Coastal battery in Valaste

The coastal battery in the village of Valaste is an interesting complex of coastal defenses from the Second World War, and its ruins are one of the few surviving parts of the fortification in Estonia from the time of the second German occupation.

German troops began building artillery batteries on the Estonian coast at the same time as the conquest of Estonia in the summer of 1941. As a rule, these were field batteries without permanent fortifications.

The development of permanent fortifications began at the end of 1943, the development of air defense started earlier. Artillery batteries were erected on the Estonian coast from Narva-Jõesuu to the outskirts of Tallinn (later, of course, they were also in Western Estonia). Guns of various calibers (20...280 mm), origin (both German and captured French, Czechoslovak or Soviet guns) and purpose (anti-ship, anti-landing and anti-aircraft artillery) and a number of buildings for the defense of the battery (trenches, bunkers, obstacles from barbed wire and minefields).

The location of the village of Valaste, about 55 meters above sea level, was extremely favorable for the battery. On the coast of Virumaa, the batteries are located to the east of Valaste (Narva-Jõesuu, Hanelu, Mummassaare, Türsamäe and Künnapõhja) and to the west (the village of Moldova, Aseri, Kunda and Natturi), so that the coast of today’s Ida- and Lääne-Viru counties was well protected from possible attacks both from sea and from air. But sometimes German coastal defenses were assessed as weak, which allowed Soviets to land troops at Meriküla in February 1944.

Battery No. 3 in the village of Valaste had three 105 mm „leFH 18“ howitzers (firing range up to 11 km), three 40 mm anti-aircraft guns and one 75 mm anti-tank gun. In terms of design, the artillery positions (the bases of large cannons with a diameter of 5 m and a circle of bolts with a diameter of 1.25 m) were built quite thoroughly and are still recognizable in the landscape. The infantry also had three machine guns.

Like many other batteries of that time in Estonia, the battery also had modern Würzburg-Giant (Würzburg-Riese) fire control radar, which was used in both anti-aircraft and anti-ship defense since 1940. The main part of the radar was a steel parabolic reflector with a diameter of 7.5 meters. The range was up to 70 km, which meant covering a large part of the Gulf of Finland. The hexagonal concrete base of the radar (height 1.70 m, side width 1.70 m) is broken, but it can still be recognized in the landscape. However, the battery contained a much rarer night vision device (WPG), which on the coast of Virumaa was only found in the Laagna battery.

The battery was built in 1943 and operated until the autumn of 1944. In September 1944, they began to withdraw German troops from mainland Estonia. Among them was the 532nd artillery division of the German Navy, which included the 3rd (Valaste) battery. During the retreat, their artillery was destroyed, including in Valaste. Unfortunately, no photographs of the battery in Valaste have reached us.