This was no garden-variety find.
A UK family has been left flabbergasted after discovering a World War II shelter in the garden of their house three years after first moving in.
“I thought ‘Oh my God, what have we found?'” Catherine Milburn, 32, told Jam Press of the hidden bunker, which is located beneath the yard of their home in the town of Southwick, England.
The Brit had been living at the domicile with her husband Liam and their two kids for three years, oblivious to its existence.
However, all the while, the regional manager said she’d “assumed there had been an overground bunker there because when we moved in there were lots of bricks in the garden.”
“We renovated around 60 percent of the garden but we hadn’t found a thing, not one piece of history in the house,” Catherine lamented. “We were desperate to find something.”
However, the couple finally unearthed the wartime refuge this past Sunday.
“There’s about a three-metre-long piece of concrete underneath a summerhouse in the garden,” said Catherine. “When we were digging it out, we noticed steel bars. We thought it was a bit over the top for a summerhouse then we got to a corrugated iron sheet.”
Realizing this was no ordinary structure, the couple kept digging into the night until they’d unearthed some stairs and a water-filled tunnel, which confirmed their suspicions.
The peculiar irrigation ditch is believed to be an Anderson Shelter, a special type of air raid shelter that was designed to protect British citizens from the German Luftwaffe.
The anti-bomb tunnels were buried about three feet in people’s gardens and were comprised of curved corrugated steel sheets bolted together at the top.
They could protect up to six people from shrapnel and even withstand a 100-pound bomb falling six feet away.
While 3.2 million of these safe spaces were installed before and during WWII, only around 15 of them reportedly remain.
Catherine said she and her hubby were over the moon about having a piece of history in “our back garden.”
“We love the idea of making use of it and we want to do something different,” said the Brit, who’s tossed out plans for a greenhouse in favor of preserving the shelter.
The couple plans to drain the water and get some light in there so they can get a sense of the subterranean structure.
“I’ll definitely document it as we go,” said Catherine. “The kids are really excited and the school want to do a trip here. It’s so educational for them to learn about the history.”
