HMS Monck - Vanduara

Image: © Raibeart MacAoidh Taken: 11 Jan 2017

Vanduara was used by Combined Operations and instead of being prepared for the onset of the busy tourist season in Easter 1942, the summer holiday residence became H.M.S Monck - headquarters of the Combined Operations and nerve-centre of many attacks on German-held Europe. A conference was held there between 28 June 1943 and 2 July 1943, code name RATTLE, under Lord Louis Mountbatten and was known as the Field of the Cloth of Gold because of the number of high ranking officers taking part. The townspeople of Largs were blissfully unaware that one of the most crucial conferences in the history of the world was taking place right under their very noses. Some noticed more security around Vanduara and Hollywood Hotels along Greenock Road. By then most people knew that military bigwigs were using the hotels as a base. Churchill and General Dwight Eisenhower, Allied Supreme Commander, and later 34th President of the United States of America, visited Largs during the conference. The two great leaders stayed at St Phillans, which later became the Manor Park Hotel between Largs and Skelmorlie. The high profile conference talks took place at Vanduara, with Lord Mountbatten later saying that the Largs gathering was one of the crucial points in the preparation of the D-Day landings.

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