The incredible secret underground mine that hid 2,000 art treasures during WW2

2,000 paintings were evacuated from The National Gallery in London and taken to Manod Quarry in Wales during WW2 (Image: Getty)In the late summer of 1941, the cloud-capped slopes of the Ffestiniog hills in remote North Wales provided an unexpected setting for lorries belonging to the London Midland & Scottish Railway Company and canvas-covered trucks…

BusinessAugust 19, 2026News Info Wire2 min read

2,000 paintings were evacuated from The National Gallery in London and taken to Manod Quarry in Wales during WW2 (Image: Getty)

In the late summer of 1941, the cloud-capped slopes of the Ffestiniog hills in remote North Wales provided an unexpected setting for lorries belonging to the London Midland & Scottish Railway Company and canvas-covered trucks on loan from the Great Western Railway. None of the vehicles in question were on railway business, however, and none carried passengers. Instead, carefully loaded, each transported goods were worth the equivalent of millions of pounds today. Only months after the Blitz had destroyed or damaged two million British homes, killing 40,000 civilians, the lorries were full of some of the nation’s most valuable artworks. The paintings carried belonged to the National Gallery, and their secret destination was a series of underground chambers in a slate quarry in this inaccessible location close to the struggling Welsh mining town of Blaenau Ffestiniog.

The greatest evacuation of art treasures in British history took place 85 years ago this summer with all the precision, frayed tempers, cost-cutting and shenanigans of a military campaign. As well as Jan Van Eyck’s well-known Arnolfini Marriage Portrait, a favourite of visitors to the National Gallery since 1843, the successful relocation to a series of repurposed subterranean caverns in disused Manod Quarry 250 miles from London may well have saved some of Britain’s best-loved paintings from destruction by Nazi bombs.The 2,000 paintings in question included masterpieces by Rembrandt and Van Dyck. Lorries were conspicuous on these little-travelled lanes. As manoeuvres got underway, gossip was rife in nearby towns and villages. Captain John Sydney Matthews, Manod Quarry’s owner, attempted to silence speculation. He told the owner of the local paper shop that the quarry was being employed to store lorry loads of butter.