Churchill's Subterranean WWII Bunker in London | Hacker News Reader

Churchill's Subterranean WWII Bunker in London

atlasobscura.com

92 pointspepys28 comments

I've taken this tour, the amount of preservation and history down there is amazing.

One of the most interesting things was a room that was explained to everyone as "Churchill's private bathroom". It was a small closet and the door even had a "FREE/ENGAGED" lock on it, taken from an airplane lavatory. You wouldn't dare enter or knock on a bathroom door that said ENGAGED, especially one belonging to Churchill would you?

http://www.timetravelturtle.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/L...

Behind the door was Churchill's SIGSALY terminal, a private encrypted voice line between the UK and terminals at the US Pentagon and White House.

http://www.timetravelturtle.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/L...

SIGSALY was the descendent of the Bell Labs "Voder", which was the first attempt at electronically synthesized human speech.

https://www.nsa.gov/about/cryptologic-heritage/historical-fi...

1939 Voder Demonstration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rAyrmm7vv0

The Voder eventually gave birth to the Vocoder and other developments beyond.

Voder is amazing. I remember when I was a kid finding out that the BBC micros had speach synth, and it sounded a lot like that. It seemed at the time to be more advanced than I had learned to expect from other gadgets.

... the door even had a "FREE/ENGAGED" lock on it, taken from an airplane lavatory.

In the 40s? I'm betting it came from a train. Some phone booths from those days, the sort you might find in a hotel rather than on the street, also had similar mechanisms.

I've done this and wholeheartedly agree. My other tip: Ottawa's diefenbunker.

> You wouldn't dare enter or knock on a bathroom door that said ENGAGED, especially one belonging to Churchill would you?

Eh...I would. A huge part of my family was wiped out because of Churchill's machinations leading to the Bengal famine. My grandfather was able to move south with the sacrifice of his siblings.

Churchill's actions put him in the grey area for me.

Thanks for saying that. I get tired of the constant lionisation of Churchill.

I remember my father, who was in the RAF in WW2, pointing out that a lot of people in the UK hated Churchill - they respected him as a war leader but didn't want him running the country after the war as it would mean a return to the pre-war status quo. This perhaps explains who he wasn't elected as PM in the 1945 general election - picking a Labour government under Clement Attlee that delivered things like the NHS.

I was talking more about his staff down in the CWR during wartime.

But I hear you.

Can also recommend The Crown on Netflix, with American actor John Lithgow masterfully interpreting the Old British Bulldog. There's even an entire episode devoted to the affair of Sutherland's portrait commemorating Churchill's 80th birthday, considered one of the art world's great lost masterpieces:

Secret of Winston Churchill's unpopular Sutherland portrait revealed

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/winston-churchill/11730850/S...

I second this recommendation. I think Claire has a very strong performance as Elizabeth.

It's a tour worth about an hour. The restoration has been done well.

There's a small electric bell near the exit marked, with wartime understatement, "Immediate danger overhead if bell is ringing".

What I found most interesting was that it was right in the middle of London. You'd think that his bunker would be out in the countryside far way from the attacks of the blitz. But then again, I guess he needed to be close to the politicians and the decision-makers. To me, it looked like after the war was over, they all just got up and walked away...

It's been a few years since I took the tour, but I think the staff largely did just kind of get up and walk away. People stuck around for a few days but slowly stopped showing up as they realized there wasn't any need to hide in the bunker anymore. This allowed the bunker to be preserved largely as it looked while in-use, which was my favorite part to see.

I was somewhat surprised at the level of secrecy around the location, given that it was a couple hundred yards from what I would assume were actual known targets. A stray bomb could have hit it totally by accident.

I believe Syria's President Assad would understand why Churchill stayed put in the capital. In the current Syria situation President Assad stays put with his family because if he was to move then that would show he has lost confidence in his armed forces and their ability to free the country from the terrorists/defend the capital.

Saddam Hussein was probably in the same boat when the same neo-cons/neo-liberals wanted regime change, Iraq was given the chance to hand him over but he chose to stay put.

Taking flight from the capital didn't work out for Gaddafi, sometimes the hardened bunker under the known palace is the only option. Moving is tantamount to resigning in a game of chess.

Remember the context at the time. Rommel had led the invasion of France, disobeying orders his armoured division had charged ahead, leaving the main formation far behind, out of range of communications. The German high command had no idea where he was so couldn't reinforce or resupply him (or summon him for a court-martial I suppose). And Rommel was in trouble at this point; his men were exhausted, his tanks were out of fuel and breaking down, spread over miles of countryside. If the French had sent one reconnaissance aircraft they would have realized this, and in fact could have just ignored him, he wasn't able to go anywhere.

Instead word reached Paris that the Germans had penetrated 150 miles into France and the French government panicked and fled, and that's how Rommel invented blitzkreig. Churchill would have been perfectly well aware of what happens when the government abandons its capital. The French are still suffering from that reputation even today!

I took the CWR tour years ago. My recollection is that Churchill had a funny sense of danger and would go up on the roof during a raid. The War Rooms weren't even reinforced against bomb damage until later when this big old slab was installed overhead.

That was the amazing part - it isn't that deep and doesn't have much protection.

Not sure because it's close to the Thames, or because there might be a Tube line close by.

According my father, my grandfather (a telecoms engineer) helped lay the cabling in this complex. Somehow he became privy to some of the details of the invasion, and late on the night of June 5 or very early in the morning of June 6 1944 took my four-year-old father up a hill to watch the airborne forces covering the sky as they made their way to Normandy.

If you're ever in London: do this tour. It's wonderfully well executed, and well worth the time.

I've done this tour a few times and it is quite interesting. If you're at all into history definitely check it out. It also, somewhat recently, added a new section with more information on Churchill and his controversial rise to power.

As others have said, it is amazing that it is in the center of the city, but he felt he needed to be there in order to run the war effectively.

Don't show this to Trump he might get some ideas... For something Under the white house.

Already exists https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidential_Emergency_Opera...

Can anyone tell me the projection of the map in the headline photo?

I'm not much of a cartographer so I'd be happy to be corrected, but it looks like a Mercator projection that omits Antarctica to me.

It is on Travel Channel almost every day as a short story.

I also highly recommend touring Churchill's war rooms in London. It is very much worth the time.

That's what this is.

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