The Blitz

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London Blitz redirects here. For the American football team, see London Blitz (American football). For the computer game, see London Blitz (computer game).

Heinkel He 111 German bomber over the Surrey Docks, Southwark, London (German propaganda photomontage).
Heinkel He 111 German bomber over the Surrey Docks, Southwark, London (German propaganda photomontage).

The Blitz was the sustained bombing of the United Kingdom by Nazi Germany between 7 September 1940 and 10 May 1941, in World War II. While the "Blitz" hit many towns and cities across the UK, it began with the bombing of London for 57[1] nights in a row. By the end of May 1941, over 43,000 civilians had been killed and more than a million houses destroyed or damaged.

The German military doctrine of speed and surprise was described as Blitzkrieg, literally lightning war, from which the British use of Blitz was derived. While German air-supported attacks on Poland, France, the Netherlands and other countries may be described as Blitzkrieg, the prolonged strategic bombing of London did not fit the term.

While the Germans never again managed to bomb Britain on such a large scale, they carried out smaller attacks throughout the war, taking the civilian death toll to 51,509 from bombing. In 1944, the development of pilotless V-1 flying bombs and V-2 rockets briefly enabled Germany to again attack London with weapons launched from the European continent. In total the V weapons killed 8,938 civilians in Britain.

Contents

[edit] Prelude

After the fall of France, the Battle of Britain began in July 1940. From July to September, the Luftwaffe frontally attacked Royal Air Force Fighter Command to gain air superiority as a prelude to invasion. This involved the bombing of fighter airfields to destroy Fighter Command's ability to combat an invasion. Simultaneous attacks on the aircraft industry were carried out to prevent the British replacing their losses.

In late August 1940, before the date normally associated with the start of the Blitz, the Luftwaffe attacked industrial targets in Birmingham and Liverpool. This was part of an increase in night bombing brought about by the high casualty rates inflicted on German bombers in daylight.

During a raid on Thames Haven, on 24 August, some German aircraft (one commanded by Rudolf Hallensleben who went on to win the Knights Cross for other actions)[2] strayed over London and dropped bombs in the east and northeast parts of the city, Bethnal Green, Hackney, Islington, Tottenham and Finchley. This prompted the British to mount a retaliatory raid on Berlin the next night with bombs falling in Kreuzberg and Wedding. Hitler was said to be furious, and on 5 September, at the urging of the Luftwaffe high command, he issued a directive "... for disruptive attacks on the population and air defences of major British cities, including London, by day and night". The Luftwaffe began day and night attacks on British cities, concentrating on London. This relieved the pressure on the RAF's airfields.

Prior to the beginning of the blitz, dire predictions were made about the number of people who would be killed by a German bombing campaign. A report by the Ministry of Health commissioned in spring 1939, calculated that during the first six months of aerial bombardment there would be 600,000 people killed and 1,200,000 injured. This proved to be greatly over-estimated because it was based upon faulty assumptions about the number of German bombers available and the average number of casualties caused by each bomb. However, it led to the mass evacuation of around 650,000 children to the countryside.

[edit] First phase

Bombed buildings in London.
Bombed buildings in London.

The first intentional air raids on London were mainly aimed at the Port of London in the East End, causing severe damage. Late in the afternoon of 7 September 300 bombers attacked, escorted by 600 fighters. Another 180 bombers attacked that night. Many of the bombs aimed at the docks fell on neighboring residential areas, killing 436 Londoners and injuring 1,600.

Children of an eastern suburb of London, who have been made homeless by the random bombs of the Nazi night raiders, waiting outside the wreckage of what was their home. September 1940 (National Archives).
Children of an eastern suburb of London, who have been made homeless by the random bombs of the Nazi night raiders, waiting outside the wreckage of what was their home. September 1940 (National Archives).

Few anti-aircraft guns had fire-control systems, and the underpowered searchlights were usually ineffective at altitudes above 12,000 feet (3,600 m). Even the fortified Cabinet War Rooms, the secret underground bunker hidden under the Treasury to house the government during the war, were vulnerable to a direct hit. Few fighter aircraft were able to operate at night, and ground-based radar was limited. During the first raid, only 92 guns were available to defend London. The city's defences were rapidly reorganised by General Sir Frederick Pile, the Commander-in-Chief of Anti-Aircraft Command, and by 11 September twice as many guns were available, with orders to fire at will. This produced a much more visually impressive barrage that boosted civilian morale and, though it had little physical effect on the raiders, encouraged bomber crews to drop before they were over their target.

