Prees Heath Army Camp
Opened in 1915 as a training base for the British Army, it had a capacity for 30,000 men for training in trench warfare. It additionally acted later as a store for supplies, with its own railway depot feed by a 1 mile (1.6 km) branch line from the LNWR's Crewe and Shrewsbury Railway. As casualties mounted, it became a hospital with a fully fledged barracks.
The scale and size of the camp brought about the appointment of the first female police officers in the Shropshire Constabulary, to manage and restrain local women from heading to the camp.
After the war ended, the facilities were downgraded, with the British Government keeping ownership of the site for Army training purposes.
Read more about this topic: Tilstock Airfield
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