Info:       

Cabinet War Rooms & 
Churchill MuseumClive Steps
King Charles Street
London SW1A 2AQ

Web:
http://cwr.iwm.org.uk

Phone:
(+44) 20 7930 6961
         
Hours:
Open daily 9.30-6
Closed Dec. 24, 25 and 26.
Last admission 5 p.m.

Admission:
Adult - £12.95
Seniors - £10.40
Students: £10.40
Children - Free
Audio guide included.

London - The Cabinet War Rooms & Churchill Museum                         

by Mitch Kaplan
photos by Mitch Kaplan

Three times I've tried to get to the Cabinet War Rooms and Churchill Museum in London. Apparently, the third time's the charm, for we finally made it last month.

The War Rooms were a bunker buried underneath the Office of Works building, or the New Public Offices, set in the heart of Whitehall between Parliament and the Prime Minister's office-residence at Number 10 Downing Street. The rooms were protected by iron beams and concrete thick enough to withstand, it was hoped, a 600-pound bomb direct hit.

Luckily, its strength wasn't tested. A direct hit never happened.

It was here that Churchill and his War Cabinet carried out planning and communications during World War II, including during the Blitz.

Hard to Find                             

It seems like they chose a good location. Penny and I walked a circuitous route, following signs, and down the length George Street. Where was this place?

We turned right at the last corner, across the street from St. James's Park. Nothing.

Turned around. Walked a few yards the other way. Aha—set underneath a wide masonry stairway, was a secretive looking, but modern, glass entryway. A small sign stood in front. We should've turned left.

Life Underground                             

It's easy to imagine the Rooms, buried deep in the ground, functioning like some kind of offices-cum-ant colony, with army, clerical and governmental personnel running from room to room doing terrible, official business. Once inside, you feel the ambience immediately.

The first display is the Cabinet Room. Here, Churchill, his advisors and Chiefs of Staff met some 115 times to strategize, argue and develop policy. This room and others are populated by lifelike mannequins that eerily add to the frozen-in-time sensibility that pervades the place.

From there, one proceeds down a long, spare corridor lined by brightly painted block walls, metal lockers and wooden cabinets. The hall leads to a series of other rooms, the functions of which are nicely explained on the handheld audio tour guide, as various sound effects clang and bang in the background.

Here, the room from which Churchill made his famous radio speeches. There, the map room in which all troop and sea vessel movements were tracked. A video features personnel who worked down here in clerical and other jobs describing their experiences.

I especially liked a description, offered in another room by Churchill's personal secretary, of the challenges involved in transcribing his dictation. That hit a personal note: once upon a time I worked as a transcriber.

Churchill Museum                             

Oddly, smack in the middle of the War Rooms tour, one is diverted into the Churchill Museum.

Here, in one large room, is displayed just about anything you'd ever want to know about the great man.

The exhibits include state-of-the-art technology (step into a circle of light from ceiling-installed bulb set before a large photo-poster, and you hear a speech relating to that photo; a long, multi-colored light table reveals, when you touch it, important events by specific year), many videos, artifacts and audios.

It was too much.

I couldn't decide which way to turn, what to look at first or next, or how the hell I was going to get out of there before I forgot what I'd been looking at in the War Rooms. The Churchill displays would function better if they were separated somehow from the War Rooms.

Still, Churchill was, is, and always will be a fascinating man. And, even if you race through this part of the experience, you'll come away with taut impressions.

Back on the Trail                         

I returned to the audio-guided War Rooms tour, passing the Churchills' personal bedrooms and, fascinatingly to me, hearing a description of the timber form post-and-beam construction seen throughout. Those forms—thick posts bolted to huge beams by way of angular connecting shafts—mirror classic wooden ship construction.

Nearly last, but perhaps most impressive, comes Room 62A. This was military headquarters. The narration states that when the German surrender was announced, the gents in this room turned out the lights and left everything as it was.

Now manned by a pair of mannequins in military garb, it looks like that's just what happened.

I've been known to watch WWII films endlessly on the History Channel and other TV stations. Penny inevitably enters the room quipping, "You mean they're still fighting World War Two?"

In this museum, they are. All the better for us to understand the challenges and sacrifices of the time.