(CNN) — Some 73 ft under the site visitors and bustle of London’s Piccadilly lies a silent warren of corridors and pitch-black rooms, hardly ever seen, hardly ever visited, however which performed an important position in the middle of Twentieth-century historical past.
Now, the chance has come spherical once more to slide behind the door of the deserted Dover Road Tube station and descend by torchlight into the World Struggle II hideaway from which campaigns such because the D-Day landings and the Dunkirk evacuation had been coordinated.
Britain’s Prime Minister Winston Churchill sheltered right here — in secret — in November and December 1940, when the German bombing marketing campaign referred to as The Blitz was at its top, and a staff of 40 workers labored right here day and evening on the warfare effort.
CNN Journey received a preview of the expertise, forward of a brand new batch of London Transport Museum’s Hidden London excursions occurring sale on December 3.
A great bunker
Tickets for the most recent Down Road excursions go on sale on December 3.
Dan Kitwood/Getty Photographs
Historian and information Siddy Holloway meets us at floor stage, the place the distinctive Leslie Inexperienced oxblood-tiled arches of the facade are nonetheless the identical as on the many different well-known Edwardian Tube stations he designed, together with Covent Backyard and Russell Sq..
Down Road opened in 1907 and served the Piccadilly line however by 1932 it had already closed. Within the coronary heart of prosperous Mayfair, a brief strolling distance from what are actually Hyde Park Nook and Inexperienced Park tube stations, it was an underused station. As well as, it was notably deep underground and there have been lengthy passageways taking it underneath the busy Piccadilly thoroughfare.
Nonetheless, after seven years of disuse, explains Holloway, “All the issues that made it not viable as a station made it completely good for secret bunkers in the course of the Second World Struggle.”
When warfare was declared in 1939, Down Road was transformed in a matter of days into the brand new headquarters of the Railway Government Committee. The REC acted as an middleman between the Struggle Workplace and Britain’s rail corporations and could be essential to the motion of troops, horses and gear within the combat forward.
Underground places of work
Descending to the platforms at the moment, it’s nonetheless clear that it is a Tube station like no different. Historic signage factors the way in which “To Workplaces” and the “Committee Room,” the draftsman’s pencil marks nonetheless seen in some areas. Mustard-colored plasterboard clings to the tiles — vestiges of an try and create an office-like atmosphere — whereas the ground has been leveled to create the typing pool the place as much as eight secretaries would sit and clack at their keys.
Employees lived and labored down right here, working shifts of as much as 12 hours, usually in a single day, maybe solely surfacing for air within the higher world each ten to 14 days. Dirty baths and bogs are what stays of the washroom services, whereas soot obscures the patterned wallpaper within the government sleeping quarters.
Nonetheless, there was opulence right here, after a vogue. “Bunkers and shelters had been off-rations in the course of the warfare,” says Holloway. A a lot larger class of meals was to be loved right here than by civilians above floor. The REC was the identical firm behind Britain’s many grand railway accommodations, and the workers right here had been capable of dine on crystal eating ware and wash at Royal Doulton sinks.
There was a totally staffed kitchen and two mess rooms, with ready workers as effectively, and 27,000 meals had been ready and eaten right here annually.
Brandy and cigars
The Struggle Rooms, only a mile or so from Down Road, on the opposite facet of Buckingham Palace, had been underground however weren’t bomb-proof. “In the event that they obtained a direct hit, you’d obliterate everybody in there,” says Holloway. “By November 1940, folks [had] began fearing for the lifetime of Winston Churchill.”
Ralph Wedgwood, chairman of the Down Road facility and brother of the British member of parliament Josiah Wedgwood, satisfied Churchill to come back to Down Road “as a result of it’s so near the seat of energy,” says Holloway. It’s very comfy, It’s very non-public, it’s very effectively provisioned with brandy and cigars and issues like that.”
Churchill stayed in a single day down right here at the very least 5 instances within the winter of 1940, having been sneaked in at floor stage after which, once more, his presence hidden from a lot of the Down Road workers. Whereas he slept on a modest camp mattress, within the government mess room, at the very least, he was capable of dwell life effectively. The civil servant John Colville recalled in his diaries that at Down Road they had been handled to caviar, Perrier-Jouet Champagne and 1865 brandy.
London’s disused stations
All through the London Underground, you’re one step away from a secret Labyrinth of forgotten tunnels and shafts
The opposite Hidden London excursions that are restarting for the primary time since March 2020 are of the disused stations and tunnels at Euston, Moorgate and Aldwych, all of which have their very own distinctive character and histories.
Aldwych, probably the most well-known, supplied shelter to peculiar Londoners in the course of the Blitz, and has been used for movie and TV shoots together with “Darkest Hour” and “Sherlock”.
The Down Road excursions are the very best priced, at £85 for adults and £80 concessions ($112 and $106), whereas the opposite station excursions are £41.50 full-price and £36.50 concessions.
The Down Road and Euston excursions run on chosen dates between January 15 and February 13, 2022, whereas the Moorgate and Aldwych excursions will happen on chosen dates between March 2 and 27, 2022.
Should you miss out on the station journeys, there are additionally strolling excursions above floor and the Hidden London exhibition on the London Transport Museum in Covent Backyard.
