Visit to Home Guard Auxiliary training site

[Great War truck]

Our local MVT Branch is organising a visit to the Home Guard Auxiliary training school at Coleshill (near Faringdon) on Saturday 9th of May. As some of you know, the Auxiliaries were trained to operate behind German lines in the event of an invasion. They were to cause as much trouble to the Germans as possible until they were captured or killed. A great deal has been written about them in recent years and in fact there was a thread on HMVF quite recently about this. The site was also used to train SOE.

 

The actual manor house was destroyed in fire after the war, but the stables and gardens still remain. Within the gardens there is a surviving underground base for the Auxiliaries which is the same as many of the others that remain and we may be able to access this.

 

The estate is a National Trust site with very limited access to the public, so this will be a private guided tour led by the historian Bill King. Cost per head is just £2.

 

The tour is limited to 30 and i expect about 20 of those will be taken up by local MVT members. If anybody else is interested in coming along please let me know.

 

Thanks

 

Tim (too)