COVENTRY MESSAGE BOARD

Seeking out information on the Holyhead Road plant, I came across these two pictures from about 1930 which I thought worth sharing.





However, of great intrigue, I picked up a rumour of a hospital that was built underneath the factory for WW2 and might still be there. Anyone know anything about it?

Great pictures Rebbonk. Can't help you with the hospital rumours I'm afraid.

rebbonk wrote:Seeking out information on the Holyhead Road plant, I came across these two pictures from about 1930 which I thought worth sharing.

Thanks Rebbonk

rebbonk wrote:However, of great intrigue, I picked up a rumour of a hospital that was built underneath the factory for WW2 and might still be there. Anyone know anything about it?

Very unlikely I would have thought Rebbonk. The original factory as shown in the picture was built above the railway bridge. It is now a tree grove fronting the road with a housing estate behind it. I walk through it twice a week and there is no sign of any former underground building.

The second, much larger, factory was built on floodland below the bridge. During excavations the remains of a pre ice-age hippo were found there.

dutchman wrote:Very unlikely I would have thought Rebbonk. The original factory as shown in the picture was built above the railway bridge. It is now a tree grove fronting the road with a housing estate behind it. I walk through it twice a week and there is no sign of any former underground building.

Thanks Dutchman. Many of these "underground facilities" turn out to be urban myths.

rebbonk wrote:Thanks Dutchman. Many of these "underground facilities" turn out to be urban myths.

Turms out this one may not be a myth after all Rebbonk?

On the wall of Morrisons there's a giant photo of the Alvis factory taken from the air in 1951. On the East side of the railway, set well back from the main road, there is a collection of what appear to be very shallow flat-roofed huts or bunkers. It's not possible to tell from the angle of the photo whether these are taller buildings sunk into the ground or not. They could well be storage bunkers, wartime air-raid shelters or as you mentioned, a hospital facility of some kind?

City planning records make no mention of what was there before the current housing estate was built but that is not unusual where wartime facilities are involved.

St John Abulance Service current headquarters are very nearby, on the opposite side of Holyhead Road so there may be a connection of some kind there?

Thanks for the update Dutchman, we'll have to keep investigating,