In every instance, all stepped forward. 13 Facts You Didn't Know About Belfast Oakland plans to unleash 'pothole blitz' to fix notorious street damage 1. There is no slacking in our loyalty. 11 churches, two hospitals and two schools were destroyed. From September 1940 until May 1941, Britain was subjected to sustained enemy bombing campaign, now known as the Blitz. continuous trek to railway stations. Belfast made a considerable contribution towards the Allied war effort, producing many naval ships, aircraft and munitions; therefore, the city was deemed a suitable bombing target by the Luftwaffe. The attacks were authorized by Germanys chancellor, Adolf Hitler, after the British carried out a nighttime air raid on Berlin. When the Blitz began, the government enforced a blackout in an attempt to make targeting more difficult for German night bombers. The offensive came to be called the Blitz after the German word blitzkrieg ("lightning war"). Instead of pressing his advantage, however, Hitler abruptly changed his strategy. It was the worst wartime raid outside of London in the UK. 7. The Blitz was devastating for the people of London and other cities. Wave after wave of bombers dropped their incendiaries, high explosives and land-mines. The Belfast Blitz: the city in the war years - History Ireland Children and World War Two - History Learning Site 29 interesting facts about Belfast you never knew - BeeLoved City With the surrender of France in June 1940, Germanys sole remaining enemy lay across the English Channel. A short respite followed, until a widespread series of night raids on April 7 included some targets in the London area. Public buildings destroyed or badly damaged included Belfast City Hall's Banqueting Hall, the Ulster Hospital for Women and Children and Ballymacarrett library, (the last two being located on Templemore Avenue). The creeping TikTok bans. 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. 150 corpses remained in the Falls Road baths for three days before they were buried in a mass grave, with 123 still unidentified. "[22], In his opinion, the greatest want was the lack of hospital facilities. Despite the military and industrial importance of the city, the Luftwaffe described the defences asweak, scanty, insufficient. Video, 00:01:41, The German bombing of Coventry. workers. 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. There were Heinkel He 111s, Junkers Ju 88s and Dornier Do 17s. Another claim was that the Catholic population in general and the IRA in particular guided the bombers. The Belfast Blitz consisted of four German air raids on strategic targets in the city of Belfast in Northern Ireland, in April and May 1941 during World War II, causing high casualties. From a purely military perspective, the Blitz was entirely counterproductive to the main purpose of Germanys air offensiveto dominate the skies in advance of an invasion of England. 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. Emma Duffin, a nurse at the Queen's University Hospital, (who previously served during the Great War), who kept a diary; John Clarke MacDermott, the Minister of Public Security, after the first bombing, initiated the "Hiram Plan" to evacuate the city and to return Belfast to 'normality' as quickly as possible. Authorities quickly implemented plans to protect Londoners from bombs and to house those left homeless by the attacks. An air raid shelter on Hallidays Road received a direct hit, killing all those in it. By the end of the attacks, between 900 and 1,000 people were dead and thousands more were injured, homeless and displaced. Video, 00:03:09, Mapping the lives lost in the Belfast Blitz, Russian minister laughed at for Ukraine war claims. Rescue workers search through the rubble of Eglington Street in Belfast, Northern Ireland, after a German Luftwaffe air raid, 7 May 1941, Anna (left) and her husband Billy (back right) survived while Harriette, Dorothy and Billy were killed along with Dot and Isa, Dot and Isa, with Dorothy when she was a toddler, Royal Welch Fusiliers assist in clearing bomb damage in Belfast, Northern Ireland, 7 May 1941, Mapping the lives lost in the Belfast Blitz. One of every six Londoners was made homeless at some point during the Blitz, and at least 1.1 million houses and flats were damaged or destroyed. The most significant loss was a 4.5-acre (1.8ha) factory floor for manufacturing the fuselages of Short Stirling bombers. Three vessels nearing completion at Harland and Wolff's were hit as was its power station. The danger faced in London was greatly increased when the V2 attacks started and the casualty figures mirrored those of the Blitz.. Video, 00:00:46, Hong Kong skyscraper fire seen on city's skyline, Watch: Matt Hancock message row in 83 seconds. During the whole period, although the citys operation was disrupted in ways that were sometimes serious, no essential service was more than temporarily impaired. From papers recovered after the war, we know of a Luftwaffe reconnaissance flight over Belfast on 30 November 1940. The House of Commons, Westminster Abbey, and the British Museum were severely damaged, and The