WWII Auxillary Unit, Coleshil Park, Buscot and Coleshill Estates

Summary

Second World War building remains within Coleshill Park when Coleshill House and Park was used by the War Department between 1939 and 1945. Coleshill House became the General Headquarters for the Auxillary Unit as they becamse known. The building remains comprise Nissen hut bases and bunkers within the park, which provided accommodation and training.

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Description

Along the north-east edge of the park between the present garden and the old gate (150612) are a series of concrete platforms 11m. by 4m. These are the bases of Nissen huts. Further east cut into the edge of the ha-ha is a bunker (SU24559375, 154005). Use was also made of the water mines, metal bars were hammered into the side of the well opposite the main gates to form a ladder.

These remains are relics of the use of Coleshill House and Park by the Auxiliary Unit part of the S.O.E. during World War II. This top-secret unit was drawn from the Home Guard and was being trained to operate behind enemy lines should Britain have fallen to the Germans. Training was in sabotage and concealment techniques, the individuals were to form the nucleus of a resistance organisation. Hide outs were dug around the estate and dummy tanks built in the woods. A handbook was even produced called "The Countryman's Diary, 1939". In the early days of the war these units were thought to be so important that they were issued with the latest weaponry before the regular army. (See Archive recording, Miss Doris Pleydell-Bouverie, Hughenden Manor, and David Lampe, " The Last Ditch" [Source 19]). [1]

A survey map by RMARG in 2003, plots the locations of the military features at Coleshill. [2]

In about 1996 Keith Blaxhill describes the remaining features and a brief history of the site. "Coleshill House isolated and secluded within extensive grounds and parkland was the chosen site for the secret training base. Here was to become the headquarters of the Auxilary Units, as they became known, a good non-descript title that gave nothing away…" [3]

Archaeology survey, excavation and metal detecting were carrried out over two years between 2011-2012 to record and understand further the remaining structures and features. This was part of the Churchills Underground War (formerly Coleshill Uncovered) project. Please see individual monument records for more detailed information. [4-11]

A 2019 pamphlet guide by B. Ashby provides a summary of the history of the Auxilary Unit at Coleshill between 1940-1945, and the remaining features in the Park as well their location. "...National training was set up at GHQ, such that every weekend, short intensive courses were run for twenty or more Auxilliers who came to Coleshill from all over the country." [12]

Further references to the activities of the Auxillary Unit at Coleshill. [13-14]

Photographs showing Auxilliers training at Coleshill. [15]

Archaeological excavations in 2018 were conducted over an underground structure previously unidentified, in the Long Shrubbery at Coleshill. See MNA201556 for more details. [16-18]

In Lampe's 1968 book The Last Ditch he describes the role of Coleshill House in training [19]

Pleydell-Bouverie's' Brief History of the Village' mentions that during the war that various army units were stationed in the basement of the house and the stable block for training. [20]

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