Duxford: Control Tower (Building 209), Duxford, Cambridgeshire

Summary

An airfield control tower, dating to 1942 and built by the Air Ministry’s Directorate of Works and Buildings. Modern air traffic control equipment and associated services are excluded from the listing.

Description

An airfield control tower dating to 1942, built to a standard design by the Air Ministry’s Directorate of Works and Buildings.

MATERIALS: the tower is constructed of rendered brick and has an asphalt roof. The windows are metal framed; the units on the upper floor of the south elevation have been replaced and have slightly thicker frames than the originals.

PLAN: the tower is square on plan with a balcony which wraps around the south elevations and southern parts of the east and west elevations.

DESCRIPTION: the tower is two storeys with a metal and glass roof top addition. The main access is in the centre of the north-west elevation via a single-leaf door. The south elevation is airside and has large multi-pane steel casement windows facing the runway and on the southern sides of the east and west elevations to provide wide visibility to the runway. A concrete balcony with tubular steel safety barrier also wraps around the airside elevations which is cantilevered out from the building and now also supported with iron columns, which were added later. Access to the balcony is by external steel staircase and by single leaf doors on either side of the former control room. The external stairs also give access to the roof which has a tubular steel safety barrier on all four sides. The current control room is a metal and glass structure which was added to the top of the building in the late 1980s and is of less interest.

As well as the main entrance the north elevation has two windows on the ground floor and a WC window to the far right. There is one window between the floors which lights the staircase and three windows on the left of the first floor. There is an irregular series of steel-framed casement windows on the east and west elevations. A timber-board door is located in the centre of the east elevation.

INTERIOR: the finishes of the building are utilitarian with plain, plastered and painted walls and exposed trunk and pipework. Some half panelled doors remain. The ground floor contains offices, WCs and a small kitchen accessed from a central passageway. The first floor is reached by a steep, single-flight stair located in the north-western corner of the building. The first floor contains the former control room which occupies the southern end of the building and is now used as a briefing room. It contains internal windows into the signal room next door, and also has a small cubicle, apparently used for radio. A further room on the first floor was used as the controller's rest room.

Pursuant to s1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’), it is declared that modern air traffic control equipment and associated services are not of special architectural or historic interest.

History

Duxford’s suitability as a landing field led to its use for military flying during the Military Manoeuvres of 1912. Construction of the Training Depot Station (TDS) started in October 1917, and the first units including Americans arriving in March 1918. It was one of 63 Training Depot Stations in existence in November 1918, and the group of hangars and other buildings on the technical site now constitute the best-preserved group of buildings surviving from a First World War airfield in Britain. Training Depot Stations, which comprised the main instructional flying unit for the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Air Force (RAF), were built in pairs, Duxford and its sister station at nearby Fowlmere making one wing. Each TDS comprised three flying units, each having a coupled general service shed and one repair hangar (the Duxford example was demolished in 1968, leaving Old Sarum in Wiltshire and Leuchars in Scotland as the only examples which survive as part of hangar groups). Other specialist buildings, such as carpenters’ shops, dope and engine repair shops, and technical and plane stores, characterised these sites.

Duxford was one of a core number of stations retained for the RAF after 1918, first as a flying training school and then (from 1 April 1923) as a fighter station with 19 Squadron. This was designated as a mobile (expeditionary) squadron, and they remained on the base until replacement by the Eagle Squadron of American volunteers in August 1941. 19 Squadron’s expertise resulted in the station introducing a number of aircraft into RAF service, such as the Gloster Gauntlet which it received in January 1935 and was displayed along with the prototype of the Gloster Gladiator at George V’s Silver Jubilee in July of that year. The first Spitfire to an RAF squadron was delivered to Duxford by Supermarine’s test pilot in August 1938, and 12,000 visitors caught their first sight of the Spitfire during Empire Day on 20 May 1939. With one exception, the wooden-framed barrack buildings were replaced in a rebuilding campaign that commenced in 1928. A major phase of modernisation was approved in 1931, resulting in the construction of the station headquarters and guardroom on the south camp, and the construction of domestic buildings in the north camp - the sergeants' mess being the first building ready for occupation. In an attempt to achieve parity with Germany’s increasing air strength, the British Government introduced a number of schemes for the expansion of the RAF, which followed in quick succession between 1934 and 1939. The Cabinet (National Government) passed five schemes: ‘A’, ‘C’, ‘F’, ‘L’ and ‘M’, which led to a large-scale re-building programme at existing RAF stations (including Duxford) and to the development of numerous new aerodromes.