Temple was almost completely destroyed. Your donations help keep MHN afloat. The government was blamed by some for inadequate precautions. After the war, when the first girl from the home got married Billy gave her away, having lost his only daughter. BBC News | NORTHERN IRELAND | The Belfast blitz is remembered "There are plans for one but there isn't one yet. By British mainland blitz standards, casualties were light. Neighbouring residential areas were also hit. Morale did suffer amid the death and devastation, but there were few calls for surrender. A charitable relief fund for the people of London was opened September 10. The initial human cost of the Blitz was lower than the government had expected, but the level of destruction exceeded the governments dire predictions. Fewer than 4,000 women and children were evacuated. 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. The past doesnt change, its just over.. Video, 00:00:36, Tears of relief after man found in Amazon jungle. 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. Belfast was largely unprepared for an attack of such a scale as 200 German bombers shelled the city on 15 April 1941. Most of the objectives laid out by the reconnaissance crews were of either military or industrial importance. 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". Incendiary bombs predominated in this raid. 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). James Craig, Lord Craigavon, had been Prime Minister of Northern Ireland since its inception in 1921 up until his death in 1940. We were in exceptional good humour knowing that we were going for a new target, one of Englands last hiding places, said one pilot of the raid. Belfast Blitz: Marking the lost lives 80 years on. Video, 00:00:51, Australia's 'biggest drug bust' nets $700m of cocaine, Thanks, but no big speech, in Ken Bruce's sign off. Another large-scale attack followed on March 19, when hundreds of houses and shops, many churches, six hospitals, and other public buildings were destroyed or seriously damaged. But the Luftwaffe was ready. Please select which sections you would like to print: Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. The use of the Tube system as a shelter saved thousands of lives, and images of Londoners huddled in Underground stations would become an indelible image of British life during World War II. So had Clydeside until recently. Why Alex Murdaugh was spared the death penalty, Why Trudeau is facing calls for a public inquiry, The shocking legacy of the Dutch 'Hunger Winter'. That evening over 150 bombers left their bases in northern France and the Netherlands and headed for Belfast. 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. What happened in 1941 changed the city forever. ", 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. He stated that "he would once more tell his government how he felt about the matter and he would ask them to confine the operations to military objectives as far as it was humanly possible. This type of shelteressentially a low steel cage large enough to contain two adults and two small childrenwas designed to be set up indoors and could serve as a refuge if the building began to collapse. British Spies and Irish Rebels by Paul McMahon, Report by the Garda Sochna 23 October 1941 IMA G2/1722, Learn how and when to remove this template message, Irish Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures, "Eamon de Valera and Hitler: An Analysis of International Reaction to the Visit to the German Minister, May 1945", "Extracts from an article, "The Belfast Blitz, 1941", "Historical Topics Series 2 The Belfast Blitz", "Your Place and Mine The Belfast Blitz", "Northern Ireland Parliamentary Elections Results: Biographies", "Belfast Blitz: The night death and destruction rained down on city", "Multitext - the Blitz - Belfast during the second World War", http://www.niwarmemorial.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/The_Belfast_Blitz.pdf, http://www.proni.gov.uk/historical_topics_series_-_02_-_the_belfast_blitz.pdf, Extracts from an article on The Belfast Blitz, 1941. Yesterday the hand of good-fellowship was reached across the Border. St. Giles, Cripplegate, and St. Mary Wolnooth, also in the city, were damaged, while the Dutch church in Austin Friars, dating from the 14th century and covering a larger area than any church in the city of London, St. Pauls alone excepted, was totally destroyed. The higher the German planes had to fly to avoid the balloons, the less accurate they were when dropping their bombs. along with England, Scotland, and Wales. A Raid From Above The "pothole blitz" is a common short-term initiative to combat storm weather damage. At 10:40pm the air raid sirens sounded. Interesting facts about Belfast. The city covers a total area of 132.5 square kilometers (51 square miles). Video, 00:01:37, Thanks, but no big speech, in Ken Bruce's sign off, Tear gas fired at Greece train crash protesters. Video, 00:00:51Australia's 'biggest drug bust' nets $700m of cocaine, Thanks, but no big speech, in Ken Bruce's sign off. In the west and north of the city, streets heavily