The wartime anti-tank defence line which protected Colchester from attack from the south, crossed Shrub End Road on the bend where Norman Way and Boadicea Avenue now run. Supported by written contemporary records, aerial photographs from 1946/7 give some indication of the defences around the crossing but the exact route of the anti-tank ditches and the formation of the concrete anti-tank defences has to be deduced from the soil marks of the ditches and the scattered cubes lying on both sides of the road.

The anti-tank ditch from the NW probably ended at a pillbox (SMR 20528) at TL 9791 2395, some 40 yards from Shrub End Road. From here it is thought likely that spaced-out concrete blocks, linked by steel cable, crossed the ground to the roadside. Across the carriageway, a removable "socket and railway line" obstacle was a standard road barrier. On the S side of Shrub End Road a row of concrete cubes probably connected the road barrier and the re-commencement of the ditch at around TL 9797 2389. Although some of this is supposition, it is thought to be reasonably accurate, conforming to the evidence seen on the aerial photographs.