Permanent
Churchill War Rooms
Free event with general admission
The Beating Heart of the War Rooms
The Map Room was in use 24 hours a day, it was here that vital information for King George VI, Prime Minister Churchill and the armed forces was collated. It was constantly staffed by one officer from each the Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force.
Walk through the rooms that once had strictly limited access, notice the tiny pinholes and markers left behind on the map walls and read the reports and charts depicting information from Women in Service to Deaths in Britain.
Highlights
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IWMV for Victory
Notice on one of the clocks in the map room that a worker celebrated the end of the war by drawing a square around the V on the face of the clock.
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IWMScrambled Messages
Look out for the black telephone with a green handle. It provided private telephone exchanges to the outside world and served anyone else trying to listen in with white noise.
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Thursday 16 August
Left almost exactly as it did at the end of the war, you will see the calendar date displayed in the Map Room marks the last time the War Rooms were used – the day after Victory in Japan.
