How Sussex inspired Ian Fleming to create 007 and where it features in the James Bond films

Not only has Sussex been used for film locations, it is the exploits of the Littlehampton-based 30 Assault Unit that became the real-life inspiration for James Bond.

Author Ian Fleming created the charismatic British secret agent, working for MI6 under the codename 007, and his novels were brought to the screen in Dr No, the first James Bond film, receiving its world premiere on October 5, 1962.

Over the past 60 years, Bond has been welcomed in both West Sussex and East Sussex, with filming locations including Amberley Museum and Beachy Head.

The old Chalk Pits and Quarry Tunnel at Amberley Museum were transformed as one of the main filming locations for the 1985 James Bond film A View to a Kill.

They became the fictional Main Strike Mine during filming in September 1984 and the 40th anniversary will be celebrated with a special James Bond at Amberley event on Sunday, September 1. Visitors will be able to see objects from the museum’s collection that took on starring roles in the film.

The camera crews came to Amberley for the Roger Moore's seventh and final outing as the famous spy. The plot focused on America's Silicon Valley and a grave threat to the San Francisco area.

Sussex played a key role in helping the story along – a tale which involved Bond legends including May Day, Miss Moneypenny and Christopher Walken's Max Zorin.

Over the years, fans have gathered at Amberley to see the film location and find out how it has changed. More than 30 fans, regular listeners and subscribers to leading podcast James Bond Radio visited the underground mine in 2017 and were filmed sat in the actual mine carts used in the film.

It was Beachy Head’s turn for a bit of the Bond limelight when The Living Daylights headed to East Sussex a few years later. This time, Bond’s mission was to organise the defection of a top Soviet general. When the general was re-captured, Bond headed off to find out why an ally of General Koskov was sent to murder him. Along the way, in the film’s opening sequence, a jeep went over Beachy Head.

And it is not just Sussex locations that can be linked to James Bond, there are people, too. Lashana Lynch, who played MI6 agent Nomi in the James Bond film No Time to Die, made an appearance at Chichester Festival Theatre’s Minerva Theatre in 2015, opposite Lenny Henry, in Educating Rita.

Perhaps our proudest link to James Bond, though, is with Ian Fleming himself, as the author founded and commanded the Royal Marines 30 Assault Unit in Littlehampton during 1944.

After training in Littlehampton and landing on Utah Beach on D-Day, the unit went on to seize the entire German naval archive, later used as evidence in the Nuremberg trials.