A war hero’s secret weapon stash sparked a bomb scare in Wimbledon Village last Friday.
It was discovered in a hidden room at Southside House – the former home of Major Malcolm Munthe, who worked behind Nazi lines in occupied Europe as a special forces soldier.
Excavations following a fire at the house in November uncovered the secret basement, accessed by moving the hearthstone in a dining room fireplace to reveal wooden steps.
Southside House curator Richard Surman, who is overseeing the work, said: “We’ve had an archaeologist in who’s found extraordinary things we were not aware of.”
He said the chairman of the family trust that owns the house had opened a trunk in the recently discovered room to find guns and ammunition including a Colt 45 istol, Sten submachine gun and magazines for an M1 carbine rifle.
Police were called and workmen and residents evacuated from the building and nearby homes on Friday, April 15.
Officers cordoned off the area at about 1pm, but re-opened it at about 2.30pm after the weapons were removed.
Mr Surman said he hoped the items could be lent to a museum in Scotland that is preparing an exhibition about Britain’s Special Operations Executive (SOE), a spy and sabotage unit of which Major Munthe was an early member.
Mr Surman described him as “a modest, but very great war hero”.
The exhibition at the museum of the Gordon Highlanders in Aberdeen – Major Munthe’s first regiment – already has an engraved sword presented to him by Italian philosopher Benedetto Crocce, who was rescued from Nazi forces in one of the most daring raids.
The major’s other wartime-exploits included blowing up a munitions train just miles from his family’s ancestral home in Sweden.
He was eventually put in charge of SOE operations in southern Italy – where he dressed as an elderly, overweight lady to smuggle a radio transmitter past Nazi lines and co-ordinate resistance efforts in the occupied zone.
After the war, Major Munthe remained in the army teaching behind-the-lines warfare.
He unsuccessfully attempted to enter politics with the Conservative Party, and died in 1995.
Southside House was badly damaged in November when fire broke out during a candle-lit violin concert at the Woodhayes Road building, which is thought to have been built in the 17th century.
About £15m of art – including paintings by Sir John Reynolds – had to be carried from the building by firefighters.
It is expected to re-open to the public on September 1.
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