On this day in Wembury — 20 May 1954
The Birmingham Daily Post reported a tragic accident at the Royal Navy’s gunnery range on Wembury Point, in which a workman lost his life. Jacob Nielson, aged 55, of Union Street, Plymouth, was killed when a trench collapsed during tunnelling work on a new building site within the range. Another man, Arthur Eldridge, 41, of Fore Street, Saltash, was seriously injured and taken to hospital with leg injuries.
The gunnery range at Wembury Point was one of several Royal Navy training facilities established after the Second World War, used for radar-controlled targeting and fire-control exercises linked to Devonport. The work being undertaken that spring formed part of continuing Cold War upgrades to the site, which included underground communications and observation structures.
The news of the accident cast a shadow over the village, where many local men found work on defence projects around Plymouth. Nielson’s death was one of several recorded industrial fatalities on the South Devon coast during this period — a stark reminder of the risks faced by those maintaining Britain’s post-war military readiness. Today, the same ground where the tragedy occurred has been reclaimed by nature, forming part of the National Trust’s Wembury Point reserve, its wartime bunkers now silent among gorse and grass.
(Birmingham Daily Post, 20 May 1954)