“The Needles were a site of a long standing artillery battery, from the 1860s to 1954, which was eventually decommissioned.
“A nearby site on High Down was employed in the testing of rockets for the British ICBM programme. The headland at High Down was used for Black Knight and Black Arrow rocket engine tests from 1956–71. During the peak of activity in the early 1960s some 240 people worked at the complex, while the rockets were built in nearby East Cowes. These rockets were later used to launch the Prospero X-3 satellite.”
