Part 4b: The Shingle Skeletons — A Prequel to the Front Line
"Before the roar of the Bofors guns and the miles of barbed wire defined our coastline, the beaches of Shoreham and Lancing were home to a much quieter kind of 'skeleton'.
My old school mate, John, who is a font of knowledge on all things railway, recently pointed out an essential detail regarding our local heritage. The 'skeleton' carriages we often talk about weren't just random relics; they were the primary building blocks of our coast, predating the 1923 Southern Railway grouping. These were the sturdy, wooden-bodied veterans of the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway (LB&SCR).
The image at the top of this post captures the sheer grit of that era in 1905. Here, a team of six heavy horses is seen chest-deep in the River Adur, hauling one of these massive carriage bodies across to Shoreham Beach.
At this time, the Lancing Carriage Works hadn't even been built. These carriages were being 'recycled' from the Brighton Works—stripped of their heavy iron underframes (the true 'skeletons' the railway wanted to keep) and sold to locals for a few pounds.
It was an incredible feat of local haulage. These men and their horses navigated tidal waters and shifting shingle to deliver what would become dozens of homes. While they looks peaceful here, these 'carriage bungalows' were about to face two major enemies: the Great Storm of 1913, and eventually, the military evacuation orders of 1940 that would clear the way for the defences we’ll look at in Part 5."
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The 1940 "Evacuation of the Beach"
The military didn't just ask people to move; they effectively "deleted" the civilian presence to make way for the Coastal Crust defences.
The Two-Day Warning: Following the fall of France, residents of the Shoreham and Lancing bungalows were given roughly 48 hours to leave. For those living in the heavy railway carriage homes, this meant abandoning their "skeletons" entirely, as there was no way to move them back across the river in time.
The "Demolition Squads": Royal Engineers were tasked with clearing "dead ground"—areas where buildings blocked the sightlines from the Bofors guns and pillboxes. Many of those carriages that had survived the 1913 storm were either dismantled for timber or simply bulldozed into the shingle to prevent them from providing cover for German paratroopers.
The Barbed Wire Entanglements: Once the people were gone, the beach was laced with miles of Z-picket and Concertina wire. The tranquil scene of the 1905 horse-crossing was replaced by a landscape of "Admiralty Scaffolding" designed to impale landing craft at high tide.
The "Skeleton" Survivors
Interestingly, not every carriage was destroyed.
Military Repurposing: The army actually found the sturdy LB&SCR teak frames quite useful. Some carriages were kept as makeshift Battery Command Posts or storage for the Bofors ammunition because they were already bullet-proofed to an extent by their thick timber.
The Return: After the war, only a fraction of the owners returned to find their homes intact. This is why the "dozens" you remembered seeing in old photos dwindled down to the few clusters we see today at sites like Golden Sands.
Voices from the Shingle
Accounts from the time reflect a mixture of patriotic duty and personal heartbreak:
The Forced Abandonment: Many residents recalled the "feverish" atmosphere as they tried to pack a lifetime into a single suitcase. Because the carriages were "fixtures" on the shingle, owners had to leave behind their furniture, decorations, and the very walls of their homes.
The "Ghost Town" Effect: One local resident described the beach in the days following the order as an "eerie, silent village of empty boxes," where the only sound was the wind whistling through the carriage vents before the demolition crews arrived.
The Sight of Destruction: There are records of residents standing on the Shoreham side of the Adur, watching through binoculars as the Royal Engineers cleared the "obstructive" bungalows. Seeing the teak frames they had carefully maintained for decades being broken up for firewood or anti-tank obstacles was a devastating sight.
The Military's Perspective
From the soldiers' diaries, we get a different but equally vivid picture:
Repurposed Homes: Soldiers of the 1st LAA Regiment mentioned the strange feeling of sleeping in a "drawing room" that happened to be a railway carriage. They used some of the more substantial bungalows as mess halls or command posts because the thick timber offered better protection than a tent.
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Mapping the "Guts" for Part 5
To make the transition to the Bofors guns as graphic as possible, here is where those emplacements were actually "dug in" relative to the homes:
The Shoreham Fort Battery: A major concentration of firepower was at the Old Fort, protecting the harbour entrance. The "dozens" of carriages nearby were cleared to ensure the guns had a 360-degree traverse.
The Lancing Gap: Because the Lancing Carriage Works was such a massive target, Bofors guns were stationed at intervals along the shingle to catch low-flying raiders coming in from the sea.
Repurposed Foundations: In some cases, the concrete pads or "hard-standing" created for the carriage bungalows were actually used as the base for the gun mounts, as they provided a level surface on the shifting shingle.
The Human Element: "The Pom-Pom Boys"
The crews of the 1st Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment became a part of the local landscape.
The Sound of War: Local residents who hadn't been evacuated (those further inland) recalled the "pom-pom-pom" rhythm of the Bofors guns during the "tip-and-run" raids on the Works.
The Vigil: These men lived in those sandbagged emplacements 24/7, staring at the horizon where the peaceful horse-drawn carriages had once been the only thing moving.
