Ramsgate Bread Factory, England

Spiritual · #1 ● 08-29-2015, 11:18 PM

The Ramsgate Flour Mill was built in 1865, and closed in 2005 when the site was sold by Rank Hovis to a private developer, as it was no longer commercially viable. It is situated next to the site of the old Ramsgate Town Station, which has long been demolished and is now a block of flats (Chatham Court).

The mill survived two world wars, but sustained heavy bombing during World War 2. As the threat of war came nearer, air raid tunnels were dug. One “for the men” was dug under the old railway cattle pens (to the rear of the site), which gave the shelter about 25 feet of chalk and concrete as protection.

For the office workers, a separate shelter was constructed, which was a brick lined tunnel dug from the general office down into the ground. Under the mill, this was made wider to give a fair size room. A way out was up two long flights of concrete steps into the Margate Road.

The shelter was provided with a bucket toilet, gas curtains either end, lighting and heating. When “Hudsons look-out” gave the alarm, the office staff would pick up their ledgers and file down the stairs and carry on working in their underground office. During the war, the mill was very lucky. A lot of damage was done for nine bombs fell on the mill site, with only one failing to go off.

The street entrance to the air raid shelter was bricked up after the war, and the entrance from beneath the office was also sealed up. Apart from a brief inspection in 1984, the tunnel has been blocked up ever since. However, by kind permission of the site’s new owner, and an ex-employee showing some photographers where the entrance was, we gained access to photos of the office air raid shelter. In 2013 a 13 year old boy named Cameron Tidy fell to his death off the roof of the mill.