A chance discovery in Kimberley Library's local history section revealed this lovely letter written in 1976 from an amazing lady who worked in RAF Watnall's secret underground bunker in WW2. She was called Mary Harrison and she says...
"I have a very soft spot for Watnall and all that went on there and it gladdens my heart to know someone is still interested in it."
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| Mary Harrison, ex-Watnall bunker girl, and her sketch of the Watnall Ops Room 60 feet underground. |
She was stationed at Watnall for 3 years and the letter explains her role in the Battle of Britain, the Dambuster's raid and the D-Day Normandy Landings³. It helps us to understand what they did deep underground in Watnall and how vital it was in helping to win the war.
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Jan 12th 1976
Dear Mr. Bennett,
I was most interested in your letter in the Nottingham Evening Post tonight concerning the now derelict old Ops Room at Watnall, and as one of the many who worked below ground it was in its day a happy place.
I always understood it was 80 feet below ground and I went there as a plotter in the Waaf early in 1940. It was then the headquarters of 12 Group Fighter Command and worked in co-operation with five Fighter Stations under the Command. On a vast map of England and the tip of France we plotted the course of all aircraft, hostile or friendly. Any aircraft was represented by a plaque, given a raid number and estimated height and placed on the grid reference on the table. These references were supplied by other stations, The Royal Observer Corps and what we called R.D.F. which no doubt can be identified as Radar today. The course of these aircraft was shown by metal arrows in three different colours. The colours representing five minutes flying time. When it was officially recognised as hostile it was given an X in front of the number, and the squadrons from the Satellite Stations given their orders to intercept or investigate. Although we were the HQ of Fighter Command we had to plot aircraft from Bomber Command as often fighters were out to protect.
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| Mary Harrison's sketch of Watnall's Ops Room |
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| This artist's impression of Uxbridge Operations Room is just like Mary's sketch of the one deep below Watnall |
There were several rooms underground, the Ops room being the largest. I should say the actual table itself must have been 15 ft. by 20 ft. and was on a slope downwards from the back of the room, so the Office could look down from their balcony, which we called the gold fish bowl because it was glassed in, and could see at a glance the position of all aircraft. At the back of the room were several large panels on which the positions of the various squadrons in flight or at readiness were shown, thus enabling the officer in charge to see which Squadron was the next to be sent out and accordingly give his orders. The position of these squadrons were indicated by lights. There were two balconies which we ascended by ladder. The army used one as of course the Anti Aircraft Gunners had to know the positions as well.
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| On the phone to Watnall... RAF Watnall HQ was in telephone contact with its five sector stations one of which was at RAF Duxford shown here in Sept 1940. "Interior of the Sector 'G' Operations Room at Duxford, September 1940. The callsigns of fighter squadrons controlled by this sector can be seen on the wall behind the operator sitting third from left. The fighter controller is sitting fifth from the left, and on the extreme right, behind the Army liaison officer, are the R/T operators in direct touch with the aircraft." |
There were several smaller rooms which were just called "signals" and we didn't have to ask questions. There were two rest rooms, for if we were not too busy, we were not required to man the table, but had to be on call should an emergency arrive. Though certain sectors had to be manned all the time, so we took it in turns. To get to the rest rooms and canteen one went upstairs just as in an ordinary house, in fact once down below it was difficult to realise one was so deep underground and of course it was air conditioned.
I was lucky enough to be there during the Battle of Britain, and although 11 Group had the major part in that⁴, it was also plotted by us. When eventually the 1,000 bomber raids began our tactics had to change, and aircraft was plotted 'in block'.
Although so safely tucked away below ground, we missed none of the excitement when one of our Group Fighters demolished one of the enemy planes and felt the sorrow when one failed to return. For plotting we wore headphones and with magnetic rods moved the arrows immediately on receiving a plot. There were many amusing incidents. The Observer Corps sent us plots lasting nearly an hour, and we wondered what this plane which could not be identified, was doing hovering over a place which to our knowledge had nothing worth bombing. The unidentified plane, did in fact turn out to be a farmer ploughing up his field on a tractor.
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| WAAF plotters whose Operations Room took a direct bomb hit and carried on working. The both received the Military Medal, only 6 of which were awarded to WAAFs in the war. Painted by Nottingham's Dame Laura Knight. |
We worked shift systems, which were pretty tough as except on stand off, we were never away from the ops room for more than eight hours at a time, We all dreaded the early morning 4am to 8am shift, for that was when in turn we had to scrub out the rest rooms, and I can assure you there is, or was in our opinion, nothing worse than having to get up at 3am to parade before going on that stint. I was there about three years, and can only say of those I worked with I have never met a finer bunch of men and women, and today I am still in touch with many and they are always the first to rally round in time of trouble.
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| Early shift meant scrubbing the latrines for the WAAFs |
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| The real girls of RAF Watnall. Mary Harrison is top row 2nd from right. |
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| The real-life cartoon girls are pictured here. Mary Harrison is 6th from the left, centre row |
We saw many interesting people down in the Ops Room. Douglas Bader, Max Aitken, Leigh Mallory. The late Duke of Kent and the late Princess Royal and many more, As far as radio communications are concerned I can tell you little, apart from plotting we did have to relay the plots in our area to stations in other areas.
