Cross Hill, Ascension Island

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Cross Hill
St Helena, Ascension
and Tristan da Cunha
ST. MARY'S CHURCH - ASCENSION ISLAND.jpg
Cross Hill behind St Mary's Church
Ascension Island
Summit: 863 feet

Cross Hill is a lone hill of 863 feet just outside Georgetown in the western part of Ascension Island, the northernmost isle of St Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha. It rises behind the island's one hotel, the Obsidian Hotel.

There is a Second World War shore battery on Cross Hill, Fort Bedford, which still has its two naval guns mounted. In 1941 the battery fired on a German submarine that had been sent to prey on shipping by the island, forcing it to withdraw: this was the only military action Ascension saw during the war. On the landward side is the island's golf course.

The hill is, like the landscape about it, a bare place, a hill of volcanic rubble and dust without tree nor grass upon it. It provides though a view over Georgetown and the other bare hills of the west of the island, including Sisters Peak and Lady Hill to the east, beyond which rises the greener massif of Green Mountain.

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