Fake 16

Spotted round the back of one of the larger buildings in the courtyard of the fort at Puckpool, near Ryde. A fort which used to contain large guns defending the approaches to Portsmouth Harbour, possibly in the first instance against the designs of the third Napoleon. Ironic that this last should wind his life up, in exile, here.

The guns were of the naval variety but it was not clear whether the fort was operated by the army or the navy. I recall that Churchill, at the beginning of the first world war, deployed a Royal Navy division to Antwerp to help the Belgians try to stop the Germans grabbing the port, so our navy clearly had land capability.

A building which mainly houses a café, mainly occupied at the time of our visit by dog people and their dogs, which did not encourage us to eat there. But there was a partially deconstructed tent round the back which appeared to have recently done service for a wedding. With the fake in question being the garlands of artificial flowers wound around the posts holding up the veranda.

To my mind, rather an innocent bit of faking. A desire to brighten the place up without going to the bother and expense of real flowers.