bombed included Percy Street, York Park, York Crescent, Eglinton Street, Carlisle Street, Ballyclare, Ballycastle and Ballynure Streets off the Oldpark Road; Southport Street, Walton Street, Antrim Road, Annadale Street, Cliftonville Road, Hillman Street, Atlantic Avenue, Hallidays Road, Hughenden Avenue, Sunningdale Park, Shandarragh Park, and Whitewell Road. Belfast was the birthplace of the RMS Titanic, the world' most famous ship which, when it was constructed in the early 1900s, was longer than the height of the world's tallest building at 882 feet and six inches in length. High explosive bombs predominated in this raid. Anna and Billy returned to England and continued running the children's home. Maps and documents uncovered at Gatow Airfield near Berlin in 1945 showed the level of detail involved. The creeping TikTok bans. 6. [27] One widespread criticism was that the Germans located Belfast by heading for Dublin and following the railway lines north. They all say the same thing, that the government is no good. KS3 History (Environment and society) The Belfast Blitz learning resources for adults, children, parents and teachers. Nine were registered on three separate occasions, and from the start of the Blitz until November 30 there were more than 350 alerts. You can see the difference in those letters - post-Blitz is very much a grieving tone. . In the subsequent years, this lack of preparation has often dominated the discussion about the Belfast Blitz, but a new project led by Alan Freeburn from the Northern Ireland War Memorial aims to shift the focus back to the ordinary men, women and children who lost their lives. Clydeside got its blitz during the period of the last moon. 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. During what was known as the "Belfast Blitz," 1,000 people were killed by bombs dropped by the Nazis in 1941 during the Second World War. 2. These private air-raid shelters were Anderson shelters, constructed of sheets of corrugated galvanised iron covered in earth. 2023 BBC. On September 10, 1940, the school was flattened by a German bomb, and people huddled in the basement were killed or trapped in the rubble. 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. 15 Powerful Photos Of The WW2 Blitz | Imperial War Museums So had Clydeside until recently. But the authorities were afraid that bombs might not be the. The nights of November 3 and 28 were the only occasions during this period in which Londons peace was unbroken by siren or bomb. Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window), Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window), Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window), Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window), Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window), Click to share on Skype (Opens in new window), The Belfast Blitz Inside the Deadly 1941 Luftwaffe Raids on Northern Ireland, Dutch Weapons and American Independence How the United Provinces Made a Fortune Supplying Muskets in the Revolutionary War , USS Devilfish The Curious Case of the Only U.S. Navy Submarine to be Attacked by a Kamikaze, The Chinchas War Inside the Little-Known Conflict Between Peru and Spain Over Animal Turds, The Battle for Nassau Inside the First Overseas Mission for Americas Marines, Mustang vs. Corsair Inside the U.S. Navys 1944 Match-Up Between the Two Fighters, Stickin It To Em The Last of the Great Bayonet Charges, Bloody First Contact When Vikings Clashed with Native North Americans, Battlefield Stalingrad Four Maps That Tell the Story of World War Twos Pivotal Struggle. [19], 220,000 people fled from the city. Only four were known still to be alive. Where they are going, what they will find to eat when they get there, nobody knows. The phrase Business as usual, written in chalk on boarded-up shop windows, exemplified the British determination to keep calm and carry on as best they could. [citation needed], There was a second massive air raid on Belfast on Sunday 45 May 1941, three weeks after that of Easter Tuesday. Interesting facts about Belfast | Just Fun Facts NI WW2 veterans honoured by France. "They have never been published before, never seen the light of day.". The district of Belfast has an area of 44 square miles (115 square km). THE BELFAST BLITZ was a series of four air raids over Northern Ireland during the spring of 1941. Again the Irish emergency services crossed the border, this time without waiting for an invitation. "But there is no such equivalent in Belfast. 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. Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, Historical Topics Series 2, The Belfast Blitz, 2007, This page was last edited on 31 January 2023, at 20:18. "It says a lot about how these people are forgotten that there is no Blitz memorial in Belfast," Mr Freeburn says. Barton insisted that Belfast was "too far north" to use radio guidance. William Joyce "Lord Haw-Haw" announced that "The Fhrer will give you time to bury your dead before the next attack Tuesday was only a sample." 