On this day in Wembury — 26 April 1949

The Western Morning News reported that Wembury Parish Council had resolved to write to the Commander-in-Chief, Plymouth, complaining of barbed wire on a public footpath below the gunsite at Wembury Point. The wire had been laid during the war as a defensive measure and had never been removed, leaving walkers unable to use the path freely. The Council’s letter pressed for its removal so that the right of way could once again be enjoyed.

Attention was also drawn to another path, the coastal route between Wembury and Newton Ferrers. Near the old coastguard rocket house at Warren Point, the path was said to be narrow and dangerous. As this section lay on land belonging to the National Trust, councillors agreed to write to the Trust to seek improvements.

The meeting reflects how, even several years after the war, Wembury’s coastline still bore the physical barriers of its wartime militarisation, and how the Parish Council was beginning to push both the Navy and the National Trust to restore safe and open public access to the coastal footpaths.

(Source: Western Morning News, 26 April 1949)