From the Cold War to special operations, this Essex museum has an extraordinary range in its collections, as
“The difficulty with the Combined Military Services Museum he difficulty with the Combined Military (CMSM) is that so many people think it is going to be a shed with a few tin hats and a couple of gas masks on the wall,” says curator Julie Miller.
Established in 1996, the museum aspires to tell the amazing stories of the British military services. Housed in a former bonded wine warehouse, it’s home to a hugely impressive – and diverse – collection, as is clear from the enormous Thunderbird surface-to-air missile that greets visitors in the car park.
This fascinating trove of artefacts originated from the private collection of Dr Richard Wooldridge, whose passion for collecting began as a child when he spotted an old military rucksack at the side of the road and persuaded his father to bring it home with them. The result is a hidden gem that Lord Ashdown (who became a patron) called “a treasure trove for anyone interested in military paraphernalia,” which is “as good as you'd find at the Imperial War Museum”.