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. The database Mr Freeburn has compiled is, he believes, the most accurate list of those killed and includes 222 children aged 16 or under. ", Dawson Bates, the Home Affairs Minister, apparently refused to reply to army correspondence and when the Ministry of Home Affairs was informed by imperial defence experts in 1939 that Belfast was regarded as "a very definite German objective", little was done outside providing shelters in the Harbour area.[14]. As many were caught in the open by blast and secondary missiles, the enormous number of casualties can be readily accounted for. Jimmy Doherty, an air raid warden (who later served in London during the V1 and V2 blitz), who wrote a book on the Belfast blitz; Read about our approach to external linking. By 1941, production of the Short Stirling Bomber and the Short Sunderland Flying Boat was underway. 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. 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 next took place on Easter Tuesday, 15 April 1941, when 200 Luftwaffe bombers attacked military and manufacturing targets in the city of Belfast. High explosives were dropped. The A.R.P. William Joyce (known as "Lord Haw-Haw") announced in radio broadcasts from Hamburg that there will be "Easter eggs for Belfast". 55,000 British civilian casualties were sustained through German bombing before the end of 1940 This included 23,000 deaths. ", Dawson Bates informed the Cabinet of rack-renting of barns, and over thirty people per house in some areas.[24]. Nevertheless, for all the hardship it caused, the campaign proved to be a strategic mistake by the Germans. The mass relocation, called Operation Pied Piper, was the largest internal migration in British history. I was definitely one of the first over the target and as I flew in there was no great defence because there were not a great many aircraft over the target at that point, recalled Becker. Beginning on Black Saturday, London was attacked on 57 straight nights. 2. The South Hallsville School disaster prompted Londoners, especially residents of the East End, to find safer shelters, on their own if necessary. The Belfast blitz devastated a city that up until 1941 had remained unscathed during World War Two. Death had to a certain extent been made decent. Other Belfast factories manufactured gun mountings. The bombing of British cities - Swansea, Belfast, Glasgow Before the war broke out, civilians had been issued with gas masks and Anderson shelters, which people were encouraged to build at the. Published: September 7, 2020 at 12:00 pm. Dissatisfaction with public shelters also led to another notable development in the East EndMickeys Shelter. Barton wrote: "the Catholic population was much more strongly opposed to conscription, was inclined to sympathise with Germany", "there were suspicions that the Germans were assisted in identifying targets, held by the Unionist population." [18], Over 900 people died, 1,500 people were injured, 400 of them seriously. The Belfast Blitz - Inside the Deadly 1941 Luftwaffe Raids on Northern When the war began, Belfast, like many other cities, adopted the wartime practices of rationing and blackouts. They are sleeping in the same sheugh (ditch), below the same tree or in the same barn. As well as these two major targets, other firms in Belfast produced valuable materials for the war effort including munitions, linen, ropes, food supplies and, of course, cigarettes. Around 1am, Luftwaffe bombers flew over the city, concentrating their attack on the Harbour Estate and Queen's Island. 255 corpses were laid out in St George's Market. London was bombed for 57 consecutive nights from 7 September 1940 Londoners enjoyed three weeks of uneasy peace until May 1011, the night of a full moon, when the Luftwaffe launched the most intense raid of the Blitz. He spoke with Professor Flynn, (Theodore Thomson Flynn, an Australian based at the Mater Hospital and father of actor Errol Flynn), head of the casualty service for the city, who told him of "casualties due to shock, blast and secondary missiles, such as glass, stones, pieces of piping, etc." Many in Northern Ireland thought that Belfast was outside the range of the Luftwaffe. At the time of the first attack in April 1941, there were no operational searchlights, too few anti-aircraft batteries and scarcely enough public air raid shelters for a quarter of the population. Clydeside got its blitz during the period of the last moon. What's the least amount of exercise we can get away with? It is perhaps true that many saved their lives running but I am afraid a much greater number lost them or became casualties."[20]. The government announced that 77 people had died, but for years local residents insisted the toll was much higher. Here are 10 facts about both the German Blitzkrieg and the Allied bombing of Germany. In total over 1,300 houses were demolished, some 5,000 badly damaged, nearly 30,000 slightly damaged while 20,000 required "first aid repairs".