Military citadels under London
Encyclopedia
A number of military
citadel
s are known to have been constructed underground in central London
, dating mostly from the Second World War and the Cold War
. Unlike traditional above-ground citadels, these sites are primarily secure centres for defence coordination.
It is already well known that a large network of tunnels exists below London for a variety of communications, civil defence and military purposes. It is much less clear how these tunnels, and the various facilities linked to them, fit together, if at all. Even the number and nature of these facilities is unclear; only a few have been officially admitted to.
—and arguably in Britain—is Pindar, a bunker built beneath the Ministry of Defence
on Whitehall
. Its construction, which took ten years and reportedly cost £126.3 million, finally came to a conclusion in 1994, but Pindar became operational two years earlier, in 1992. The high cost became the subject of some controversy in the early 1990s. Much of the cost overrun was related to the facility's computer equipment, which proved extremely difficult to install due to the very limited degree of physical access to the site.
Pindar's main function is to serve as a crisis management and communications centre, principally between the MOD headquarters and the actual centre of military operations, the Permanent Joint Headquarters
in Northwood. It is reported to be connected to Downing Street
and the Cabinet Office
by a tunnel under Whitehall
. In addition, despite rumours, armed Forces Minister Jeremy Hanley
told the House of Commons
on 29 April 1994 that "the facility is not connected to any transport system."
Although Pindar is not open to the public, it has had some public exposure. In the 2003 BBC
documentary on the Iraq conflict
, Fighting the War, BBC cameras were allowed into the facility to film a small part of a teleconference
between ministers and military commanders. Also, in 2008 the British photographer David Moore published his series of photographs, The Last Things, widely believed to be an extensive photographic survey of Pindar.
The name Pindar
is taken from the ancient Greek
poet, whose house alone was left standing after his city was razed.
The Admiralty Citadel, London's most visible military citadel, is located just behind the Admiralty
building on Horse Guards Parade
. It was constructed in 1940-1941 as a bomb-proof operations centre for the Admiralty, with foundations 30 feet (nine metres) deep and a concrete roof 20 feet (six metres) thick. It is also linked by tunnels to government buildings in Whitehall.
Sir Winston Churchill described it in his memoirs as a "vast monstrosity which weighs upon the Horse Guards Parade" - and Russian vine has been encouraged to cover it in an apparent attempt to soften its harsh appearance. Its brutal functionality speaks of a very practical purpose; in the event of a German invasion, it was intended that the building would become a fortress, with loopholed firing positions provided to fend off attackers.
In 1992 the Admiralty communications centre was established here as the stone frigate
HMS St Vincent, which became MARCOMM COMCEN (St Vincent) in 1998. The Admiralty Citadel is still used today by the Ministry of Defence
.
The only central London citadel currently open to the public is the Cabinet War Rooms, located in Horse Guards Road in the basement of what is now HM Treasury
. This was not a purpose-built citadel but was instead a reinforced adaptation of an existing basement built many years before. The War Rooms were constructed in 1938 and were heavily used by Winston Churchill
during World War II
. However, the Cabinet War Rooms were vulnerable to a direct hit and were abandoned not long after the war. The Cabinet War Rooms were a secret to all civilians until their opening to the public in 1984. They are now maintained by the Imperial War Museum
.
The section of the War Rooms open to the public is in fact only a portion of a much larger facility. They originally covered three acres (1.2 hectares) and housed a staff of up to 528 people, with facilities including a canteen, hospital, shooting range and dormitories. The centrepiece of the War Rooms is the Cabinet Room itself, where Churchill's War Cabinet met. The Map Room is located nearby, from where the course of the war was directed. It is still in much the same condition as when it was abandoned, with the original maps still on the walls and telephones lining the desks. Churchill slept in a small bedroom nearby. There was a telephone room down the corridor that provided a direct line to the White House
in Washington, DC, via a special scrambler in an annexe basement of Selfridges department store.
The facility was built in a 12 ft (3.7 m) diameter tunnel during World War II, and extends under Whitehall from Trafalgar Square to King Charles Street. The project was known as 'Post Office scheme 2845'. A detailed description, with photographs, was published just after the war in the January 1946 edition of The Post Office Electrical Engineers' Journal.
Sites equipped with unusual amounts of GPO/BT telecommunications plant are given a BT site engineering code
. This site's code was QWHI, and this is presumably the origin of the name Q-Whitehall.
