When I first lived in Ganger Camp there were still some ex P.O.W's living in some of the huts. They were mainly Italian and Polish. There was still a guard house on the site and a massive water tower. The water tower was very often climbed by the children that lived their. In 1958 the Council started building proper brick house’s on the site, these gradually replaced all the huts and became Woodley Close. In one of the photos below the top half of Ganger Camp had been demolished. The black huts can be seen in the distance along side a smaller water tower. In the middle 60,s the Great Woodley estate was starting to be built with prices starting from £2,999. A shopping precinct was also built at Warren Gardens.

Fifty one years ago one of the largest helicopters in the world, a Vertol H21 from the United States Air Force, made a force landing in a field next to Ganger Camp (Woodley Close).

It spent nearly 21 hours grounded. The red and silver 22-seater twin rotor machine, came from Braintree in Essex. It had left its base with a crew of four to fly to Exeter. It refuelled at Greenham Common, and took a different course to avoid bad weather. Visibility then got so poor that it made an emergency landing in Woodley, Romsey. No one got hurt. A nice gesture by the Americans was to let dozens of local children go on board to have a look around. They entered the helicopter at the front end and left through a door at the rear.