Qualla: Fort Hommet https://qualla.com/fort-hommet en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:11 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/b/y/1/fort-hommet-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Fort Hommet https://qualla.com/fort-hommet Fort Hommet: Introduction https://qualla.com/fort-hommet/ Photo credit Peter__Brown, CC BY-SA 2.0. Walk out onto the Vazon Bay headland and you are walking on a stratigraphy of fear. A single low hill, exposed to the Atlantic and a short hop from the French coast, has been fortified continuously since at least 1680. There is a 1680 gun position somewhere under your feet. The squat stone cylinder above you is a Napoleonic-era Martello tower from 1804. The concrete casemates dug into the slope - half-buried, blank-faced - were poured by German engineers in 1942. Fort Hommet is what happens when one good spot for a gun is found and then never abandoned.

Read more: Fort Hommet on Qualla

Image: Peter__Brown | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/b/y/1/fort-hommet-wp/gby1-fort-hommet-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Fort Hommet: The First Gun https://qualla.com/fort-hommet/ Photo credit AlanFord at English Wikipedia, Public domain. The earliest record of a fortification here dates to 1680, when one gun stood on the headland. Vazon Bay was an obvious landing beach for any French invader, and the British and Guernsey authorities knew it. After the French nearly took Jersey in 1781, defences across both bailiw...

Read more: Fort Hommet on Qualla

Image: AlanFord at English Wikipedia | Public domain

]]> Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/b/y/1/fort-hommet-wp/gby1-fort-hommet-the-first-gun.mp3 0:06 2 full Fort Hommet: Doyle's Field Works https://qualla.com/fort-hommet/ Photo credit Man vyi, Public domain. The Martello tower at the heart of Fort Hommet went up in 1804, during the Napoleonic Wars and during the tenure of Lieutenant Governor John Doyle. Doyle, never a man to wait for paperwork, sidestepped the Royal Ordnance Corps entirely by classifying the construction as 'field wo...

Read more: Fort Hommet on Qualla

Image: Man vyi | Public domain

]]> Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/b/y/1/fort-hommet-wp/gby1-fort-hommet-doyles-field-works.mp3 0:06 3 full Fort Hommet: Heavier Guns for a Closer Enemy https://qualla.com/fort-hommet/ Photo credit Man vyi, Public domain. The Victorian army updated the fort to match its new artillery. In 1852, the 24-pounders were replaced in some batteries with 68-pounders and eight-inch shell guns. Barracks went up. Magazines were enlarged. The headland kept gathering iron. In World War II, after Guernsey was de...

Read more: Fort Hommet on Qualla

Image: Man vyi | Public domain

]]> Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/b/y/1/fort-hommet-wp/gby1-fort-hommet-heavier-guns-for-a-closer-enemy.mp3 0:06 4 full Fort Hommet: Buried and Then Unearthed https://qualla.com/fort-hommet/ Photo credit Man vyi, Public domain. When liberation came in May 1945, the British Army and the islanders went to work on the German structures with hammers and scrap-metal hopes. By the late 1940s the guns, blast doors, and metal fittings were gone. Many of the bunkers - including the Fort Hommet gun casemate - wer...

Read more: Fort Hommet on Qualla

Image: Man vyi | Public domain

]]> Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/b/y/1/fort-hommet-wp/gby1-fort-hommet-buried-and-then-unearthed.mp3 0:06 5 full