page_title: Dunstanburgh Castle
section_title: 20th and 21st centuries
hierarchical_section_title: Dunstanburgh Castle / History / 20th and 21st centuries
caption_attribution_description: English: Pillbox overlooking Embleton Bay, north of Dunstanburgh Castle A lozenge pillbox constructed using corrugated iron shuttering. The pillbox was constructed c1941-42 as part of the Northumberland coast defences.
context_page_description: Dunstanburgh Castle is a 14th-century fortification on the coast of Northumberland in northern England, between the villages of Craster and Embleton. The castle was built by Earl Thomas of Lancaster between 1313 and 1322, taking advantage of the site's natural defences and the existing earthworks of an Iron Age fort. Thomas was a leader of a baronial faction opposed to King Edward II, and probably intended Dunstanburgh to act as a secure refuge, should the political situation in southern England deteriorate. The castle also served as a statement of the earl's wealth and influence, and would have invited comparisons with the neighbouring royal castle of Bamburgh. Thomas probably only visited his new castle once, before being captured at the Battle of Boroughbridge as he attempted to flee royal forces for the safety of Dunstanburgh. Thomas was executed, and the castle became the property of the Crown before passing into the Duchy of Lancaster.
  Dunstanburgh's defences were expanded in the 1380s by John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster, in the light of the threat from Scotland and the peasant uprisings of 1381.
context_section_description: A golf course was constructed alongside the castle in 1900, and the estate was later sold to Sir Arthur Sutherland, a wealthy shipowner, in 1919. Sutherland opened an additional course at the castle in 1922, designed by the Scottish golfer, James Braid. The costs of maintaining the property became too much for him and, after undertaking eight years of clearance work in the 1920s, he placed the castle into the guardianship of the state in 1930, with the Commissioners of Works taking control of the property. Archaeological investigations were carried out as part of the clearance work by H. Honeyman in 1929, exposing more of the main gatehouse, and further work was carried out under Robert Bosanquet in the 1930s. Aerial photography was carried out by Walter de Aitchison for the Ordnance Survey.
  Shortly after the outbreak of the Second World War, concerns grew in the British government about the threat of German invasion along the east coast of England. The bays just to the north of Dunstanburgh Castle were vulnerable targets for an enemy amphibious landing, and efforts were made to fortify the castle and the surrounding area in 1940, as part of a wider line of defences erected by Sir Edmund Ironside.
  The castle itself was occupied by a unit of the Royal Armoured Corps, who served as observers; the soldiers appear to have relied on the stone walls for protection rather than trenches, and, unusually, no additional firing points were cut out of the stonework, as typically happened elsewhere. The surrounding beaches were defended with lines of barbed wire, slit trenches and square weapons pits, reinforced by concrete pillboxes to the north and south of the castle, at least partially laid down by the 1st Battalion Essex Regiment.
  A 20-foot (6 m) wide ditch was dug at the north end of the moat to prevent tanks from breaking through and following the track south past the castle, and a 545-foot by 151-foot (166 m by 46 m) wide anti-personnel minefield was laid to the south-west to prevent infantry soldiers from circumventing the castle's defences and advancing down into Craster. After the end of the war, the barbed wire was cleared away from the beaches by local Italian prisoners of war, although the two pillboxes, the remnants of the anti-tank ditch and some of the trenches and weapons pits still remain.
  In 1961, Arthur's son, Sir Ivan Sutherland, passed the estate to the National Trust. Archaeological surveys were carried out in 1985, 1986 and 1989 by Durham University, and between 2003 and 2006 researchers from English Heritage carried a major archaeological investigation of 35 hectares (86 acres) of land around the castle.
  In the 21st century, the castle remains owned by the National Trust and is managed by English Heritage. The site is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and the ruins are protected under UK law as a Grade I listed building. It lies within the Northumberland Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and is part of a Site of Special Scientific Interest, with parts of the site comprising a Special Protection Area for the conservation of wild birds. The National Trust has encouraged the land around the outside of the castle to remain waterlogged to enable the conservation of amphibians and bird species, and the inside of the castle is protected from grazing animals to encourage nesting birds.
caption: A type 24 concrete pillbox from the Second World War, positioned north of the castle[60]
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