The Story of 'The Angels' Where does all this information come from Why were they called 'The Aycliffe Angels'? What did the Factory manufacture? Plans and Photos of the Factory (1940s) TIMELINE of the Factory & Workers Winston Churchill visits the Aycliffe Factory (1942) Mrs Dillon - Senior ROF worker who received a medal Honour at last, thanks to The Northern Echo The Aycliffe Angels 2000-2020 Extremely dangerous work... Workers' Houses and Accommodation 350 Houses on Secret Estate in Darlington Photo Gallery 1 - (Admin Staff) Photo Gallery 2 - (Production Staff) Photo Gallery 3 - (Individual Angels) Photo Gallery 4 - (ROF site in 1945) Photo Gallery 5 - (ROF Fire Brigade) Documents and Certificates etc... What's left of Aycliffe ROF? Surviving ROF buildings... Links for History of The Aycliffe Angels    Workers' Houses and Accommodation Royal Ordnance factory houses in Congreve Terrace, Aycliffe Village. Built in the 1940s. At many of the other Wartime ROFs, there were large numbers of billets or accommodation areas for the factory workers. However, at Aycliffe not too many of these were built. There were some local billets and a few houses at Clarence Farm to the north of the factory (see below for a photo of a Clarence Farm Munitions house). Many of the workers lived locally or travelled from a radius of about 25 to 30 miles each day. This journey was often long and uncomfortable, by bus or train. A nearby area, which is now Newton Aycliffe town centre and the Aycliffe Young People’s Centre (former Approved School), was earmarked to build more accommodation for munitions workers, but these plans were never fully actioned and it was handed over to the current occupants in 1942. One of the few exceptions were the building of two streets of houses in Bickford Terrace and Congreve Terrace (now part of Aycliffe Village). Most of these houses were typical single-story or two story, flat-roofed munitions factory houses. They were built from brick, concrete and had small metal framed windows. They included a blast-proof room with very thick concrete walls, just in case a large explosion occurred! There were some larger, two-storey houses with pitched roofs (visible in the photo below) built at the end of Bickford Terrace by Durham Police when they moved into the ordnance factory Admin. Buildings in 1947.    Bickford Terrace, Aycliffe (1951) The photo above shows Bickford Terrace Aycliffe Village in approximately 1951. These houses are all still here today, but look very different! There are a couple which still have flat roofs, but most now have pitched roofs.    Modern Day house in Bickford Terrace (2004) This is one of the few remaining houses in Bickford Terrace which still has a flat roof, as shown in the old photos. Photograph taken March 2004.    Bickford Terrace, Aycliffe (2004) Shot taken March 2004. This is how the houses in Bickford Terrace, Aycliffe Village look today.    Clarence Farm Munitions Factory House Photo from The Northern Echo archive. In an area north of the Royal Ordnance factory some houses for workers were built. The photo above shows a typical house at Clarence Farm, now part of Newton Aycliffe.     'Secret' ROF Housing Estate... There was also a 'secret' ROF housing estate built in the Eastbourne area of Darlington on Lingfield Lane, now named Mc Mullen Road. This estate was shrouded in mystery at the time and little was known about it, being built by The Ministry of Supply for key workers at the Aycliffe factory and occupied by ROF families from 1942 onwards. Very few photographs of the houses are known to exist. The photo to the right, which is of poor quality, has been copied from one held by the Darlington Library Local Studies dept.   Click the link below to read more about this estate. Read More HERE