Air Ministry and other Government WWII dispersals

On 1 January 1940 Goering announced, 'The German Air Force will strike at Britain with such an onslaught as has never been known in the history of the world...' With the possibility of London being flattened an elaborate system was in place to move government departments into the provinces. These schemes were known as the Black, Yellow, Blue, and Grey Plans. They were top secret at the time and ran in parallel with another scheme - the North-West Surburban Plan, which would move key military personnel to the Harrow / Neasden area of London.

Generally personnel who were not directly responsible for the day-to-day running of the war (Personnel, Accounts etc) would relocate to the provinces, while key departments (e.g. Intelligence, Operations) would remain 'close to Whitehall'.

Air Ministry staff would initially locate to:
Code letters and staffing levels are shown.

Worcester became the principal AM site, with an extensive telephone network being available at the vast 25MU Hartlebury.

Many sections of the Ministry of Aircraft Production moved to Harrogate.

Initially hotel office accommodation was used, but a more efficient solution was needed.

Graham

The Temporary Office Building (TOB)
The probability of mass staff evacuation from London required the rapid construction of extensive office accommodation in the provinces. By 1940 a new type of building had been designed by Sir James West for the Ministry of Works, and constructed in groups, generally on the outskirts of towns. This building was a steel-framed single-storey brick and concrete construction, having a central spine with a central reception area, and twelve wings. The corridors within the spine were made wide enough such that the building could easily be converted into a hospital, or other premises should the need arise.

These buildings were so successful that many are still in use today. Some time after WWII they were renamed the Standard Office Buildings (SOB).

Between one and six blocks were built at each site, three being the average, however space was always reserved for additional construction. A separate canteen building was located on each site of more than one block.

The first unit available for use was at Redhill, Worcester in June 1940, and a further eleven had been completed across the UK by the end of the year. Three such sites were eventually allocated to the Air Ministry, two initially in Worcester and a third at Harrogate.

Below: The ex Air Ministry site at Redhill. Worcester. Three TOBs and a Canteen Block. LINK



Below: ex AM TOB at Henwick, now used by the University of Worcester. LINK


Below:The Harrogate site was also used by the Post Office. It was demolished recently. LINK



The Admiralty had three large sites in Bath - Foxhill, Ensleigh, and Warminster Road. The first two are still in use by the MoD / DLO. The third site is Accounts and has been threatened with closure for several years. The War Office had two sites in Cheltenham. The TOBS surrounding GCHQ were demolished a few years ago.

Graham

Chessington as well? I remember visiting Defence lands there in the mid 1980s, which I am sure had the look of a TOB (or could it have been a former hospital?

... and Harrogate as well? I remember visiting a number of the finance branches there, especiallt F6(Air), which held the purse strings for aircraft spares amongst many other things. A lot of the RAF Supply staffs found themslves posted to Harrogate and if I remember correctly, a lot of the Tornado supply support was provided from Harrogate in the early days of this now venerable aircraft's life. I seem to remember BT on part of the site during my visits during the Tornado introduction to service.

There's this five-TOB site off Heyhouses Lane at Lytham St. Annes:



All five blocks and the canteen are still standing with later extensions, marked on the current OS maps as the ubiquitous "Government Offices".

Browsing back up the thread, the layout of the buildings, and even the boundary hedge and nearby roads looks very similar to the first illustration:


All the best,
PB

WJT;40792 wrote:

Chessington as well? I remember visiting Defence lands there in the mid 1980s, which I am sure had the look of a TOB (or could it have been a former hospital?

... and Harrogate as well? I remember visiting a number of the finance branches there, especiallt F6(Air), which held the purse strings for aircraft spares amongst many other things. A lot of the RAF Supply staffs found themslves posted to Harrogate and if I remember correctly, a lot of the Tornado supply support was provided from Harrogate in the early days of this now venerable aircraft's life. I seem to remember BT on part of the site during my visits during the Tornado introduction to service.

I was stationed at RAF Chessington in 1985, the Defence lands complex known to us as MoD Chessington was fully active then; It came up fairly close to the RAF Chessington buildings and can be seen in the south east corner of the aerial picture in the Barrage balloon depot thread, but was a seperate site. I have copied it here for ease of reference.

The other complex I am aware of was known to us as RAF Stanmore I visited the site in late 1985 to obtain some archive material from the RAF inspectorate of Recruiting who were based there. I have pulled the attached from a GE historical image which shows the RAF Stanmore PARK site after clearance and the RAF Stanmore ( north east corner of image) site just before it too was demolished for housing.
The Harrogate site was occupied by the branches I dealt with for GSE /workshops spares etc, it undertook much of the current task of the IPTs currently at Wyton/Brampton.

TED

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The information below is from what was officially known as 'Miss Sharpe's List' (source: various TNA Treasury files). Her job was to catalogue the TOB useage towards the end of WWII regarding future requirements.
The number of TOBs are shown for each site, together with the departments and ministries which occupied them. Each TOB was rated at 400 staff, and 17,000 civil servants were accommodated c.1944. Spa towns were favourites for relocation, as it was known that the local populace was accustomed to receiving large numbers of temporary residents.

Bath (14) Admiralty
Blackpool (8 ) Pensions, Health, War Transport, Customs & Excise, HC for India
Birmingham (1) Fuel. Supply / Timber Control
Bristol (1) Supply / Home Grown Timber Link
Buxton (?) Customs & Excise
Cambridge (1) Works. Pensions
Cardiff / Llandaff (1) War Transport, Seamen's Registry
Cheltenham (12) War Office, US Army SoS.
Colwyn Bay (1) Food
Droitwich (5) War Office, RA Pay Corps
Gloucester (6) Air Ministry
Harrogate (6) Aircraft Production, Post Office
Liverpool (?) War Office
Llandudno (?) Inland Revenue
Leeds (2) Works, Home Security
London / Bushy Park (4) USAAF (8th)
London / Osterley (2) Board of Trade, Ordnance Survey
London / Stanmore (2.33) Government Communications
London / Eastcote (3) Government Communications.
Malvern (12) Admiralty, Supply
Manchester (2) Postal & Telegraph Censorship, Fuel, Works
Nottingham (2) Works, Labour
Oxford (1) Food. Admiralty, Home Office
Newcastle (1) Fuel, Aircraft Production, Works
Preston (1) Works, Labour
Reading (2) Works, Fuel, Pensions
Rhyl (?) Works
St Annes (5) Pensions, War Transport, Fuel & Power, Agriculture & Fisheries
Southport (?) Registrar General, Labour Assistance Board
Tunbridge Wells (1) Pensions, Works
Worcester (6) Air Ministry

Post WWII - Accommodation was urgently required for all government staff returning from their wartime locations and a large number of SOBs (later design of TOB) were constructed between 1946 and 1949 in the following suburbs:
Bromley, Chessington, Epsom, Ewell, Hatch End, Kidbrooke, Mottingham, Northwood, Orpington, Ruislip Stanmore, West Wickham, Tolworth / Surbiton (Toby Jug / Alpine Avenue)

Construction took place at other cities, e.g. Bristol / Brislington - 2 SOBs plus standard canteen.

It is known that the list is incomplete, and will be updated occasionally.

The thread title has been amended accordingly

Graham