NHER 34541 (Monument record) - Site of Worstead Park World War Two training camp

July 1946.
RAF aerial photograph (S1) shows footings of two adjoining circular structures around 10m diameter. Probably a searchlight battery.
B. Cushion (NLA), 8 June 1999.

October 2004. Recorded observation.
This area is now thickly wooded by pines and was not entered due to pheasants in residence. Note however the same aerial photograph shows what appears to be a large sewage works immediately to the north, of which no trace now remains. Could there have been some sort of military camp here removed before 1946?
E. Rose (NLA), 27 October 2004.

November 2006. Norfolk NMP.
NMP mapping has led to the alteration of the central grid reference of the site from TG 3111 2525 to TG 3092 2538.
As suggested above, Worstead Park (NHER 40884) was the site of a World War Two army camp, visible as earthworks, structures and buildings on aerial photographs taken in April 1946 (S2). Personal accounts of the site by soldiers based there during the war, which are accessible on a number of websites (S3)-(S4), indicate that it was established by at least August 1941. It appears to have been used both as a holding camp and for training. The personal accounts describe artillery and signals training, as well as ‘jungle training’, lectures, driving instruction, blast proofing tents, and digging trenches for laying phone wires near Coltishall airfield (NHER 7697).
As the site was large and notably dispersed it has not been mapped in detail. The extent of the main area of military activity, as visible in April 1946, has been defined (there is no coverage of this date for the northern edge of the park). It is likely that in fact the whole park was under military control. Worstead House (NHER 15440), which was demolished in 1939 (or possibly 1937), might even have been destroyed by the army; certainly, evidence of activity visible on the aerial photographs suggests that its ruin and the surrounding grounds were used for training or something similar. The extent of the sewage works noted above has been mapped (at TG 3105 2537), as has the outline of two conjoined circular structures, almost certainly settling tanks for the sewage works. The description of the possible searchlight emplacement, given above, sounds as though it is a mis-identification of this site, although the original grid reference for the site correlates (more or less) with a cluster of pits or emplacements at TG 3110 2527. The latter features, which have not been mapped, were almost certainly dug for training purposes, and there is no evidence that an operational searchlight emplacement existed at the site. Further to the south, an elongated building has been mapped at TG 3120 2507. The ruins of this brick-built structure were identified on the ground in October 2004, during an inspection of the stable block located immediately to its north (NHER 15440) (see (S5)-(S6)). At the time, the structure was recognised as possibly being defensive but was thought to pre-date World War Two due to its unusual plan. Now that a World War Two camp is known to have existed at the site, its construction during this period seems more likely, although its function remains enigmatic. Perhaps it was associated with some of the specialist signals training that was carried out here, as described in (S4). A substantial sunken feature at TG 3073 2500, which incorporated both earthwork and structural elements, was probably a firing range. Now largely levelled, it is visible as an amorphous cropmark (and slight earthwork?) on post-war aerial photographs, including (S7).
Other elements of the site which have not been mapped, but are nevertheless noteworthy, include: numerous Nissen-type huts dispersed amongst the wooded parts of the park, including the southwest avenue; the impressions left by tents, arranged in a grid pattern, visible at TG 3119 2536 (elongated banks of soil visible immediately to their west may have covered air raid shelters); clusters of freshly dug emplacements and/or weapons pits, as at TG 3110 2527 and TG 3066 2593 (at least some of these are likely to have been gun emplacements given the use of the site by at least one artillery regiment (S3)); and a football pitch, oriented north to south, with goals either side of TG 3079 2497. Vegetation marks at TG 3066 2485 are also likely to be military in origin, as was a block of small fields, possibly allotments or vegetable plots, along the southeast side of the southwest avenue (at TG 3072 2509).
Aerial photographs taken in July 1946 (S8)-(S9) demonstrate that the huts had already been removed by that date. The sewage works also appear to have been removed in the post-war period, and most of the earthworks and other structures removed or levelled, as they are not visible on photos such as (S7). Whether any elements of the site, other than the ruined building discussed above, still survive above ground is not known.
S. Tremlett (NMP), 16 November 2006