Control Tower, Former Little Walden Airfield

Control Tower, former Little Walden Airfield

This control tower was built in 1942 to designs of the Air Ministry's Directorate of Works and Buildings as an Office for All Commands design, drawn to Drawing No. 12779/41. It is constructed of rendered brick with an asphalt roof.

The ground floor contains a watch office to the front, with a duty pilot's rest room, meteorological office, switch room and lavatories to the rear. The first floor houses a control room to the front, with a controller's rest room and signals office to the rear, opening onto a passage with access to stairs.

The exterior features large multi-paned steel casements to the front and to the flank walls of the watch office and control room, providing clear views of the flying field. These windows were reduced in size later in the war according to design 343/43. Access is provided by steel stairs on the return elevation leading to a concrete balcony with tubular steel railings and iron columns providing support. Smaller steel casements light the rear part of the side and rear elevations. Doors open to the left-hand and rear elevations. The interior contains concrete stairs.

The control tower has been restored and converted into a house. It stands as an exceptionally complete example of a control tower type commonly used on airfields constructed during the Second World War. The airfield was used by the USAAF from April 1944 by the 409th Bomb Group, and from September by a mixture of bomber and fighter units. Some lengths of perimeter track and a section of runway survive, though the runway section is now absorbed into the B1052. Prefabricated structures including Romney huts and a modified T2 hangar also survive on the site.

This control tower is one of 162 examples built to this Air Ministry design (Watch Office for All Commands), of which 82 now survive. It is one of a very small number to have survived in this degree of preservation, with other comparable examples at Alconbury (with operations room attached), Duxford, Dunkeswell, Rougham, Ludham and East Kirkby.

The control tower first appeared as a recognisable design in 1934. From the second half of the 1930s, increasing attention was given to the dispersal and shelter of aircraft from attack, ensuring serviceable landing and take-off areas, and the control of movement, resulting in the development of the control tower and the planning from 1938 of the first airfields with runways and perimeter tracks. The control tower became the most distinctive and instantly recognisable building associated with military airfields, particularly during the Second World War when they served as foci for base personnel awaiting the return of aircraft from operations. This is one of a very small number of control towers on Second World War airfields which are either exceptionally well preserved or have distinguished operational histories. Their iconic value as operational nerve centres and as memorials to the enormous losses sustained by American and Commonwealth forces in the course of the Strategic Bomber Offensive has long been recognised.