Can you shed light on lost Resistance bases?
WE have, you may take relief in knowing, been in national lockdown before and equally fearful if not more so than we are at present. Eighty years ago precisely Britain appeared defenceless in the face of invasion by the Nazis and precautions were extreme. The consequences of succumbing had been made clear in Europe. We were surely to follow the same fate. The importance of Lincolnshire and its splendid and firm beaches provided ideal ground for invasion. The Humber ports including Grimsby and Immingham were vital. Our flat interior soon to become an enormous airfield was equally important. And the county, on the gateway to engineering works at Lincoln and Gainsborough and thence to the Midlands, Sheffield, Doncaster and so on, was obvious. Gun emplacements were established in quantity. Pill boxes were built, hospitals were braced, antiaircraft guns were seemingly everywhere.
Based at Louth was formed an armoured train pulled by a 2-4-2 tank engine and comprising two fighting trucks with six-pounder guns, Brenguns and anti-tank rifles. The loco was in the middle and the train ran from New Holland to Grimsby, Mablethorpe, Willoughby, Skegness and Boston with 30 soldiers aboard. Post-Dunkirk, the regular army arrived in the shape of a Guards brigade. Field Marshal Alanbrooke arrived in February and went to Louth in bitter weather. Montgomery arrived too. The King came. Grimsby Docks was earmarked and the North Wall was given guns. The population were told to remain local. The first air raids began.
But the real homespun effort was made by the formation of the Local Defence Volunteers, soon to be the Home Guard. Colonel JH Hinton commanded in Grimsby, Colonel SF Thomas, headmaster of Clee Grammar School, at Cleethorpes, Colonel Harold Mountain was in charge at Humberston. Many were 1914-18 war veterans and elderly. Many were too young for regular service. But… but, there was yet another unit of which little is spoken and even less known. Indeed, their contribution to our plight is legendary largely because of the secrecy surrounding it.
They were called Auxiliary Units and Resistance Battalions. The members must have been exceptional people for their task was virtually suicidal.
Now I mention this specifically this week because, rather late after the event, some steps are underway to find the bases from which they operated.
These units were recruited from Home Guard volunteers, double volunteers if you like, who had an intimate knowledge of the areas in which they lived.
In the main they were countrymen, used to the vagaries of the weather and, in particular, living off the land. Thus they included farmers, foresters, roadmen and, suitably for the famous county in which they belonged, poachers.
These men in groups of about eight were trained, as were commandos, as assassins. They lived in small secret underground bunkers which they had built, and remained in them as the battle raged overhead.
But when the enemy – as was expected – had moved on, they would emerge from their fastnesses to disrupt communications, blow up bridges, and to kill not only senior ranking enemy officers but collaborators in the population.
All were sworn to secrecy and signed the Official Secrets Act. And therein lies the nub of my article this week. For they, all of them, took their oath so seriously that even when they ceased their troglodyte existence in 1944, they felt it necessary never to speak of it or to reveal where their headquarters had been.
This week the British Resistance Association is attempting against all odds to locate these dens of resistance, these bunkers so wreathed in mystery and legend.
Now I know some years ago that the Telegraph did a story about one
such refuge. But I am quite unable to reach the Telegraph files now, or even to leave my house.
What is more, I can no longer speak to any of the people who might know their whereabouts. For the Grim Reaper has intervened. As a generality, the Barton Street, the first Stopline from Brocklesby to Louth, say, is the area in which they can be found, but all my farming friends from this area will have taken their knowledge with them. So who to speak to now?
Should any of you be able to elaborate then one Andy Chatterton of the Archive is the man to speak to, and to Dr James Pringle of Keele University, who is also involved. Maybe metal detectorists could be enrolled. I should be pleased to know too.
This photograph taken on Brackenborough Lawn near Louth in 1941 was found among the late Sir Geoffrey Harmsworth’s belongings. He lived at Thorpe Hall at the time. Here are 17 members of a Louth Home Guard rural unit, among them privates W Clumpton of Cisterngate and H Stones of Gospelgate. It was from them and groups like them that Auxiliary Resistance Units were formed.
A few as you see wear medal ribbons from the 1914-18 war.