10 facts about the belfast blitz

While some of the poorer and more crowded suburban areas suffered severely, the mansions of Mayfair, the luxury flats of Kensington, and Buckingham Palace itselfwhich was bombed four separate timesfared little better. Under the leadership of amon de Valera it had declared its neutrality during the Second World War. In every instance, all stepped forward. The most significant loss was a 4.5-acre (1.8ha) factory floor for manufacturing the fuselages of Short Stirling bombers. It is believed that the wartime government covered up the death toll because of concern over the effect it would have had on public morale. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. While the balloons themselves were an obvious deterrent, they were anchored to the ground by steel tethers that were strong enough to damage or destroy any aircraft that flew into them. But the authorities were afraid that bombs might not be the. Brian Barton of Queen's University, Belfast, has written most on this topic.[19]. It was solemn, tragic, dignified, but here it was grotesque, repulsive, horrible. Two of the crews received refreshments in Banbridge; others were entertained in the Ancient Order of Hibernians hall in Newry. By then 250 firemen from Clydeside had arrived. Around 20,000 people were employed on the site with 35,000 further along in the shipyard. Wherever Churchill is hiding his war material we will go Belfast is as worthy a target as Coventry, Birmingham, Bristol or Glasgow." The raids on London primarily targeted the Docklands area of the East End. Many bodies and body parts could not be identified. Those who sought refuge at the school were told that they would quickly be relocated to a safer area, but the evacuation was delayed. The bombs continued to fall until 5am. Your donations help keep MHN afloat. Belfast, the city with the highest population density in the UK at the time, also had the lowest proportion of public air-raid shelters. Targets identified included: the Short and Harland Ltd. Aircraft Factory; the Belfast power station and waterworks; Other maps uncovered following the Second World War also showed the parliament and city hall, Belfast gasworks, a rope factory and the Royal Belfast Academical Institution. ", US journalist Ben Robertson reported that at night Dublin was the only city without a blackout between New York and Moscow, and between Lisbon and Sweden and that German bombers often flew overhead to check their bearings using its lights, angering the British. 255 corpses were laid out in St George's Market. The 2017 film Zoo depicts an air raid during the Belfast Blitz. Has it taken bursting bombs to remind the people of this little country that they have common tradition, a common genius and a common home? The Blitz began at about 4:00 in the afternoon on September 7, 1940, when German planes appeared over London. The town of Dromara saw its population increase from 500 to 2,500. Belfast is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland. In the course of four Luftwaffe attacks on the nights of 7-8 April, 15-16 April, 4-5 May and 5-6 May 1941, lasting ten hours in total, 1,100 people died, over 56,000 houses in the city were damaged (53 per cent of its entire housing stock), roughly 100,000 made temporarily homeless and 20 million damage was caused to property at wartime values. Heavy jacks were unavailable. Read about our approach to external linking. The fourth and final Belfast raid took place on the following night, 56 May. Belfast, Irish Bal Feirste, city, district, and capital of Northern Ireland, on the River Lagan, at its entrance to Belfast Lough (inlet of the sea). The Belfast blitz devastated a city that up until 1941 had remained unscathed during World War Two. There were still 80,000 more in Belfast. Of the churches, besides St. Pauls cathedral, where at one time were five unexploded bombs in the immediate vicinity and the roof of which was pierced by another that exploded and shattered the high altar to fragments, those damaged were Westminster abbey, St. Margarets Westminster, Southwark cathedral; fifteen Wren churches (including St. In addition, there simply was not enough space for everyone who needed shelter in one of the largest and most densely populated cities in the world. Belfast Blitz: Marking the lost lives 80 years on. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Between Black Saturday and December 2, there was no 24-hour period without at least one alertas the alarms came to be calledand generally far more. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. After a brief lull, the Luftwaffe returned in force on February 17. MacDermott would be proved right. London was bombed for 57 consecutive nights from 7 September 1940 The initial human cost of the Blitz was lower than the government had expected, but the level of destruction exceeded the governments dire predictions. 