91福利社

Use 91福利社.com or the new 91福利社 App to listen to 91福利社 podcasts, Radio 4 and the World Service outside the UK.

Episode details

Radio Merseyside,06 May 2025,6 mins

The tunnels under New Brighton's arcades

Hidden Merseyside

Available for over a year

During the Second World War, a vault beneath the arcades in New Brighton housed 200 women who made vital small armaments for the war effort. In 1944, a national newspaper report on the 鈥榰nderground grotto鈥� at a 鈥榥orth-west seaside town鈥� described how the female war workers turned out hundreds of thousands of machine gun bullets a week while holiday makers and day trippers strolled, oblivious, along the promenade above. Believed to be one of a kind in the north of England, you can now see the tunnels where the women worked in eight-hour shifts below ground, keeping the machines running around the clock.

Programme Website
More episodes