[3]. The Titanic was built in Belfast. Blitz, The - Kids | Britannica Kids | Homework Help In 1995, on the 50th anniversary of the ending of the Second World War, an invitation was received by the Dublin Fire Brigade for any survivors of that time to attend a function at Hillsborough Castle and meet Prince Charles. Over 150 people died in what became known as the 'Fire Blitz'. Thank you. Lecturer of History, Queens University, Belfast, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Belfast_Blitz&oldid=1136721396, During the war years, Belfast shipyards built or converted over 3,000 navy vessels, repaired more than 22,000 others and launched over half a million tons of merchant shipping over 140. In spite of blackouts, ubiquitous shelters and sandbags, the visible effects of mass evacuation, the presence of A.R.P. While Anderson shelters offered good protection from bomb fragments and debris, they were cold and damp and generally ill-suited for prolonged occupancy. C.S Lewis was born in Belfast, and the nearby countryside helped inspire The Chronicles of Narnia. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Around 20,000 people were employed on the site with 35,000 further along in the shipyard. Ulster Historical Foundation. When a bombing raid was imminent, air-raid sirens were set off to sound a warning. 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. By then most of the major fires were under control and the firemen from Clydeside and other British cities were arriving. Nevertheless, through sheer weight of numbers, the Germans were on the brink of victory in late August 1940. Several accounts point out that Belfast, standing at the end of the long inlet of Belfast Lough, would be easily located. In many cases the daily life of the city was able to resume with delays of only hours. At 4:15am John MacDermott, the Minister of Public Security, managed to contact Basil Brooke (then Agriculture Minister), seeking permission to seek help from the Irish government. The Blitz | Facts, History, Damage, & Casualties | Britannica The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. And even then, Westminster stated it was not ample provision; Stormont still worried about the costs to industry. By the. Several theatres and many cinemas were open, and there were even a few sporting events. The offensive came to be called the Blitz after the German word blitzkrieg (lightning war). Hitlers intention had been to break the morale of the British people so they would pressure their government to surrender. The youngest victim was just six-weeks-old. The shipyard was among the largest in the world, producing merchant vessels and military shipping. Learn how your comment data is processed. Another defensive measure employed by the British was barrage balloonslarge oval-shaped unmanned balloons with stabilizing tail finsinstalled in and around major target areas. With tangled hair, staring eyes, clutching hands, contorted limbs, their grey-green faces covered with dust, they lay, bundled into the coffins, half-shrouded in rugs or blankets, or an occasional sheet, still wearing their dirty, torn twisted garments. By mid-September 1940 the RAF had won the Battle of Britain, and the invasion was postponed indefinitely. Many "arrived in Fermanagh having nothing with them only night shirts". The bombs continued to fall until 5am. 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.". Video, 00:01:23, Watch: Matt Hancock message row in 83 seconds, Isabel Oakeshott: Why I leaked Hancock's messages. The British government had anticipated air attacks on its population centres, and it had predicted catastrophic casualties. department distributed more than two million Anderson shelters (named after Sir John Anderson, head of the A.R.P.) The Blitz began at around 4 pm on September 7, 1940, when German bomber planes first appeared over London. In the east of the city, Westbourne and Newcastle Streets on the Newtownards Road, Thorndyke Street off the Albertbridge Road and Ravenscroft Avenue were destroyed or damaged. TOP 10: Facts About Belfast You Didn't Know - Ireland Before You Die This hub of industry and trade represented a legitimate military target for the Germans, and some 25,000 bombs were dropped on the Port of London alone. Belfast was ill-prepared for the blitz. Video, 00:02:12Isabel Oakeshott: Why I leaked Hancock's messages, Tears of relief after man found in Amazon jungle. On April 16 an attack even fiercer and more indiscriminate than those of the previous autumn started at 9:00 pm and continued until 5:00 the following morning; 500 aircraft were believed to have flown over in continuous waves, raining an estimated 450 tons of bombs across the city. His report concluded with: "a second Belfast would be too horrible to contemplate". [citation needed], On Easter Tuesday, 15 April 1941, spectators watching a football match at Windsor Park noticed a lone Luftwaffe Junkers Ju 88 aircraft circling overhead.[15]. to households. Just eight days earlier, eight planes destroyed the aircraft fuselage factory and damaged the docks, with 15 people ultimately killed as a result of that raid.
Damon Gameau Contact Email,
Elevated Permissions Are Required To Run Dism Windows 10,
Tyran Tata Smith Net Worth,
Patrick Baldwin Sr Salary,
Spay Incision Pictures,
Articles H