During the Battle of Britain (10 Jul – 31 Oct 1940), Duxford was the most southerly airfield in 12 Group, responsible for the defence of the Midlands and East of England but also making it well-placed to reinforce and support 11 Group to the south, which bore the brunt of the Luftwaffe assault. Czech and Polish squadrons operated from Duxford during the battle, and on 15 September - the critical point in the battle - five Duxford squadrons led by Squadron Leader Douglas Bader claimed their highest score of 52 aircraft destroyed (plus 16 probably destroyed and 3 damaged). Bader - Commander of 242 Squadron initially based at Coltishall - was the instigator of what became known as the Duxford Wing, a strategy whereby he led 3 and later 5 squadrons of Spitfires and Hurricanes into battle, which formed the focus of disagreement concerning fighter defence strategy. This continued into the winter of 1940 and finally resulted in the removal of Sir Hugh Dowding from his position as Commander in Chief, Fighter Command, and the replacement of Air Vice Marshal Keith Park as Air Officer Commanding 11 Group by his rival Air Vice Marshall Trafford Leigh-Mallory of 12 Group. Some of the pillboxes, air raid shelters and fighter pens installed by 1940 for the purposes of airfield defence and protection against attack have survived.

The arrival of the RAF’s Air Fighting Development Unit, in December 1940, saw a wide variety of new aircraft for evaluation and testing, including the replacement of the Hurricane, Hawker Typhoon, Mosquito and Mustang (the most powerful fighter of the Second World War). The airfield was officially handed over to become base 357 of the United States Eighth Air Force on 1 April 1943, the first of 75 P47 Thunderbolts arriving on the same day. After their visit in January 1941 to inspect the base and present medals, the King and Queen returned to Duxford to welcome the Americans in May. The first of the new Merlin-powered P51 Mustangs, which were to play a critically important role in the European air war, arrived to replace the Thunderbolts after the completion of the steel matting runway in December 1944. The base in its fighter support role was responsible for the destruction of 338 aircraft in the air and a further 358 on the ground, with the loss of 167 aircraft and 113 pilots. Duxford’s post-war service as a jet fighter station, with Meteors, Hunters and then Javelins, was marked by the completion of a replacement runway in concrete (6000 feet long with Operational Readiness Platforms at both ends) in August 1951.

RAF Duxford was closed in 1961, and subsequently chosen as one of the locations for filming of the Battle of Britain in 1968, (when the 1918 repair section hangar was destroyed). In 1969, the Ministry of Defence declared its intention to dispose of Duxford, and the Imperial War Museum duly requested permission to use part of one of the airfield’s hangars as temporary storage. The Imperial War Museum was founded in 1917, and opened to the public at Crystal Palace in Sydenham Hill in 1920, before moving to the Imperial Institute in South Kensington in 1924, and finally the Bethlem Royal Hospital in Southwark in 1936. The museum was originally intended to record the civil and military war effort and sacrifice of Britain and its empire during the First World War. The museum's remit has since expanded to include all conflicts in which British or Commonwealth forces have been involved since 1914. As of 2012, the museum aims to provide for, and to encourage, the study and understanding of the history of modern war and wartime experience. Duxford became the first outstation of the Imperial War Museum in 1976, and Cambridgeshire County Council joined with the Imperial War Museum and the Duxford Aviation Society to purchase the runway in 1977. The construction of the M11 along the east boundary of the site in 1977 shortened the runway by about 1,200ft (366m). The final aircraft to land at Duxford before the runway was shortened was Concorde test aircraft G-AXDN, now on display in the Airspace hangar. In October 2008, an agreement was reached between Cambridgeshire County Council and the Imperial War Museum, under which the runways and 146 acres of surrounding grassland were acquired by the museum.

The Control Tower, or Building 209, was constructed to the Air Ministry’s Directorate of Works and Buildings standard design in 1942, during a period of expansion in the early years of the war. It is one of 162 examples built to this Air Ministry design (Watch Office for All Commands, Drawing No. 12779/41’2) of which 82 now survive, including the one at Duxford. Paul Francis et al suggest a construction date of 1943 – when it was apparently completed by the civilian contractor, W & C French. A photograph taken in 1944 shows a rooftop observation post installed on the tower by the 78th fighter corps.

The control tower continued in use during the USAAF occupation of the airfield until 1945 and in the RAF post-war use of the base during the late 1940s and 1950s. Following its disposal by the RAF in 1969 and its acquisition by the Imperial War Museums, the airfield remains active for use, though primarily now used for air shows and leisure flights. The control tower was refurbished in the 1980s at which time some of the windows were replaced. The building is now used as offices, and a further roof top addition added in the late 1980s now acts as the control room.

The Control Tower was listed at Grade II in December 2005.

Reasons for Listing

The Control Tower at Duxford Airfield dating to 1942 is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* in spite of later alterations the tower continues to reflect its 1942 design.

Historic interest:

* it is one of the key buildings on Duxford Airfield which forms important physical evidence of the historic use of the airfield and more generally of the military forces deployed within the United Kingdom during the Second World War.

Group value:

* it is part of the important surviving ensemble of military airfield structures at Duxford airfield.

External Links

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