The site provided protected accommodation for the lines and terminal equipment serving the most important government departments, civil and military, to ensure the command and control of the war could continue despite heavy bombing of London.
At the northern end, the tunnel connects to a shaft up to the former Trafalgar Square tube station (now merged with the Charing Cross station), and to the BT deep level cable tunnels which were built under much of London during the Cold War
. At the southern end, an 8 ft (2.4 m) diameter extension (Scheme 2845A) connects to a shaft under Court 6 of the Treasury Building: this provided the protected route from the Cabinet War Room. The 8 ft (2.4 m) tunnel was further extended (Scheme 2845B) to the Marsham Street Rotundas
.
Access to the tunnel is gained via an 8 ft (2.4 m) lateral tunnel and a lift shaft in the nearby Whitehall telephone exchange in Craig's Court.
Spur tunnels, 5 ft (1.5 m) in diameter, were built to provide protected cable routes to the major service buildings either side of Whitehall.
The Whitehall tunnels appear to have been extended in the early 1950s. Some official documents refer to a Scheme 3245: this is the only numbered tunnel scheme that has never been officially revealed or located by researchers. Files in the National Archives which may relate to this have been closed for 75 years and will not be opened until the 2020s.
The journalist Duncan Campbell
managed to get into the BT deep level cable tunnels below London, and described his adventure in a New Statesman
article in 1980. He found a (closed) entrance to Q-Whitehall below Trafalgar Square
. He has since put some pictures of this trip on a web site.
Military
A military is an organization authorized by its greater society to use lethal force, usually including use of weapons, in defending its country by combating actual or perceived threats. The military may have additional functions of use to its greater society, such as advancing a political agenda e.g...
citadel
Citadel
A citadel is a fortress for protecting a town, sometimes incorporating a castle. The term derives from the same Latin root as the word "city", civis, meaning citizen....
s are known to have been constructed underground in central London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, dating mostly from the Second World War and the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
. Unlike traditional above-ground citadels, these sites are primarily secure centres for defence coordination.
It is already well known that a large network of tunnels exists below London for a variety of communications, civil defence and military purposes. It is much less clear how these tunnels, and the various facilities linked to them, fit together, if at all. Even the number and nature of these facilities is unclear; only a few have been officially admitted to.
Pindar
The most important military citadel in central LondonCentral London
Central London is the innermost part of London, England. There is no official or commonly accepted definition of its area, but its characteristics are understood to include a high density built environment, high land values, an elevated daytime population and a concentration of regionally,...
—and arguably in Britain—is Pindar, a bunker built beneath the Ministry of Defence
Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom)
The Ministry of Defence is the United Kingdom government department responsible for implementation of government defence policy and is the headquarters of the British Armed Forces....
on Whitehall
Whitehall
Whitehall is a road in Westminster, in London, England. It is the main artery running north from Parliament Square, towards Charing Cross at the southern end of Trafalgar Square...
. Its construction, which took ten years and reportedly cost £126.3 million, finally came to a conclusion in 1994, but Pindar became operational two years earlier, in 1992. The high cost became the subject of some controversy in the early 1990s. Much of the cost overrun was related to the facility's computer equipment, which proved extremely difficult to install due to the very limited degree of physical access to the site.
Pindar's main function is to serve as a crisis management and communications centre, principally between the MOD headquarters and the actual centre of military operations, the Permanent Joint Headquarters
Permanent Joint Headquarters
The Permanent Joint Headquarters is the British tri-service headquarters from where all overseas military operations are planned and controlled. It is situated at Northwood Headquarters in Northwood, London....
in Northwood. It is reported to be connected to Downing Street
Downing Street
Downing Street in London, England has for over two hundred years housed the official residences of two of the most senior British cabinet ministers: the First Lord of the Treasury, an office now synonymous with that of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and the Second Lord of the Treasury, an...
and the Cabinet Office
Cabinet Office
The Cabinet Office is a department of the Government of the United Kingdom responsible for supporting the Prime Minister and Cabinet of the United Kingdom....
by a tunnel under Whitehall
Whitehall
Whitehall is a road in Westminster, in London, England. It is the main artery running north from Parliament Square, towards Charing Cross at the southern end of Trafalgar Square...
. In addition, despite rumours, armed Forces Minister Jeremy Hanley
Jeremy Hanley
Sir Jeremy James Hanley, KCMG , is a politician and chartered accountant from the United Kingdom. He served as the Chairman of the Conservative Party from 1994-95, and as a Member of Parliament representing the constituency of Richmond and Barnes from 1983-97.Hanley was educated at Rugby School,...
told the House of Commons
British House of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...
on 29 April 1994 that "the facility is not connected to any transport system."
