St Paul’s School was on Church Street St Paul’s. Perhaps for reasons of space, its Second World War air-raid shelters, to accommodate some 324 scholars and staff, seem to have been on land adjoining St Augustine’s College, in the area known as ‘Mount Pleasant’. From about 1940 this concrete-trench shelter was made available for public use outside school hours. An undated note in the Chief Air-raid Warden’s Notebook indicates that for this purpose, the best route to the shelter was via the ‘Main entrance to Malt House [from which one would find the shelter] entrance in [the] orchard on left of drive.’ This agrees well with a piece of artefactual evidence: Canterbury Museums hold a ‘printed notice on reused card stating that "During Air Raid Warnings this Gateway is an A.F.S. Post and should not be used for loitering nor as a Shelter (unless in sudden emergency). The nearest Shelter is down the lane through the brick archway. By Order".’ This is believed to have been displayed at ‘St. Augustine's Gateway’ (i.e. ‘Fyndon’s’ rather than the ‘Cemetery’ Gate?). The ‘brick archway’ was clearly the gate to the Almonry, from Lady Wooton’s Green, and the shelter in question is presumably the St Paul’s School Shelter. The St Paul’s Shelter was greatly extended from mid 1941 as an ‘emergency concrete-trench shelter’ – the new pre-cast concrete trenches, with room for a further 418 persons, being distinguished from the existing shelter under the name ‘St Paul’s extension.’ Basically, when the latest plans for the Canterbury Nodal Point had been announced, it had been found that some of the existing schemes for expanding Canterbury’s shelter provision now fell outside the defensive perimeter. Materials which had been amassed for these schemes were now redirected to sites within the perimeter, including the St Paul’s School shelter. The extension may have been well under way by the end of August 1941 when tenders were invited to provide electrical wiring to the extension. In March 1943 it was suggested that the ‘St Paul’s School shelters, Mount Pleasant’, might be made available to North Holmes Area by the provision of an entrance way from North Holmes Road.
Owner : Private
Publicly accessible : No
How accessed for survey :
Tourism Potential :
Condition : Destroyed
Date of visit :

Anon. Canterbury Auxiliary Fire Service officer, Auxiliary Fire Service notice (Artifact). SKE14942.

Anon. Canterbury Auxiliary Fire Service officer, Auxiliary Fire Service notice (Artifact). Ske14942.

Canterbury City Council Emergency Committee, 01/01/39, Canterbury City Council Emergency Committee Minute Books 1 to 6 (Unpublished document). SKE14941.

Canterbury City Council Emergency Committee, 01/01/39, Canterbury City Council Emergency Committee Minute Books 1 to 6 (Unpublished document). Ske14941.

Simon Williamson, 01/01/39, Chief Air-Raid Warden’s notebook (Unpublished document). SKE14943.

Simon Williamson, 01/01/39, Chief Air-Raid Warden’s notebook (Unpublished document). Ske14943.