Beaumont Tower

Beaumont Tower

The westernmost of three towers built to defend St Aubin's Bay, Beaumont Tower, also known as St Aubin No 3, was cruicial to protect the approach to St Aubin, the island's main harbour at the time. It was built before 1787 and is now owned by the States

This tower was built on the site of the boulevards adjoining Vaull Battery and armed with an 18pdr carronade on a wooden traversing platform and slide. In 1797 it was manned by a sergeant, corporal and ten men of the Invalids and in 1803 by a corporal and six men of the 3rd Royal Garrison Battalion. In October 1813 it was not occupied.

A report of 1840 states that it is armed with one 18pdr Carronade on a wooden traversing platform, barracks for one sergeant and twelve men. It had a magazine for 20 barrels of powder. It was sold, with the land situated by Beaumont Railway Station on 26 July 1922 for £300.

During the Occupation the tower was armed with a French Hotchkiss anti-aircraft machine gun mounted on the roof.

HER entry

Along with all Jersey's other coastal towers and historic fortifications it is a listed building, described as follows in the Jersey Heritage Historic Environment Record website:

Built circa 1780s, the tower is significant as an integral part of a group of surviving Conway towers in Jersey that not only illustrates the changing political and strategic military history of the Island in the late 18th and 19th century, but represents a turning point in the history of defence strategy across Europe, and global trends in the history of war.

Standard Conway pattern tower. Round and tapered, built of worked rubble granite. The two upper floors are punctuated with circuits of musketry loopholes partially formed in brickwork, with the original dressed granite doorway retained at first floor level. Later doorway formed at ground floor. Stonework parapet with four machicolations.