Although Pindar is not open to the public, it has had some public exposure. In the 2003 BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
documentary on the Iraq conflict
2003 invasion of Iraq
The 2003 invasion of Iraq , was the start of the conflict known as the Iraq War, or Operation Iraqi Freedom, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 21 days of major combat operations...
, Fighting the War, BBC cameras were allowed into the facility to film a small part of a teleconference
Teleconference
A teleconference or teleseminar is the live exchange and mass articulation of information among several persons and machines remote from one another but linked by a telecommunications system...
between ministers and military commanders. Also, in 2008 the British photographer David Moore published his series of photographs, The Last Things, widely believed to be an extensive photographic survey of Pindar.
The name Pindar
Pindar
Pindar , was an Ancient Greek lyric poet. Of the canonical nine lyric poets of ancient Greece, his work is the best preserved. Quintilian described him as "by far the greatest of the nine lyric poets, in virtue of his inspired magnificence, the beauty of his thoughts and figures, the rich...
is taken from the ancient Greek
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...
poet, whose house alone was left standing after his city was razed.
Admiralty Citadel
Admiralty
The Admiralty was formerly the authority in the Kingdom of England, and later in the United Kingdom, responsible for the command of the Royal Navy...
building on Horse Guards Parade
Horse Guards Parade
Horse Guards Parade is a large parade ground off Whitehall in central London, at grid reference . It is the site of the annual ceremonies of Trooping the Colour, which commemorates the monarch's official birthday, and Beating Retreat.-History:...
. It was constructed in 1940-1941 as a bomb-proof operations centre for the Admiralty, with foundations 30 feet (nine metres) deep and a concrete roof 20 feet (six metres) thick. It is also linked by tunnels to government buildings in Whitehall.
Sir Winston Churchill described it in his memoirs as a "vast monstrosity which weighs upon the Horse Guards Parade" - and Russian vine has been encouraged to cover it in an apparent attempt to soften its harsh appearance. Its brutal functionality speaks of a very practical purpose; in the event of a German invasion, it was intended that the building would become a fortress, with loopholed firing positions provided to fend off attackers.
In 1992 the Admiralty communications centre was established here as the stone frigate
Stone frigate
Stone frigate is a nickname for a naval establishment on land. The term has its origin in Britain's Royal Navy after its use of Diamond Rock, off Martinique, as a 'sloop of war' to harass the French...
HMS St Vincent, which became MARCOMM COMCEN (St Vincent) in 1998. The Admiralty Citadel is still used today by the Ministry of Defence
Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom)
The Ministry of Defence is the United Kingdom government department responsible for implementation of government defence policy and is the headquarters of the British Armed Forces....
.
Cabinet War Rooms
HM Treasury
HM Treasury, in full Her Majesty's Treasury, informally The Treasury, is the United Kingdom government department responsible for developing and executing the British government's public finance policy and economic policy...
. This was not a purpose-built citadel but was instead a reinforced adaptation of an existing basement built many years before. The War Rooms were constructed in 1938 and were heavily used by Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. However, the Cabinet War Rooms were vulnerable to a direct hit and were abandoned not long after the war. The Cabinet War Rooms were a secret to all civilians until their opening to the public in 1984. They are now maintained by the Imperial War Museum
Imperial War Museum
Imperial War Museum is a British national museum organisation with branches at five locations in England, three of which are in London. The museum was founded during the First World War in 1917 and intended as a record of the war effort and sacrifice of Britain and her Empire...
.
The section of the War Rooms open to the public is in fact only a portion of a much larger facility. They originally covered three acres (1.2 hectares) and housed a staff of up to 528 people, with facilities including a canteen, hospital, shooting range and dormitories. The centrepiece of the War Rooms is the Cabinet Room itself, where Churchill's War Cabinet met. The Map Room is located nearby, from where the course of the war was directed. It is still in much the same condition as when it was abandoned, with the original maps still on the walls and telephones lining the desks. Churchill slept in a small bedroom nearby. There was a telephone room down the corridor that provided a direct line to the White House
White House
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
in Washington, DC, via a special scrambler in an annexe basement of Selfridges department store.
