Wolverhampton 7 hours ago. Sorry, we are not accepting comments on this article. Wolverhampton 8 hours ago. Peter Rhodes 12 hours ago. Readers' letters 12 hours ago. Peter Rhodes Nov 11, Birmingham 12 hours ago. Mind you, you will need to book ahead as admission is by arranged, guided tour only, more on that below. Shadow factories was a British concept that took hold in the s. The idea was to mix knowledge and machinery between industries so that each would mutually benefit.
The tunnels proved very useful during WW2 as they immediately lent themselves to the production of aircraft and tank engines. As the long frost of the Cold War set in, the Drakelow Tunnels took on yet another purpose.
In the British Government started converting the complex into a top-secret facility named Regional Seat of Government 9 R.
By the complex was re-designated R. With the government out by the mid-nineties, the tunnels and all of the remaining somewhat obsolete equipment went into private ownership. In more recent years, however, the Drakelow Tunnels Preservation Trust has been working tirelessly to restore the complex and transform it into a fascinating Cold War Museum. Turning the complex into a family-friendly museum has proved to be a slow process. Some sections are open to visitors, however, as already mentioned these can only be conducted via organized tours that occur on set dates.
To find out when these are you need to visit the Save Drakelow Facebook page. Here, you will be given information on upcoming tours and whether spaces are available. They have a strict person limit and due to the sporadic nature of the open days, these sell out fast. You will also be allocated a time, as the people are split into tour groups throughout the day. Payment is by cash on the day and they ask that you bring the correct amount if possible. Mr Stokes first went in 10 years ago on the pretence of buying it.
The reality was more mundane. Mr Stokes and his friends have found one level covering 53 acres and no evidence of secret chambers or munitions. When it was built as one of the four national "shadow factories" to keep the war effort going, Rover employed people making engines for Sunderland flying boats and Blenheim bombers. The complex was thought large enough to relocate much of the essential midlands industry. Most of the hard labour was completed by prisoners of war from the surrounding concentration camps of Walbrzych County.
The centrepiece of Project Riese would have been a far older building — the 13th-Century Ksiaz Castle in the city of Walbryzch. The last private owners were the Hochberg family, who lost possession of the castle in to the Nazi party after falling into debt. To make the castle suitable for military occupation, two levels of tunnels were bored 53m ft under the courtyard and joined to the train line at Lubiechow by a narrow gauge railway — allowing direct access by rail into the castle.
Top-secret military construction did not end with World War Two. In , as the Cold War bloomed, the UK government began to build 15 fortified war rooms across the country. But in the case of the much bigger threat of a nuclear attack, these buildings would not have been enough to protect their inhabitants.
They also were built too close to the major cities which could have been a target for an attack: five were built in London, for example. Having seen the effect of a nuclear attack in Japan, the British government commissioned the Strath Committee, led by head of the Central War Plans Secretariat William Strath, to analyse the potential effects of a nuclear attack on the UK. Food and water would be contaminated, the NHS would be overwhelmed with four million serious casualties and 12 million deaths, and industry would shut down.
Strath recommended the UK invest in a network of nuclear bunkers to protect the population. With such a prohibitively expensive cost, a compromise was reached. Padmore and Strath recognised the need to build multiple headquarters underground. In the event of a nuclear attack on London, power would pass to local heads of government who would control fragments of the UK from inside their nuclear bunker.
These bunkers would become Regional Seats of Government RSG — where a staff of anywhere from a few dozen to a few hundred people would continue the administrative work of the area. From here, public service notices could be broadcast from BBC studios deep in the bunkers to the public outside, keeping them up to date. In case of attack, announcements would have been broadcast from a machine like this one, which was donated by a BBC Radio station and is not the original Credit: William Park.
To find suitable locations for these bunkers, Padmore looked for sites far enough away from populated areas to not be at risk of a direct hit, deep enough underground to protect the inhabitants from nuclear fallout but still practical enough to support life for months at a time.
The Drakelow tunnels were a perfect fit. But this is how the public would have been reassured that the government was still running the country.
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