After I left Watnall I worked with RAF Intelligence as a Topographic Model Maker³ and was with the team to make the models for the raids on the Dams, and which were shown briefly in the film the 'Dam Busters' and the film 'Operation Crossbow' was based on a book written by one of the WAAF officers, who discovered the sites of the experimental flying bombs, but that is another side of the RAF that little is known about, although for eighteen months before D-Day we were working on the models of the Normandy Beaches.
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| Mary Harrison's dam models as shown in the Dambusters film |
I am sure you will get hundreds of letters from ex-Watnall 'types' for many like myself, came from Nottingham, and who like myself come straight to Watnall without any training whatsoever in RAF discipline, and were absolutely clueless when first going on 'parade'.
I think I can say we were in touch with aerodromes all over England and Wales. If there is anything else can tell you please do not hesitate to write, for I have a very soft spot for Watnall and all that went on there and it gladdens my heart to know someone is still interested in it.
Incidentally it looked this year as though I should have to spend Christmas alone. Three ex-Watnall colleagues just would not hear of it and I spent one of the happiest Christmas's I have spent in a long time. I have had my fair share of 'ups and downs' in the past five years, but the friendship and loyalty of the old Watnall Waafs has helped me more than I can say.
I do hope you can get more information on the station and the RAF.
Yours sincerely,
Mary E Harrison
Pictures of the well-preserved Raigmore and Kenton give an excellent impression of what Watnall would have looked like... (the bikes are a modern addition I suspect!)
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| Kenton Ops Room |
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| Kenton table map |
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| Raigmore ventilation system! A pair of c.1980s Abbey "Pro Gold" vintage bikes in decent nick. |
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| Watnall Victoria Institute possibly the same place referred to as The Chapel? |
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| Visual representations of 11 Group's early warning bunker from Len Deighton's book on the Battle of Britain. Watnall's 12 Group bunker worked the same. |
There is an excellent 25-minute YouTube video explaining the RAF WW2 early warning system by author of the definitive book on the Battle of Britain Stephen Bungay. You can watch it here...
17/5/43 00:15 - Remembering the Dambusters today and the Kimberley tail gunner who lost his life...
23-year-old Richard Bolitho spent his last leave before the Dambusters raid at his home in Kimberley. He brought two of his Canadian colleagues, Floyd Wile and Albert Garshowitz, and the Scot John Kinnear along as his guests. All would die together near Marbeck in Germany just a few days later, in the early hours of Monday 17 May 1943, and they lie together in Reichswald Forest War Cemetery, having been reinterred after the war from their original graves in Borken.
https://dambustersblog.com/2013/11/26/dambuster-of-the-day-no-56-richard-bolitho/
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| Jean Nunn placing a Kimberley-themed tribute on the grave of Richard Bolitho at Reichswald British War Cemetery, Germany, three miles from the Dutch frontier. Photo: David Nunn |
- Contributed by
- kozak42
- People in story:
- Kathlyn Presdee
- Location of story:
- Watnall Nottingham
- Article ID:
- A4655298
- Contributed on:
- 01 August 2005
KATHLYN PRESDEE nee GREEN
Quantock Corner, 17 Robert Street, Williton, Somerset, TA4 4PG
When war was declared, I was working as a chemist’s assistant in Gloucester. I did not think that things would change a great deal, but my fiancé Rowland was determined to volunteer, first to the navy who turned him down, because of his eyesight and then the RAF. He was accepted despite the failed attempts to fit him with contact lenses. He was sent on a wireless operators’ course. Nine months later he ended up at a strip of jungle in Sumatra with 232 Hurricane Squadron, the nearest place being Seletar.
At first I had been loathe to leave my job, but concluded that it was ‘all hands to the pump’ and volunteered for the WAAF. I was sent away to learn how to type, as there was no trade for a chemist’s assistant. I completed my course and was accepted as a Clerk doing general duties. I soon found this to be rather boring, but plodded on.
Then suddenly I was posted to Watnall near Nottingham and found myself working watches at a place called ‘The Chapel’. It turned out to be Bomber Command Operations 12 Group under Leigh Mallory. It was top security and all very exciting, especially when we sent out the first thousand bomber raid. Another time we plotted enemy aircraft over the top of us, but escaped detection, unlike 11 Group. The navy was in the rooms below us, guarded by the army with fixed bayonets. No one got past them without special order.
The billet I shared with another girl would not have passed muster in peace time. It was an old cottage with an elderly lady who needed looking after. The slide windows in the tiny bedroom were stuck open and the snow came in on our beds. A bowl of hot water was provided each morning to splash our faces with. We then trudged half a mile to camp to get breakfast and thaw out.
At the fall of Singapore, in February 1942, Rowland (who had become my husband on embarkation leave) was reported missing, believed killed. There was a chapter in a book called ‘Hurricane Over The Jungle,’ by Terence Kelly, which described how he walked into a Japanese ambush and it was thought that must have died. In fact, he survived in the jungle for three weeks before he was captured and put into a prisoner of war camp at Palembang, Sumatra. He had many dreadful experiences and three and a half years later, after the war ended, he returned on 15th August 1945. War had dramatically changed us. We were almost like strangers, but we managed to pick up the threads and resume married life and go on to have two children. He died in 1987.
Something unique happened to me just towards the end of the war. I had been visiting Cambridge and popped into a coffee shop. Sitting alone, I was approached by a young man who sat down and excitedly started to talk. “You look as though you can keep a secret, just for a while until the top brass and Winston Churchill have been informed. I simply have to tell someone about it. We have just completed work on something that could end the war and it should cause the biggest explosion known to man and you are the first to know.”
It was the atom bomb.
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