Q-Whitehall
Q-Whitehall is the (possibly unofficial) name given to a communications facility under Whitehall.The facility was built in a 12 ft (3.7 m) diameter tunnel during World War II, and extends under Whitehall from Trafalgar Square to King Charles Street. The project was known as 'Post Office scheme 2845'. A detailed description, with photographs, was published just after the war in the January 1946 edition of The Post Office Electrical Engineers' Journal.
Sites equipped with unusual amounts of GPO/BT telecommunications plant are given a BT site engineering code
BT site engineering code
A BT site engineering code is a group of letters assigned by BT, or its predecessor the General Post Office, to a physical location which is equipped by the company with unusual amounts or types of telecommunications....
. This site's code was QWHI, and this is presumably the origin of the name Q-Whitehall.
The site provided protected accommodation for the lines and terminal equipment serving the most important government departments, civil and military, to ensure the command and control of the war could continue despite heavy bombing of London.
At the northern end, the tunnel connects to a shaft up to the former Trafalgar Square tube station (now merged with the Charing Cross station), and to the BT deep level cable tunnels which were built under much of London during the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
. At the southern end, an 8 ft (2.4 m) diameter extension (Scheme 2845A) connects to a shaft under Court 6 of the Treasury Building: this provided the protected route from the Cabinet War Room. The 8 ft (2.4 m) tunnel was further extended (Scheme 2845B) to the Marsham Street Rotundas
Marsham Towers
The Marsham Towers were three towers at the corner of Marsham Street and Great Peter Street in Westminster, London. They served as the headquarters of the Department of the Environment.-Redevelopment:The redevelopment of the site was long planned...
.
Access to the tunnel is gained via an 8 ft (2.4 m) lateral tunnel and a lift shaft in the nearby Whitehall telephone exchange in Craig's Court.
Spur tunnels, 5 ft (1.5 m) in diameter, were built to provide protected cable routes to the major service buildings either side of Whitehall.
The Whitehall tunnels appear to have been extended in the early 1950s. Some official documents refer to a Scheme 3245: this is the only numbered tunnel scheme that has never been officially revealed or located by researchers. Files in the National Archives which may relate to this have been closed for 75 years and will not be opened until the 2020s.
The journalist Duncan Campbell
Duncan Campbell (investigative journalist)
Duncan Campbell is a British freelance investigative journalist, author and television producer who, since 1975, has specialised in the subjects of intelligence and security services, defence, policing, civil liberties and, latterly, computer forensics. He was a staff writer at the New Statesman...
managed to get into the BT deep level cable tunnels below London, and described his adventure in a New Statesman
New Statesman
New Statesman is a British centre-left political and cultural magazine published weekly in London. Founded in 1913, and connected with leading members of the Fabian Society, the magazine reached a circulation peak in the late 1960s....
article in 1980. He found a (closed) entrance to Q-Whitehall below Trafalgar Square
Trafalgar Square
Trafalgar Square is a public space and tourist attraction in central London, England, United Kingdom. At its centre is Nelson's Column, which is guarded by four lion statues at its base. There are a number of statues and sculptures in the square, with one plinth displaying changing pieces of...
. He has since put some pictures of this trip on a web site.
See also
- Fortifications of LondonFortifications of LondonThe fortifications of London are extensive and mostly well maintained, though many of the City of London's fortifications and defences were dismantled in the 17th and 18th century...
- TURNSTILETurnstileA turnstile, also called a baffle gate, is a form of gate which allows one person to pass at a time. It can also be made so as to enforce one-way traffic of people, and in addition, it can restrict passage only to people who insert a coin, a ticket, a pass, or similar...
- a city-sized shelter beneath WiltshireWiltshireWiltshire is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset, Somerset, Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire. It contains the unitary authority of Swindon and covers... - Subterranean LondonSubterranean LondonThe metropolis of London has been occupied for millennia, and has over that time acquired a large number of subterranean structures.These have served a number of purposes:-Water and waste:Since its foundation, the Thames has been at the heart of London...
- Civil defence centres in LondonCivil defence centres in LondonDuring the Cold War every London Borough was obliged to have a Civil Defence centre. These were controversial structures as it was widely believed that planning for the aftermath of nuclear war was both expensive and pointless....
- Paddock (war rooms)Paddock (war rooms)Paddock is the codeword for an alternative Cabinet War Room bunker for Winston Churchill's World War II government located in Dollis Hill, North West London under the Post Office Research Station. It was constructed in 1939 but only rarely used during the war, with only two meetings of the War...
External links
- Churchill Museum and Cabinet War Rooms on the Imperial War Museum site