In 1881, the Richardson Family of Hartlepool commissoned the building of Kirklevington Hall, Kirklevington, Yarm as a rural retreat. Now a listed building, the hall remained a private residence until the 1980s when it was adapted to become lodgings for circuit judges on location in the northeast.
Though, still privately owned it is now known as Judges Country House Hotel. During the Second World War it was apparently a secret command centre for the northeast, can anyone tell us if this is true?
The photographs date from November 1989.
The HMP Detention Centre, at Kirklevington Grange is shown on the WWII Airfield Information Exchange, as being used as an Army barracks. As to whether the grounds of Kirklevington Hall, (though designated for such purposes), were ever actually used as a POW camp for axis prisoners, still remains to be confirmed.
Surely ‘stories’ would abound in nearby Yarm / Kirklevington village, i.e. of POW’s being seen working in and around the local area, if the Hall had been used for a POW camp?
Prior to becoming the Judges Hotel, I believe the Hall was owned by a ‘Captain Downes’, who was then a director of the Walton-Mole Co. in Middlesbrough at that time.
The main London to Darlington railway line is approx 0.7 mile from the Hall. So now we have to wonder what cargo was this train carrying and why was it so secret that it had to be delivered at night by special train under armed guard, during WW2. My first thought was perhaps it was the Crown Jewels being hidden (I discarded it was German V2 rocket or high ranking German General prisoners), and, weighing up the facts known to me my guess is this train contained ‘the British Crown Jewels and / or valuable works of art from the London area’. This movement was carried out in secret so as not reveal to the general population that the Government viewed the threat of a German invasion so seriously that they were hiding the family silver.
Relevant dates are: The British Army was sent to France in September 1939 and returned defeated from Dunkirk in May 1940, 338,326 men were evacuated from the beaches and following this a German invasion of Britain appeared likely. During this same period the Tower Hamlets area of London, which contains the Tower of London was bombed lightly –“the Blitz commenced September 1940” during which the Tower was hit twice by German bombs. Because of these two related events the Tower of London was closed to the public and the Crown Jewels removed to a safer location. A false rumour was circulated that the Crown Jewels had been shipped to Canada for safety, but this was untrue, they are not allowed out of the country. It’s my understanding that they were initially taken to Windsor Castle and hidden in the basement there but wiser heads suspected this would be the first place to be searched by German troops if they arrived, so common-sense suggests they were taken from Windsor during 1940, and well hidden, and where better a place than Stockton-on Tees, a loyalist stronghold area.
Reference the subject of the alleged train under armed guard stopping close to Kirklevington Hall, Yarm, and unloading it’s cargo. One wonders was the Hall being used as a weigh station and accountancy centre for the gold bullion, coins and share certificate securities Britain sent to Canada for safekeeping and they were being counted, tabulated and re-boxed in Kirklevington Hall, so as to get them away from London and in part on there way to Greenock, Glasgow, Scotland. The following article is self explanatory and the date fits in with the panic caused by our May 1940 defeat in France.
BRITAIN GOLD RESERVES SHIPPED TO CANADA.
A shipment of fish that arrived in Halifax harbour on July 1, 1940 was classified top-secret. What could be so special about a load of fish? “Fish” was actually the code name for a cargo consisting of Britain’s gold reserves and priceless securities. During the Second World War, Britain’s wealth was secretly packed in crates and shipped across the Atlantic Ocean. The valuables were sent in several shipments and each reached its destination safely. The first load of 2,229 boxes of gold ingots and coins were added to the ships cargo and kept for the duration of the war in the Bank of Canada’s vaults on Wellington Street in Ottawa. The securities were locked in an underground vault three stories beneath the Sun Life Assurance Company building in Montreal and guarded by Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers around the clock. The 5,000 Sun Life employees never knew what was stored away beneath them.
Although hundreds of people were involved in the operation, not a single piece of the cargo went missing. And although no one was required to give an oath of secrecy, no information was ever leaked.
Thank you for showing the differences between Kirklevington Hall and Kirklevington Grange.
Yes, it was the Northern Command HQ and there was a prison camp nearby for German POWs.
The Richardson family were specialist marine engineers (est’d 1832) in Hartlepool, who were at the very forefront of UK coal and diesel powered, large scale shipping-engines. The company amalgamated with the Furness Westgarth Company of Middlesbrough in 1900 to become Richardson Westgarth Ltd.
The Hall was occupied by the family from 1884 and was eventually sold in 1940.
After this date, Kirklevington Hall was designated by the MOD as a Prisoner of War centre during WWII and the pens and stockades necessary for this purpose were built, but apparently never used. The secret ‘command-centre’, description, may therefore have some resonance.
Ironically, the large country-house property opposite, known as Kirklevington Grange, was also in the possession of the Richardson Family, this nowadays better know as HM Prison Service Kirklevington Detention Centre.
The ability for the Industrial magnates of the 19thC to live so far from their place of business, was of course to do with the intense railway network that traversed the region at that time. In this case, the nearest station for access by the Richardson’s would have been at the tiny hamlet of Picton, just south of Kirklevington village.
This hamlet’s only claim to fame being that it was once the childhood home of actress Wendy Craig, who by coincidence, stayed at ‘Judges’ Kirklevington Hall Hotel, when she officially opened the new village-hall at nearby Hutton Rudby a few years ago.
40 years ago I worked with a chap when we where at UBM Wares in Stockton. During the war he was an engine driver and covered the northeast. He told me he was called out one night to drive a special train. When he got into the engine cab there was the fireman and two armed soldiers. He new the area as he had driven it for years, but this night he went along a stretch of track he didn’t know. As it was night with no lights, he believed that the track had been laid specially for that night. When he was told to stop all he could see was the dark shape of a big house. The two soldiers in the cab told him to stay where he was. When he looked out of the side of the cab he could see there were sodiers flanking the train on both sides. He thinks he was there for about two hours when he had to take the train back to where he started. This could be the house he was at…
Dick Ainsley; Difficult to say if this was the actual house that your pal was asked to drive his train to that night during WWII. However, it should be noted, that most convenient site chosen for the new unmanned railway-halt named ‘Yarm’ ( on the main Northallerton line passing just behind this house) was at Greens Lane bridge, about a quarter mile across the fields from the Hall.
What a great story, how interesting!