Churchill War Rooms

The Cabinet War Rooms were constructed in 1938 beneath the Treasury building in Whitehall as a bomb-proof shelter for government in the event of war, and became operational days before Britain declared war on Germany in September 1939. Winston Churchill and the War Cabinet worked and, on occasion, slept in these rooms throughout the Blitz and the remainder of the war, directing military strategy from the Map Room, which was staffed around the clock and left untouched when the lights were switched off on the day Japan surrendered in August 1945. The Imperial War Museum has preserved the complex largely as it was found, including pinholes in the wall maps tracking convoy movements and Churchill's private room with its BBC broadcasting line. An adjoining Churchill Museum, opened in 2005, uses interactive displays and a 15-metre digital timeline to place the war rooms within the wider arc of Churchill's life and career. The bunker's original ventilation and structural reinforcements remain visible, and conservation work focuses on stabilising the original 1940s fittings and paper records rather than restoring them to a pristine state.