[conan]

Thanks for all you replies and help with this

[pandy]

By the apparent dimensions and brick construction it is probably a gauging station for monitoring the downstream (navigation cut) water level. It is not one I was familiar with during my time at the old KRA but as there was and I believe still is an outpost depot (Environment Agency) beside the Anchor Pub just upstream, maybe they attended to it. You can see these constructions at varying points along rivers and steams, usually on the upstream side of a weir.

[cliveh]

Could be S4

[Sentinel S4]

Water monitoring station?

S4.

[conan]

Ah thanks for that cliveh so its probably a tool shed or or similar

[cliveh]

Got it!! - Its Hampstead Lock! I was only there a few weeks ago! I should've recognized it sooner!

The building is definitely not a pillbox or air-raid shelter and must be something to do with the lock itself

cliveh

[conan]

Must admit I was a bit worried about it being a pill box, I've been using the defence of Britain overlay on google earth to try to find the location and, as you say, they are all type 24s. I'm wondering if it's some form of air raid shelter, some did have windows high up as in this illustration of one in Birmingham, but why there would be a shelter out in what appears to the middle nowhere I don't know.



cliveh,  Eldridges lock seems to have the weir to the right of the lock chamber but, as you say, the locks have been rebuilt since. The print would have been taken in the mid 60s when my parents friends had a cruiser on the river and I don't know when the rebuilding took place.

[grandarog]

I agree with Cliveh. It appears more like a brick built toilet block .The embrasures are far higher than one expects in a pill box. They look more like small windows .

[cliveh]

I actually have my doubts that is a pillbox in the original photo. It looks too 'square'. All the ones along the Medway I've seen are Type 24's which are in the shape of an irregular hexagon. I wonder if the building is something to do with the lock itself?

cliveh

[cliveh]

Possibly Eldridge's Lock though no pillbox there now. However there is a Type 24 just a little further upstream.

cliveh

[ChrisExiledFromStrood]

Looking at aerial photos and maps on Bing and Google maps, I'd have guessed more upstream (around the E end of Tonbridge area) rather than Yalding, as the river's narrower and appears to be without the big bypass weirs.
Trouble is there are too many leaves on the trees in the aerial shots, and anyway a lot of the locks appear to have been rebuilt or improved in recent years.

[conan]

Thanks for the suggestion JohnWalker, but looking on Google earth there is a road bridge going over the head of Yalding lock carrying the B2162.

[JohnWalker]

That open space in the distance makes me think of Yalding.

[conan]

I'm looking for some help please. Can anybody identify this lock for me? It's on the Medway somewhere, and I would like to know where it is and whether the pill box is still in situ.Thanks in advance