Beaulieu in WW2: The Montagu Arms & the Wrens

In 1942, Exbury House and other properties on the Beaulieu River were requisitioned as part of the war effort. The buildings became collectively known as HMS Mastodon and provided training facilities and administration for the D-Day invasion.

However, by the summer of 1943 it was already clear there wasn’t enough accommodation within the HMS Mastodon network of properties to cope with number of women being called to serve in the area. The base was expanding fast, and beds were becoming as much of a problem as boats, vehicles and stores, meaning more rooms were required for the Women’s Royal Naval Service (WRNS), known as ‘Wrens’.

As a result, in November 1943, the Montagu Arms was requisitioned to billet Wrens working at HMS Mastodon. Each day, the women now living at the Montagu Arms were transported to work between Beaulieu and Exbury in lorries for the three-and-a-half mile journey.

But before long, even the hotel filled up. More Wrens were then billeted in homes across Exbury and Beaulieu, and farm cottages were also requisitioned for additional accommodation. There were even discussions about using Palace House in Beaulieu as a headquarters for a captain of landing barges and thirty-six personnel. It never happened, despite no objections from the Montagu family if it had been needed. Palace House was not requisitioned, but it was later listed as a standby property for emergency use during D-Day.

For the Wrens, the Montagu Arms wasn’t just a billet. It became part of a lively local social scene. There were weekly dances in the village hall, plus the Domus at Beaulieu Abbey. American airmen from the nearby Beaulieu Airfield often invited the Wrens to dances too. In the hotel, the women’s mess was now the oak-panelled dining room, a luxurious upgrade compared to what they were used to if having been previously billeted in cold and damp Nissen huts.

A recollection from the time, recounted how the strict Captain Swinley visited the hotel to check on the Wrens. He found an unopened bottle of gin in a locker and punished the guilty woman with a month’s confinement in the hotel, with no leave.

By early 1945, it’s estimated just under seventy Wrens remained in operation at HMS Mastodon, and they were still billeted at the Montagu Arms. But by April 1945, the base was placed under Care and Maintenance status, and gradually the activity reduced until it was eventually no longer needed for wartime. And as a result, the Wrens moved out of the hotel, and things started to return to normal.

Today, the Montagu Arms looks like what it is: a historic hotel in a beautiful New Forest village. But from late 1943 through to 1945 it was also part of the operational footprint of HMS Mastodon, housing many women who helped keep the wartime machine moving in the critical months leading up to D-Day.