Duncombe Park Army Camp

About 3km after crossing Rievaulx Bridge with its opportunity to gaze at the majestic abbey, the Cleveland Way crosses a concrete road at Griff Lodge. Here the National Trail bears left to Helmsley avoiding Duncombe Park.

The concrete road is a reminder of the military presence during WW2 at Duncombe Park. Following it through Park Plain Wood reveals more evidence. Hidden among the mature beech trees are concrete and brick foundations for the Nissan huts. A solitary hut remains, “a steel rib from the roof survives, though not in situ”¹. In Blackdale Howl Wood, I found a brick sump which I assume to be associated with sewage treatment.

I guessing this is part of the sewage treatment system.

The camp was occupied by the 11th Armoured Division when it was formed in 1941². There is surprisingly very little history available online about the camp. A photo in the Imperial War Museum is captioned “… the Prime Minister inspects Valentine tanks and crews of 11th Armoured Division at Helmsley …” which has been identified as Duncombe Park³⁴. There is a couple of interesting oral histories at the Imperial War Museum which confirms Duncombe Park and point to other types of tanks being stationed there: Covenanters, Crusaders, Comets, Cromwells and Centaurs⁵⁶.

Standing in a scout car, the Prime Minister inspects Valentine tanks and crews of 11th Armoured Division at Helmsley in Yorkshire, 6 November 1941. © IWM (H 15377)

At some time later in the war, the 22nd Dragoons were stationed there⁷, and later still Canadian troops. When these had left, they were followed by the Polish 4th Armoured Regiment and the 2nd Warsaw Armoured Brigade⁸.

Here’s a photo I took six years ago showing a tank crossing upstream of Rievaulx Bridge which was too narrow for the tanks. The far bank is now a private garden.

Now here’s a challenge for you. Where was this photo taken? Presumably on the North York Moors.

Valentine tanks of 11th Armoured Division gather near a church during an exercise in Northern Command, 16 October 1941. © IWM (H 14738)

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1
“Heritage Gateway – Results.” Heritagegateway.org.uk, 2015, www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=1517158&resourceID=19191. Accessed 5 Apr. 2021.
2
Wikipedia Contributors. “11th Armoured Division (United Kingdom).” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 21 Mar. 2021, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/11th_Armoured_Division_(United_Kingdom). Accessed 5 Apr. 2021.
3
“THE BRITISH ARMY in the UNITED KINGDOM 1939-45.” Imperial War Museums, 2021, www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205198206. Accessed 5 Apr. 2021.
4
“Military and Related Organisations – HA08149 Winston Churchill Inspecting Troups in Duncombe Park – the Helmsley Archive.” Helmsleyarchive.org.uk, 2013, www.helmsleyarchive.org.uk/displayimage.php?album=6&pid=3212. Accessed 5 Apr. 2021.
5
“Lock, Gerald (Oral History).” Imperial War Museums, 2021, www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/80021530. Accessed 5 Apr. 2021.
6
“Duckworth, Peter Alexander (Oral History).” Imperial War Museums, 2021, www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/80018087. Accessed 5 Apr. 2021.
7
“Duckworth, Peter Alexander (Oral History).” Imperial War Museums, 2021, www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/80018087. Accessed 5 Apr. 2021.
8
“Heritage Gateway – Results.” Heritagegateway.org.uk, 2015, www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=1517158&resourceID=19191. Accessed 5 Apr. 2021.

Posted

5th April 2021

Duncombe Park, North York Moors

Fhithich

Tags:

military, ruin, WW2

Comments

12 responses to “Duncombe Park Army Camp”

Bob howe

6th April 2021

Is it Goathland Mick

Reply
1. Fhithich
  
  6th April 2021
  
  I don’t think so, Bob. Church looks different unless it’s been rebuilt in the last 60 years.
  
  I don’t know the answer by the way. Ran out of time last night. I suspected it be one of the villages on the Tabular Hills plateau. Old Byland or round about there.
  
  Reply
John

6th April 2021

Your church challenge required some serious detective work and lateral thinking involving 23rd Hussars, churchyard yews and background limekilns. All of which eventually led me to All Saints Church at Ryal in Northumberland.
Following the 23rd Hussars link led me to some interesting images on the IWM site (H13032, H13033 & H13037 in particular). I think these may have been taken on Wheeldale Moor and the beck in the photos is possibly Rutmoor Beck. Which leads me to ask are the remains at SE7855996100 related to the military training activities on the moor in WW2?

