Along side the famous Littlewoods building on Edge Lane, Liverpool, hidden beneath Wavertree Botanic Park, is a secret, long lost WWII Air Raid Shelter…
During WWII, Liverpool suffered greatly from bombing raids, with Liverpool being one of the most heavily bombed cities outside London. As a result, many air raid shelter’s were built throughout the city. One such shelter, was built just inside the boundary of Wavertree park, along side the attractive art deco Littlewoods building, built 1938.
The shelter was built on a Northerly Axis, and at approximately 280m long, it would have been large enough for a considerable number of people seeking safety. The Littlewoods shelter, had been built using the cut and fill method, using reinforced concrete, with earth covering the top, for further bomb protection. It was designed as a series of interlinked rectangular passages, which resemble chain links. There were 13 entrances, throughout the length of the bunker. These provided rapid access down into the shelter via sloping passages, that are marked on the 1940’s map. The entrance passages, joined the shelters connecting corridor at right angles, which would have provided excellent blast protection for those inside.
Location and plan of the Littlewoods Air Raid Shelter (in red), showing on both historic mapping and Google Earth. The map is: OS 1:1,250/1:2500, 1944-1974 Map (curtesy of National Library of Scotland).
Several years ago, myself and colleagues from the Friends of Williamson’s Tunnels, were given permission by Liverpool City Council to open up this long forgotten Air Raid Shelter. This was to examine, photograph and to organise an official visit into the shelter, for the charity, Subterranea Britannica. Following on from this first visit, we were able to open this fascinating structure for a number of visits and events over the following few years.
Within this long forgotten wartime structure, in and around Bay 5, are these wonderful drawings on the walls. These “Faces of the Blitz”, probably portraits of the people who sought safety from the chaos and bombs of war outside…
Urban explorers are known to explore this interesting structure from time to time. Being as myself and colleagues from FoWT were ‘Close Confined Space Trained’ when granted permission to access the bunker. The air quality, especially at the South end of the bunker, was found to be unsafe if not fatal, due to the lack of Oxygen. So please, should you choose to visit this structure, extreme caution is required for your safety.
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