Wooden shed @ Ty Tedwch
Exterior, Studio Interior, Studio @ Treflach Farm
Exterior, Leyland Arms Interior, Leyland Arms @ Treflach Farm
Pictured top left the wooden shed removed from Park Hall, Oswestry in the early 1980's by Gary and Janet Jones of Ty Tegwych, Treflach for £250.
Originally Park Hall Camp housed up to 21,000 troops for training purposes with the Old Oswestry ramparts ideal for turning civilians into soldiers. The camp was used again in WW2 but was closed down in the 1970's hence the sale of the sheds used as agricultural buildings and today is a stable for horses.
The other images are of part of a set of pre-fabricated concrete & sawdust panel sheds (2 at Treflach Hall and 4 at Treflach Farm) that were removed from Halston Hall, Whittington and Otley Hall, Ellesmere in 1952.
- The sheds found at Treflach Hall are from Halston Hall and cost £60 each. They became housing for a 30 cow tie up dairy and chicken housing for deep litter hens
- The two larger sheds at Treflach Farm came from Otley Hall, were placed on the Cae Nant and were used for a large free range hen enterprise. Two smaller sheds came from Halston Hall, cost £30 each and were placed in the farmyard to become a milling shed and a machinery shed
- Today the sheds at Treflach Hall have been repurposed into a store shed and a calf house
- At Treflach Farm the two larger sheds are now a store shed and housing for a free-range pig unit while the two smaller sheds are a yoga studio and a communal space ‘The Leyland Arms’ (pictured)
Halston Hall was a 1000 bed American hospital while Otley was home to a massive camp of G.I.s. All materials were imported from America by ship to Liverpool then transported and constructed by local tradesmen. Young men of all races in a place far from home whose camaraderie and service endured the loneliness and brutality of war. Many romances at local dances resulted in a number of G.I. marriages too. These sheds however were places of training and recuperation after the horrors of war. John F. Kennedy may have strolled the lawns of Woodhill just down the road when he stayed with Lord Harlech, the then ambassador in New York, but these sheds, implanted into this corner of England, will forever be American and commemorate the American spirit.
My father, a young man of 23, pulled down and rebuilt these sheds which was no mean feat. In one of the roofs of a shed destined for Treflach Farm (which Uncles Bob and Elliot farmed at the time) he found a pair of leather despatch riders' boots, a poignant reminder that these buildings were a home to many who never made it back.
From destruction to construction. This building boom after the war on local farms when money was short and food was scarce allowed rationing to end within a few years. These sheds that meant so much to so many during WW2 then with pain, sweat and ingenuity created prosperity and abundance to the grateful, are special places that time has just forgotten.