Watford Air Raid Shelter (Pic Heavy)

[adam.h]

Recently discovered this air raid shelter near to where I live. It is pitch black in there, and was a late plan so only had a tiny torch between the 3 of us! haha

I was expecting it to be pretty small and trashed but it was much bigger than I had thought and in pretty good condition. Dont think many people know about it which is good!

Anyhoo, one of my first explores...

Main Entrance

Inside the main entrance

Rabbit hutch spider. Loads of them. bloody huge too. Had to turn back and go in another entrance at one point as there where too many and they where mashoooosive. I have a serious fear of spiders.

Another entrance

Out on top

These used to be benches and run along all the walls apparently

Paint cans

More broken benches

only bit of electrical work left

Entrance / Exit from the inside bricked up

The Bunker from the field

 

[Engineer]

Air Raid Shelter.

Nice pics and very interesting, is it anywhere near the canal?

 

[RedDave]

Wow. Just goes to show that there are interesting places to go even in Watford. Good find, and in surprisingly good nick too.

 

[Goldie87]

That looks quite good, its not often you see the benches remaining in place

 

[fluffy5518]

Nice one Adam !! I love finding air raid shelters (so much social history) and i expect that every town-on the bombing routes-had them.Great report mate THANX !!!

 

[phill.d]

Excellent stuff.
I really like the old entrance as it slopes down. A bit like a big ships chimney. It's great the old signage is still there too.
Good to see under Watford.

Nice one!

 

[Kaputnik]

Great find!

 

[adam.h]

Cheers, it is not too far from the canal

Apparently they are supposed to go on a lot further one of the other peeps I was on with used to go there years ago and an old gardener told him about them and how much more tunneling there is supposed to be. Who knows.

 

[chris]

Really nice looking site - thanks for the report

 

[outkast]

Nice report mate and cracking pics, thanks for posting

 

[outkast]

Went and took a look at these today, crack shelter, wich seemed to go forever, found the original latrines too, well worth a look if you are in the area, there are three other shelters on the site as the plan below from 1941 shows, wether they are accessable I dont know but there were too many golfers and members of staff around today so may need further investigation, the red circle on the plan shows the shelters that are the subject of this thread, the others in green.

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

Nice pics, I wouldn't consider it pic heavy at all (Y)

The HDR is pretty overdone though, but as I'd imagine your just starting out, its something you'll tone down after more trying with it, if your using Photomatix, try to never put the light smoothing below 'Medium', ideally keeping it it 'high' or 'max' and adjusing other settings

Subtly is the key!

 

[Engineer]

Air Raid Shelter.

Looks like one of the unexplored shelters has been redeveloped, see link.

http://atlas.freshlogicstudios.com/?cp=51.67656206557797~-0.43717056512834307&style=h&lvl=18

 

[adam.h]

Cool, I may have a scout for the other ones next weekend then and see if they are still there.
No these are not HDR images. I was just going for and eery look to them.

 

[chris]

They are great shelters Adam - thanks for letting us know about them. Never seen that style of construction before.

Very few spiders really

 

[adam.h]

haha for me there was too many
I am actually able to scream if a spider lands on or near me

 

[adam.h]

so we went back today and walked around the golf course. Looked a bit out of place carrying torches and a camera and not wearing funny checkered trousers But it seems that all the other shelters have been removed when they did the golf course which is a shame.

 

[CitadelMonkey]

Is this shelter in the grounds of the current Grove hotel?

 

[adam.h]

Is this shelter in the grounds of the current Grove hotel?

Yea, right by part of the golf course and a few buildings.

 

[CitadelMonkey]

I did a big 2 day conference there last year and have just looked into my files from that event. The Grove during WW2 was actually the secret wartime HQ for the London, Midland & Scottish Railway. The shelters were built to house the troops and railway personnel that were stationed there.

Be aware that the 6 shelters that remain on the Grove estate house a large colony of rare bats and disturbing them is a criminal offence so beware if you venture down there again.