Welcome to the WW2 Coventry Hostels section
Within these pages, we are trying to bring together as much information as possible about
the Hostel accommodation used in Coventry during and after World War Two. Much of the story
about life within these hostels remains untold, yet in some way they affected the lives of many
thousands both during and after the war.
People where sent to some of these hostels to work in nearby war factories, others found
them selves homeless after being bombed out, some came from overseas, many spent years
in the accommodation, and many married and had children whilst living within the hostels.
To get some idea of the scale of the building which took place during the five-year period
1942 to 1947 on hostels for the Ministry of Works we have obtained copies of documents
from the Public Records Office [PRO] of LAB 22/63, which lists of Industrial Hostels.
These documents are Crown Copyright, and reproduced with the permission of
A grand total of 66 hostels holding at capacity 39,662 and occupied by 10,805 residents
on the 31st Dec 1942, where available to the Ministries and departments connected with
war works.
 Most people would have been sent to these
hostels by the Department of Works.
Men and women of all ages received official
notification via the Royal Mail that they where
being sent to work for the war effort at a
designated place possibly miles from where
they lived, sometimes in the case of Northern Ireland to another country.
Travel information and the passes would be supplied and on the allotted date, the person
would be required to be at the place notified, for collection by hostel or Ministry of Works
personnel.
From the station in Coventry many were taken to the old Whitley Insulation Hospital, were
they where allotted their billet and work place. Some of the men working in the south of the
city would come to the Chace Hostel's here in Willenhall, and the women went to Baginton
Fields Hostel.
We are amassing a huge amount of information related to the number of persons and the
places these hostels were through research being carried at the Public Records Office by
the groups researcher, Rosie Taylor, who is doing some wonderful work for the group,
and visits to both Local Studies and Coventry Archives.
HOWEVER, what we need is photographs and stories relating to these and the many hostels
countywide, to bring these back to life and to be able to tell the story of what happened to
individuals and to the places.
 A huge amount of social history is at present
missing from this era, so please help us to
not only preserve but also to inform those
who have not lived though these experiences.
The work presently being carried out is solely
based on the hostels within the Coventry area,
although we are hoping to enlarge to a National
scale some time in the future, when more information is available, this is where YOU come in !
Please if you have any information about WW2 hostels, we would love to hear from you.
National Information with limited information about hostels in each area
|