Eathorpe Lighting Decoy Site

1 Eathorpe lighting decoy emplacement in the QL programme for the Coventry area. It was set up to simulate factory lighting in an attempt to protect factories in Coventry. No information at present of any grid reference.
Lighting decoys were a cheap and successful way of confusing the enemy and date from 1941. Every site differed, so that they were a sort of theatrical lighting show to mimic some local vulnerable point. An associated shelter would have been built to house the generator/s and other equipment.
2 There is no evidence of earthworks on an aerial photo of 1947.
3 Described as Civil Bombing Decoy CC7A. A Second World War bombing decoy site at Eathorpe. It was built as part of the ‘C-series’ of civil decoys to deflect enemy bombing from Coventry. This was a ‘QL’ decoy, which displayed a series of lights to simulate factories in Coventry. The first civil decoys for Coventry were in place by January 1941 and were decommissioned in the summer of 1944. This decoy site is known to have been in use during 1942 and 1943. Aerial photography shows that by 1946 the site had been given over to agricultural use and no features of the decoy survive. Eathorpe was one of seven civil bombing decoy sites for Coventry.