Dover, Shakespeare Cliff, Fort Amherst

The 350ft tall chalk face of Shakespeare Cliff is the point of England nearest to France. In her posthumous travelogue, 'Through England on a Side Saddle' (1888), Celia Fiennes noted: "I saw the cliffs and hills plaine, but some dayes towards the evening you may see the towers and buildings of Calais." The south coast was particularly vulnerable to French invasion during the Napoleonic wars and consequently there was huge strengthening of coastal defences, one of which was Fort Amherst.