Historic WW2 water tower for sale: former prisoner of war camp tower in Essex transformed into dramatic family home

A water tower for a former prisoner of war camp in Braintree, Essex, has been listed for sale as a four-bedroom home.

Now a luxurious albeit unconventional five-storey house, the red-brick structure has been painstakingly transformed by its current owners Jon and Victoria Oakley.

The couple, who own local businesses, took a risk when they snapped up the derelict tower in early 2017 for £285,000 without planning consent — but they jumped at the chance to tackle their own Grand Designs-style project.

Called The Water Tower, it once fed the water supply to High Garrett prisoner of war camp directly next door.

Historic England records High Garrett as a “German Working Camp”. Locals believe it housed around 700 Italian - and then a few years later German - prisoners, many of whom worked on local farms during the day before returning to the open prison-style camp in the evenings.

The tower's war effort wasn't limited to supplying water to the camp, it seems. Owners Jon and Victoria say they found radios and wiring when they entered the property and they believe it was a Marconi communications hub, acting as an early warning system for nearby Wethersfield airbase which was used by the RAF and US military during the 1939-45 conflict.

It's now a five-storey home after 14 months of renovations that included fitting insulation and adding another “skin” of brickwork to the outside of the building. Walls are now one-metre thick, and switching the heating on is rarely necessary, says Jon.

Upon buying the property in Halstead Road, the couple found a few panels from the original water tank lying in the field so they tracked down the makers — a family-run business in Wales — who told them they'd made the panels in the Twenties or Thirties for the Royal Engineers but hadn’t known what they were to be used for.

"We knew that the derelict water tower had passed through a few developers' hands but all plans to go up a storey — in brick — were denied," says Jon, "Once we'd found the original suppliers of the panels we were able to go to local heritage and offer to invest in the same company in exchange for permission to reinstall the 'tank' level and put a bedroom in there."

The transformed tower now has windows, a huge open-plan extension on the ground-floor level and en suite bedrooms on each of the four upper floors.

The interiors are a mix of modern greys and whites, with light-reflecting mirrors, pendants and glass surfaces dotted throughout.

"It's very Essex, all chandeliers and sparkling floors," says Jon. "People can always dress it with something else, it's a good starting point for someone.

"For us, with kids and a dog, it's easy to look after."

On the top floor, a seven-metre square room that resembles a water tank from the exterior is currently used as a dressing room, with a wall of shoes.

Jon calls it "the Kardashian room", although he says it was intended to be a large bedroom and the en suite has a luxe freestanding bath.

Having spent a "substantial amount", the couple and their two young children are now ready to find their next adventure. The Water Tower sits in a one-acre plot but as the Oakleys have been renting the field next door, they would like to move to a property with a bit more of its own land, for horses.

Damian Prior of Zoe Napier, the agents marketing The Water Tower, says the home’s unique nature makes it very difficult to value. First listed for sale at £1.3 million in October 2019, it's now on the market for £1.2 million.

Braintree station is three miles away, with direct trains to London Liverpool Street taking just over an hour.