National Treasures

Saving The Nation's Art in World War II

Author: Caroline Shenton

The gigantic covert wartime mission led by the men and women of London's museums and galleries to save the nation's priceless heritage.

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Summary

The gigantic covert wartime mission led by the men and women of London's museums and galleries to save the nation's priceless heritage.

Description

As Hitler prepared to invade Poland during the sweltering summer of 1939, men and women from across London's museums, galleries and archives formulated ingenious plans to send the nation's highest prized objects to safety. Using stately homes, tube tunnels, slate mines, castles, prisons, stone quarries and even their own homes, a dedicated bunch of unlikely misfits packed up the nation's greatest treasures and, in a race against time, dispatched them throughout the country on a series of top-secret wartime adventures.

National Treasures highlights a moment from our history when an unlikely coalition of mild-mannered civil servants, social oddballs and metropolitan aesthetes became the front line in the heritage war against Hitler. Caroline Shenton shares the interwoven lives of ordinary people who kept calm and carried on in the most extraordinary of circumstances in their efforts to save the Nation's historic identity.

Critic Reviews

“Geeks triumph over the forces of darkness: nothing could have given me greater pleasure. Combining an exciting story with scrupulous research, Caroline Shenton has done her unlikely heroes proud”

-- Lucy Worsley

An engrossing and uplifting story of how some of the greatest treasures of Britains museum, gallery and library collections were protected and preserved during the darkest days of WWII

-- Richard Ovenden, author of Burning the Books

An engrossing and uplifting story of how some of the greatest treasures of Britains museum, gallery and library collections were protected and preserved during the darkest days of WWII

-- Richard Ovenden, author of Burning the Books
Shenton has the archivist's unerring eye for detail and the storyteller's instinct for what will make a compelling tale. It is brought to life with energy and confidence -- Julie Summers, bestselling author of Jambusters

Entertaining, surprising and full of brilliant vignettes, Shenton does justice to one of the great untold stories of the Second World War

-- Josh Ireland, author of Churchill & Son
Fascinating, engaging and often eye-stretching, Caroline Shenton's account of the battle to save the nation's greatest treasures during wartime features a wonderfully eclectic cast of oddballs, bluestockings and endearingly eccentric aristocrats. A cracking read -- Giles Milton
Shenton manages to combine scholarly and diligent research with a powerful narrative drive and a hugely entertaining taste for the anecdotal. Moreover, her cast of characters wouldn't disgrace an Ealing comedy. I haven't enjoyed a book so much in years -- Adrian Tinniswood
Reveals the wonderfully inventive ways Britain's great museums hid their priceless exhibits from Hitler's bombs -- Daily Mail
Vigorously researched and highly entertaining -- Daily Telegraph

About the Author

Dr Caroline Shenton was Director of the Parliamentary Archives at Westminster, where she worked for eighteen years. Prior to this she was a senior archivist at the National Archives, and she is currently a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and the Royal Historical Society. Caroline has written for the Guardian, The London Review of Books, and reviewed books for The Spectator.

More on this Book

'Geeks triumph over the forces of darkness: nothing could have given me greater pleasure. Combining an exciting story with scrupulous research, Caroline Shenton has done her unlikely heroes proud' - Lucy Worsley As Hitler prepared to invade Poland during the sweltering summer of 1939, men and women from across London's museums, galleries and archives formulated ingenious plans to send the nation's highest prized objects to safety. Using stately homes, tube tunnels, slate mines, castles, prisons, stone quarries and even their own homes, a dedicated bunch of unlikely misfits packed up the nation's greatest treasures and, in a race against time, dispatched them throughout the country on a series of top-secret wartime adventures. National Treasures highlights a moment from our history when an unlikely coalition of mild-mannered civil servants, social oddballs and metropolitan aesthetes became the front line in the heritage war against Hitler. Caroline Shenton shares the interwoven lives of ordinary people who kept calm and carried on in the most extraordinary of circumstances in their efforts to save the Nation's historic identity.