2. The nights of November 3 and 28 were the only occasions during this period in which Londons peace was unbroken by siren or bomb. Death should be dignified, peaceful; Hitler had made even death grotesque. In the first days of the Blitz, a tragic incident in the East End stoked public anger over the governments shelter policy. "It says a lot about how these people are forgotten that there is no Blitz memorial in Belfast," Mr Freeburn says. Nearby were the citys main power station, gasworks, telephone house and the Sirocco Engineering works. NI WW2 veterans honoured by France. You can see the difference in those letters - post-Blitz is very much a grieving tone. The database Mr Freeburn has compiled is, he believes, the most accurate list of those killed and includes 222 children aged 16 or under. Belfast has the world's largest dry dock. They prevented low-flying aircraft from approaching their targets at optimal altitudes and angles of attack. Half of the city's housing was damaged over the course of all the raids. On 24 March 1941, John MacDermott, Minister for Security, wrote to Prime Minister John Andrews, expressing his concerns that Belfast was so poorly protected: "Up to now we have escaped attack. At nightfall the Northern Counties Station was packed from platform gates to entrance gates and still refugees were coming along in a steady stream from the surrounding streets Open military lorries were finally put into service and even expectant mothers and mothers with young children were put into these in the rather heavy drizzle that lasted throughout the evening. But these people all had families and friends and they had to deal with their loss for the rest of their lives.". Nearby residential areas in east Belfast were also hit when "203 metric tonnes of high explosive bombs, 80 land mines attached to parachutes, and 800 firebomb canisters containing 96,000 incendiary bombs"[16] were dropped. and Major Sen O'Sullivan, who produced a detailed report for the Dublin government. Video, 00:02:12Isabel Oakeshott: Why I leaked Hancock's messages, Tears of relief after man found in Amazon jungle. By mid-September 1940 the RAF had won the Battle of Britain, and the invasion was postponed indefinitely. He described some distressing consequences, such as how "in one case the leg and arm of a child had to be amputated before it could be extricated. The creeping TikTok bans, Hong Kong skyscraper fire seen on city's skyline. Around 1am, Luftwaffe bombers flew over the city, concentrating their attack on the Harbour Estate and Queen's Island. Air-raid damage was widespread; hospitals, clubs, churches, museums, residential and shopping streets, hotels, public houses, theatres, schools, monuments, newspaper offices, embassies, and the London Zoo were bombed. About 1,000 people were killed and bombs hit half of the houses in the city, leaving 100,000. The Blitz began at around 4 pm on September 7, 1940, when German bomber planes first appeared over London. The government was blamed by some for inadequate precautions. The creeping TikTok bans. "A lot of the people I spoke to were relatives who ended up donating images and handwritten letters from before and after the Blitz. By Jonathan Bardon. Accounts differ as to when flares were dropped to light up the city. He was replaced by 54-year-old Sir Basil Brooke on 1 May. Up to now, we have escaped an attack, said John MacDermott, the Minister for Security, Belfast, on March 24, 1941. The Air Raid Precautions (A.R.P.) After the first week of September, although night bombing on a large scale continued, the large mass attacks by day, which had proved so costly to the Luftwaffe during the Battle of Britain, were replaced by smaller parties coming over in successive waves. Horrendous Belfast losses during World War Two bombing blitz It has been reported that on Easter Tuesday, Belfast suffered the highest loss of life of any city in the UK in a single raid. Video, 00:03:09Mapping the lives lost in the Belfast Blitz, Belfast City Hall in darkness as the Blitz is marked, Street fighting in Bakhmut but Russia not in control, Russian minister laughed at for Ukraine war claims. The Luftwaffe had lost more than 600 aircraft, and, although the RAF had lost fewer than half that many, the battle was claiming British fighters and experienced pilots at too great a rate. Apart from those on London, this was the greatest loss of life in any night raid during the Blitz. When the Blitz began, the government enforced a blackout in an attempt to make targeting more difficult for German night bombers. This article was most recently revised and updated by, https://www.britannica.com/event/the-Blitz, National Museums Liverpool - Merseyside Maritime Museum - The Blitz, The History Learning Site - The Blitz and World War Two. He gave an interview saying: "the people of Belfast are Irish people too". Sometimes they were trying establish a blockade by destroying shipping and port facilities, sometimes they were directly attacking Fighter Command ground installations, sometimes they were targeting aircraft factories, and sometimes they were attempting to engage Fighter Command in the skies. For more than six months, German planes had flown reconnaissance flights over Belfast. The working-class living close to industrial centres suffered more than anyone over the course of the four raids. Train after train and bus after bus were filled with those next in line. 2. Belfast was not properly prepared for the attacks, with too few shelters and not enough anti-aircraft guns. Some 27 percent of Londoners utilized private shelters, such as Anderson shelters, while the