Reply
1. Fhithich
  
  6th April 2021
  
  Well done. Looks a good fit. I’m a bit surprised at Northumberland.
  
  Where do the 23rd Hussars come from?
  
  Rutmoor Beck looks interesting. Never been there.
  
  Reply
John

6th April 2021

The photo you posted is one of a sequence of 7, each one has written description (brief due to wartime censorship). On H14733 somebody had scrawled 23rd Hussars as an afterthought. Checking the internet I found a brief history which said the Hussars had been in Exercise Percy up near Hadrian’s Wall on 9/10/1941 returning to the Whitby area 16/10/1941. The officer who took the photos also took some in Edinburgh the same day. I also found a photo of tanks on railway flat cars in Newcastle 17/10/1941. Finding the church was a chew which is where the churchyard yews came in. I should also add that I am now a world renowned expert on the architecture of the churches of Northumberland. 🙂

Reply
1. Fhithich
  
  6th April 2021
  
  There’s a book here somewhere.
  
  Reply
Penny Hoskyn

22nd January 2023

My father was stationed at Duncombe Park . He spoke little of his time in the army, like so many, but he did develop a love of Yorkshire . He told me they would take a tank down to the coast for a day out… then right it off in an accident… but it was just written off as casualties of war , no come back. He was very proud that he was in the first Armoured Division in the country. He was with his platoon when sent to Anzio in Jan. 1944, Italy. He said they walked into a trap everyone was killed except for him and one other man. My dad was injured and spent 48 in a ditch. Eventually he was sent back to England. I don’t think he ever got over this experience and even in his 80s on Remembrance day was always very emotional.
I cannot find much about his time in Italy. I have been back to Anzio and Duncombe Park, both visits I have found very moving.
Father was John Eric Thompson Army number 21457 born 1916 died 2003

Reply
Angela Barry

15th August 2024

The Church looks to me like St. Mary Magdalene, East Moors, a few miles north of Helmsley, where I grew up.
I remember the camp very well, and the nissan huts. Just inside the gateway (in Helmslely), was a large nissan which was the NAAFI; my mother did an evening shift there from time to time and occasionally took me along. The soldiers always made a fuss of me, my mother said they probably thought of their own little girls back home, I was 3 or 4 at this time. At the top of the hill, before reaching Duncombe Park House (which was then used as St. Mary’s School for Girls), I remember another large nissan being erected, at the behest of Nigel Patrick, a well known actor of the day. It became a theatre and cinema, which was open to the villagers as well as the troops and I saw many early films there. Several Polish children came to our school, and I remember attending a birthday party for one of them in a nissan hut. The street where we lived led to the railway station, and it was an exciting event when a new batch of troops arrived which I could watch from my bedroom window. The lorries and tanks, and the troops would line up all long the road before driving up to the camp in convoy, and I remember a Canadian soldier wandering over the road and asking me if I would like some chocolate, handing me up a large bar. What a treat! One morning in school assembly, the headmistress instructed us to bring clean jam jars the next day. The soldiers had given the school a large container of drinking chocolate, another prize.
There was a young Canadian soldier called Mitch, who seemed to spend his days driving a jeep back and forth between the camp and the village, and on several occasions when I and another friend were walking up the road to Duncombe Park to play with a friend whose father was the Caretaker there, Mitch would be passing and give us a lift.
Life seemed very quiet after the war and the camp emptied, but they left behind a concrete tennis court which I and my friends spent many happy hours using. I was fortunate to have a very happy childhood in spite of the war.

Reply
1. Fhithich
  
  15th August 2024
  
  Thanks, Angela, for your reminiscences, most interesting. I’ll remember your suggestion of East Moors church the next time I pass that way.
  
  Reply
John Kirby

14th September 2024

Slightly off subject. My mum was in the NAAFI based at Carlton Camp near Carlton Park Farm, Carlton, near Helmsley, North Yorkshire. I can find references to Duncombe Park Army Camp at Helmsley. But no mention at all about Carlton Camp.

Does anyone have any information about this please? If only I had asked mum the relevant questions when she was alive!

Reply
John K

15th September 2024

I have found out now, from another source, that mum was a manageress in the NAAFI at Duncombe Park Army Camp, at Helmsley. Carlton Camp was only a military camp.

Reply
B Bunting

6th November 2024

I have always understood that the Army was reviewed by The King at Duncombe Park in Spring 1944 before they transferred to the south coast prior to the D day landings – i’m sure I’ve also seen a photo of the event somewhere though can find no reference to this. Can anyone confirm?

Reply