Viewpoint of old Amroth lost to the sea

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The view from here in Victorian times included houses, commercial buildings and works, gardens and allotments which have all been lost to the sea.

Where you see the pebble beach and ‘Bertie the Bass’ sculpture is where Beach Cottages stood – a row of 1880s houses – before storms wrecked them in the 1930s. Further on, there were garage buildings in the Templebar area (near today’s public toilets), and previously a boathouse.

The houses lining the road from here to the Amroth Arms were originally called Croggan’s Cliff. They were built in the 1860s along with Ebenezer Chapel. Their gardens, on the seaward side of the road, were washed away during storms in the 1890s.

The small square patch projecting from the road opposite Beach Haven is called the Bandstand. It once had a canopy. A small village band was formed during the First World War but was short-lived, perhaps because the musicians based themselves at the Temple Bar Inn!

In the Second World War a Mr Spry – a one-armed retired sailor – used a telescope to keep watch from the Bandstand for German submarines. The Bandstand was built above stables accessed at beach level. Horses used in the mining of “patches” (mineral outcrops) were kept there, but that’s hard to imagine now that the top of the beach is almost level with the Bandstand.

Looking the other way from the viewpoint, you’ll see how the road climbs and curves to landward – as built in the 1930s to replace the original highway alongside the sea wall. Storms damaged the road there in 1931. Amroth lost another house – demolished to make way for the new road.

Along the beach are groynes, installed as sea defences in the 1950s. Some of the stanchions were rails from the Maenclochog Railway, lifted in 1952. The work was partly funded by the Government, because Exercise Jantzen (to prepare for the D-Day landings) had weakened the older defences and allowed erosion to proceed faster.

With thanks to Mark Harvey

Postcode: SA67 8NG    View Location Map

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