on the island.
However, out of the nine planned bunkers, only MP1, MP2 and MP3 were built.
The bunker was almost 18 metres high and had walls 2 metres thick. Observation and targeting took place on five floors through the openings in the front of the bunker.
The bunker was painted with camouflage, so that it looked like one of the characteristic round granite towers, for which Jersey is well known.
In 1976, the bunker was used for coastal surveillance and a glass observation room was built on the top. In 2004, the surveillance function was moved and in 2007 the bunker was converted to a holiday apartment with three-storey bedrooms, kitchen and living room at the top.
References
Information on how to visit La Corbiere strongpoint is at the excellent Channel Islands Occupation Society here.
General information on the lighthouse and tower is on the Wiki page here.
If you want to stay in the tower, information is here.
Information on the occupation sites is also here.
The history above is copied from the battlefields ww2 site here.