3 minute read
Remembering When
London was bombed from 1940 until 1941 which became known as the Blitz
By Ken Hayes - Honorary Membership Secretary
In 1940 when France had surrendered to Germany and the British Expeditionary Force had been evacuated from Dunkirk, Hitler wanted to gain air supremacy over Southern England before mounting an Invasion.
The Royal Air Force had become an independent part of the British Armed Services. It had built up itself in the inter-war period and now had three of the best fighter aircraft in the world, the Hawker, the Hurricane, and the Supermarine Spitfire. The battle between the Luftwaffe and the RAF took place between July and October 1940 known as the Battle of Britain and the courage and skill of the RAF pilots convinced Hitler to postpone the invasion of England. Instead, he concentrated on bombing London and other cities such as Liverpool and Birmingham.
On the 10th of July 1940 Luftwaffe German Bomber planes bombed the London docks the start of a campaign to bomb London and which continued until March 1941. This became known as the Blitz, from the German word Blitzkrieg, (lightning war). On that first day 337 tons of bombs were dropped in East and South East of London and killing 448 civilians. On 7th September 1940, the Luftwaffe increased their raids with an unbroken 57- day assault, with the RAF fighter pilots attacking them with great loss of planes and pilots on both sides. The courage and determination of the RAF fighter pilots slowed down the raids and this phase of the War was named the Battle of Britain. The Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, commenting on the success of the RAF said.
“Never in the field of human conflict has been so much owed by so many to so few”.
The population of London were alerted to the bombing raids by Air raid sirens and took shelter in Underground Stations, where they could wait until all clear was sounded. Disused tunnels were also used as shelters, as the old tunnels of the City and South London Railway under Borough High Street were. turned into shelters with beds and toilets. People living in suburban houses were encouraged to build ‘Anderson Shelters’, (a curved sheet of corrugated iron over a hole dug in their gardens, with the soil piled on top). The bombings were widespread but were mainly aimed at the London Docks in East and South East London. The Rotherhithe and Bermondsey areas suffered huge damage and loss of life as they were highly populated. Coming out of a shelter in the morning after a bombing raid people might find their homes were destroyed. The bombing of London became widespread and not always on target. Some of the bombs would be dropped whether they were on target or not to enable the bombers to be able to return to their home bases. Food was rationed and if your home was destroyed you had to move in with your relatives. The government built prefabricated houses and placed them on cleared bomb sites. These were designed to last for 10 years and some were still in use until the end of the 1990’s.
As the War moved on the bombing was not as frequent in London. In December 1941, the USA joined the War1, following the bombing of Pearl Harbour by the Japanese and they stationed their aircraft in England to join in the bombing of Germany. In 1944 the new V1 and V11 flying bombs were targeted on London. The King and Queen insisted on staying i n London during the War and they visited the areas that had been bombed. The general population of London adopted a war time spirit of keeping calm and carrying on as best they could in extremely difficult and stressful times.
It is estimated that 12000 metric tons of bombs were dropped on London during the Blitz and about 30,000 civilians were killed by enemy action which changed the landscape of the city unlike anything since the Great Fire of London in 1666.
• People sheltering on the platform of
Elephant and Castle Underground station