remaining 64 percent spent their evenings on duty with some branch of the civil defense or remained in their own homes. Protection of the city fell to seven anti-aircraft batteries of 16 heavy guns and six light guns. The refugees looked dazed and horror stricken and many had neglected to bring more than a few belongings Any and every means of exit from the city was availed of and the final destination appeared to be a matter of indifference. The House of Commons, Westminster Abbey, and the British Museum were severely damaged, and The Temple was almost completely destroyed. A short respite followed, until a widespread series of night raids on April 7 included some targets in the London area. Many of the surface shelters built by local authorities were flimsy and provided little protection from bombs, falling debris, and fire. But Mr Freeburn's research casts doubt on this. The first was on the night of 78 April 1941, a small attack which probably took place only to test Belfast's defences. Both planes quickly proved their mettle against German bombers, and Germanys best fighter, the Bf 109, was of limited use as an escort due to its relatively short operating range. The Royal Air Force announced that Squadron Leader J.W.C. Belfast suffered a series of bombing raids in the spring of 1941, which became known as the 'Blitz of Belfast'. Once more, London was targeted and children were victims. As of October 2020, the population of Belfast is about 350,000 people. Death had to a certain extent been made decent. In another building, the York Street Mill, one of its massive sidewalls collapsed on to Sussex and Vere Streets, killing all those who remained in their homes. For eight months the Luftwaffe dropped bombs on London and other strategic cities across Britain. THE BELFAST BLITZ was a series of four air raids over Northern Ireland during the spring of 1941. Moya Woodside[23] noted in her diary: "Evacuation is taking on panic proportions. Wave after wave of bombers dropped their incendiaries, high explosives and land-mines. Video, 00:00:36, Tears of relief after man found in Amazon jungle. And even then, Westminster stated it was not ample provision; Stormont still worried about the costs to industry. 2023 BBC. Streetlights, car headlights, and illuminated signs were kept off. Belfast was bombed by the Nazis in World War II. In many cases the daily life of the city was able to resume with delays of only hours. Similar initiatives bearing the same name were ordered in the past decade by former mayors Libby . From their photographs, they identified suitable targets: There had been a number of small bombings, probably by planes that missed their targets over the River Clyde in Glasgow or the cities of the northwest of England. On July 16, 1940, Hitler issued a directive ordering the preparation and, if necessary, execution of Operation Sea Lion, the amphibious invasion of Great Britain. But the raid of 15-16 April - the Easter Tuesday Raid - was on another scale. From papers recovered after the war, we know of a Luftwaffe reconnaissance flight over Belfast on 30 November 1940. Nine were registered on three separate occasions, and from the start of the Blitz until November 30 there were more than 350 alerts. Belfast is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland . Initially it was thought that the Germans had mistaken this reservoir for the harbour and shipyards, where many ships, including HMS Ark Royal were being repaired. to households. This raid overall caused relatively little damage, but a lot was revealed about Belfast's inadequate defences. Some had received food, others were famished. High explosive bombs predominated in this raid. The 'Blitz' - from the German term Blitzkrieg ('lightning war') - was the sustained campaign of aerial bombing attacks on British towns and cities carried out by the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) from September 1940 until May 1941. He was succeeded by J. M. Andrews, then 69 years old, who was no more capable of dealing with the situation than his predecessor. These shelters, made of corrugated steel, were designed to be dug into a garden and then covered with dirt. When the house was hit William, Harriette, Dorothy, 36-year-old Dot and 41-year-old Isa were all killed. Given Belfast's geographic position, it was considered to be at the fringe of the operational range of German bombers and hence there was no provision for night-fighter aerial cover. (Great War casualties) had died in hospital beds, their eyes had been reverently closed, their hands crossed to their breasts. The RAFs Spitfire was a superlative fighter, and it was not always easy for the Germans to distinguish it from the slightly less maneuverable but much more numerous Hurricanes. Still, many in Northern Ireland believed no Luftwaffe attack would come. A Luftwaffe terror bombing attack on the Spanish city of Guernica (April 26, 1937) during the Spanish Civil War had killed hundreds of civilians and destroyed much of the town. 29 interesting facts about Belfast you never knew - BeeLoved City The A.R.P. 10 fascinating facts about Belfast that you probably didn't know Despite the military and industrial importance of the city, the Luftwaffe described the defences asweak, scanty, insufficient. ", Dawson Bates informed the Cabinet of rack-renting of barns, and over thirty people per house in some areas.