Underground Shelters On Figge's Marsh

A Memory of Mitcham.

In 1944, when I was six, bombs dropped at the end of our road in N. Mitcham (Caithness Road) rendering our home, and others, uninhabitable, and after spending one night at Woodland Way Community Hall we were transferred to the underground shelters on Figge's Marsh. I believe there were three in a row, access by several steps down to the door. As far as I recall, there were bunks three high on either side of a center aisle. I can still see the looks of despair on the faces of some of the traumatized adults, and can smell the stuffy earthy smell around us. Many of us in those shelters were evacuated to Sheffield a few days later. For several years after the end of the war the shelters remained in place, visible by the domed tops above the surface of the ground, and the grass which had been put on top of them to make them less obvious to enemy planes during the war. The shelters would not have been much protection from bombs which might have fallen nearby, but they at least provided shelter from the elements. Does anyone else remember these shelters? I have searched online in vain for mention of them. Does anyone know when they were dismantled?


Added 21 April 2014

#308318

Comments & Feedback

I remember the shelter on Figges Marsh. I am not certain but there might have been 2 of them. One on the smaller green bit in front of the row of houses along the side edge of the park. But the one I remember the most was the big one down the end of Figges Marsh nearest to the small children's playground at that end of the Marsh. That one was dismantled in the late 1960s. I lived at Heaton Road nearby to Figges Marsh from January 1963 to Summer of 1972. I was born in 1962 so I was quite young at the time but my mum used to take me often to picnic on top of the air raid shelter which was like a little mountain covered with grass. We did not know then it was a shelter. We thought it was just a little hill that children would play on and me and mum would picnic on. One day in summer in the late 1960s during one of our picnics there was a shriek and a boy who had been running around on the top of the shelter disappeared. He had fallen through the top. I guess it had just worn out with age and no maintenance on it. They got him out. After that my mum told me the council had decided it was unsafe so they knocked it down for public safety. I was very upset because that had been my picnic hill.
I remember the shelter on Figges Marsh. I am not certain but there might have been 2 of them. One on the smaller green bit in front of the row of houses along the side edge of the park. But the one I remember the most was the big one down the end of Figges Marsh nearest to the small children's playground at that end of the Marsh. That one was dismantled in the late 1960s. I lived at Heaton Road nearby to Figges Marsh from January 1963 to Summer of 1972. I was born in 1962 so I was quite young at the time but my mum used to take me often to picnic on top of the air raid shelter which was like a little mountain covered with grass. We did not know then it was a shelter. We thought it was just a little hill that children would play on and me and mum would picnic on. One day in summer in the late 1960s during one of our picnics there was a shriek and a boy who had been running around on the top of the shelter disappeared. He had fallen through the top. I guess it had just worn out with age and no maintenance on it. They got him out. After that my mum told me the council had decided it was unsafe so they knocked it down for public safety. I was very upset because that had been my picnic hill.

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