Monument record LWT 321 - World War Two Naval Base, HMS Mantis

July 2014. Lothingland, Lowestoft and North Suffolk Coast and Heaths National Mapping Programme.
The site of World War Two Naval Base, HMS Mantis, at Hamilton Docks Lowestoft is visible on aerial photographs (S1-S2). This is outside of the current project area (falling within the previous Suffolk Coastal NMP project) and therefore has not been included within the mapping. The site was the base for the Royal Navy's Coastal Forces Information from the Lowestoft Museum website states that the Headquarters buildings for Mantis were on the Hamilton Dock, the vessels attached to Mantis the MGB's (Motor Gun Boats) MTB's (Motor Torpedo Boats) and ML's (Motor Launches) used Hamilton Dock itself from where they set out for “E-Boat Alley” off the East Coast to engage the German E-Boats. Officers were billeted at the Royal Hotel (now demolished) and the crews were mainly billeted in requisitioned houses in the Grove Road area (S3).
The aerial photographs show that large numbers of huts and military buildings were positioned along the sides of roads in around the docks and that there was numerous earthen covered air raid shelter. Three large fuel tanks are located to the immediate north of the site, surrounded by barbed wire obstruction, previously recorded under LWT 094.
S. Horlock (Norfolk Historic Environment Service), 23rd July 2014.