[24]. Find out how it began, what the Germans hoped to achieve and how it severe it was, plus we visit nine places affected by the attacks. Later, guided by the raging fires caused by the first attack, a second group of planes began another assault that lasted until 4:30 the following morning. By the time the raid was over, at least 744 people had lost their lives, including some living in places such as Newtownards, Bangor and Londonderry. There [is] ground for thinking that the enemy could not easily reach Belfast in force except during a period of moonlight. The bombs caused death and destruction across the city, affecting those of all religions and political backgrounds. He believed that this was being done already but it was inevitable that a certain number of civilian lives should be lost in the course of heavy bombing from the air". As well as photographs, the Luftwaffe gathered information on landmarks, potential targets and defences or lack thereof. The couple, who ran a children's home, stayed with Anna's parents, William and Harriette Denby, and her sisters, Dot and Isa, at Evelyn Gardens, off the Cavehill Road, in the north of the city. The fall of France in June, 1940, enabled the Luftwaffe to establish airfields across the north of the country, leaving Ulster within reach of bombers. The wartime output of the yard included aircraft carriers HMS Formidable and HMS Unicorn, cruisers such as HMS Belfast and more than 130 other vessels used by the Royal Navy. O'Sullivan reported: "There were many terrible mutilations among both living and dead heads crushed, ghastly abdominal and face wounds, penetration by beams, mangled and crushed limbs etc.". When the war began, Belfast, like many other cities, adopted the wartime practices of rationing and blackouts. During the first year of the war, behind-the-lines conditions prevailed in London. Tommy Henderson, an Independent Unionist MP in the House of Commons of Northern Ireland, summed up the feeling when he invited the Minister of Home Affairs to Hannahstown and the Falls Road, saying "The Catholics and the Protestants are going up there mixed and they are talking to one another. It lies where the Lagan River flows into a part of the Irish Sea. Belfast Blitz: The Luftwaffe attacks Northern Ireland - WartimeNI [12], There was little preparation for the conflict with Germany. The first attack was against the city's waterworks, which had been attacked in the previous raid. 4. Video, 00:00:46, Hong Kong skyscraper fire seen on city's skyline, Watch: Matt Hancock message row in 83 seconds. Belfast is famous for being the birthplace of the Titanic. Since 1:45am all telephones had been cut. In clear weather, targets were easily identifiable. Guided by Davies, the people of the shelter created an ad hoc government and established a set of rules. He went to the Mater Hospital at 2pm, nine hours after the raid ended, to find the street with a traffic jam of ambulances waiting to admit their casualties. VideoRussian minister laughed at for Ukraine war claims, The children left behind in Cuba's mass exodus, Xi Jinping's power grab - and why it matters, Snow, Fire and Lights: Photos of the Week. "They have never been published before, never seen the light of day.". 55,000 British civilian casualties were sustained through German bombing before the end of 1940 This included 23,000 deaths. All were exhausted. The Luftwaffe never attacked the city after May 1941, but it would be many years before life returned to normal for many in the city. Elsewhere in the skies over Britain, Nazi official Rudolph Hess chose that same evening to parachute into Scotland on a quixotic and wholly unauthorized peace mission. Streets heavily bombed in the city centre included High Street, Ann Street, Callender Street, Chichester Street, Castle Street, Tomb Street, Bridge Street (effectively obliterated), Rosemary Street, Waring Street, North Street, Victoria Street, Donegall Street, York Street, Gloucester Street, and East Bridge Street. [9], War materials and food were sent by sea from Belfast to Great Britain, some under the protection of the neutral Irish tricolour. The night raids on London continued into 1941, and January 1011 saw exceptionally heavy attacks; the Mansion House (residence of the lord mayor of London) and the Bank of England narrowly avoided destruction when a bomb fell directly between them, creating a gigantic crater. Belfast's Albert Clock tower is sinking - it leans by four feet. Over 500 received care from the Irish Red Cross in Dublin. Video, 00:02:54Living through the London Blitz, At least 17 dead in Jakarta fuel storage depot fire. "Through resources such as the Public Records Office and ancestry and genealogy websites I managed to get about 100 photos - which is about one tenth of the victims," he says. Anna and Billy were buried up their necks in sewage but were rescued and survived. Even the children of soldiers had not been evacuated, with calamitous results when the married quarters of Victoria Barracks received a direct hit. Beginning in September 1940, the Blitz was an aerial bombing campaign conducted by the Luftwaffe against British cities.