During this first phase of the Blitz, raids took place day and night. Between 100 and 200 bombers attacked London every night but one between mid-September and mid-November. Most bombers were German, with some Italian aircraft flying from Belgium. Birmingham and Bristol were attacked on 15 October, and the heaviest attack of the war so far — by 400 bombers and lasting six hours — hit London. The RAF opposed them with 41 fighters but only shot down one Heinkel bomber. By mid-November, the Germans had dropped more than 13,000 tons of high explosive and more than 1 million incendiary bombs for a combat loss of less than 1% (although planes were lost in accidents inherent to night flying and night landing).

In bombing the East End, the Germans hoped to create a division between those living there and the rest of London, but they did not succeed. The theory was that since the majority of London's poorer population lived in the East End in terraced housing and worked in the Docklands and other low paid jobs, it would be possible to create discontent within the working class of the East End of London. This in turn would lead to an uprising against the richer West End. The plan failed because the Royal Family and senior cabinet ministers such as Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden visited the heavily bombed areas of London on a regular basis, and the propaganda from the government-controlled British newspapers and the BBC helped calm citizens.

[edit] Second phase

From November 1940 to February 1941, the Luftwaffe attacked industrial and port cities. Targets included Coventry, Southampton, Birmingham, Liverpool, Bristol, Swindon, Plymouth, Cardiff, Manchester, Sheffield, Portsmouth, and Avonmouth. During this period, 14 attacks were mounted on ports excluding London, nine on industrial targets inland, and eight on London.

Probably the most devastating raid occurred on the evening of 29 December, which caused what has been called The Second Great Fire of London. A famous photograph shows St Paul's Cathedral shrouded in smoke.

British defences were still fairly weak, and German losses were sustainable — only 75 aircraft during these four months. However, the German High Command was becoming unconvinced that the bombing would make possible the invasion of Britain, as the RAF remained effective. Preparations were under way for Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union, which to Hitler had higher priority than defeating Britain.

[edit] Third phase

Further information: Belfast blitz

In February 1941, Grand Admiral Erich Raeder persuaded Hitler to attack British seaports in support of the Kriegsmarine's Battle of the Atlantic. Hitler issued a directive on 6 February ordering the Luftwaffe to concentrate its efforts on ports, notably Plymouth, Portsmouth, Bristol and Avonmouth, Swansea, Liverpool, Belfast, Clydebank, Hull, Sunderland, and Newcastle. Between 19 February and 12 May, Germany mounted 46 attacks against those cities, with only seven directed against London, Birmingham, Coventry, and Nottingham.

The effort was aimed as much against civilians as against industrial targets, and the raids were intended to provoke terror. British defences were much improved by this time. Ground-based radar was guiding night fighters to their targets, and the Bristol Beaufighter, with airborne radar, was effective against night bombers. An increasing number of anti-aircraft guns and searchlights were radar-controlled, improving accuracy. From the start of 1941 the Luftwaffe's monthly losses increased (28 in January, 124 in May). The impending invasion of the Soviet Union required the movement of German air power to the East, and the Blitz ended in May 1941.

The last major attack on London was on 10 May: 541 bombers destroyed or damaged many important buildings, including the British Museum, the Houses of Parliament and St. James's Palace. The raid caused more casualties than any other: 1,436 killed and 1,800 seriously injured. Six days later 111 bombers attacked Birmingham; this was the last major air raid on a British city for about a year and a half.

[edit] Civilian and political reactions

The civilians of London had an enormous role to play in the protection of their city. The main objective of Hitler was to destroy the morale of the civilian population, but he failed, and indeed the blitz, like the bombing of Germany did not have the effect that most commentators had assumed. Many civilians who were not willing or able to join the military became members of the Home Guard, the Air Raid Precautions Service, The Auxiliary Fire Service, and many other organizations.

Bomb shelter in a Tube tunnel.
Bomb shelter in a Tube tunnel.

During the Blitz, far fewer dedicated public bomb shelters than necessary were available. The government feared that a "shelter mentality" would develop if people were provided with central deep shelters. This was one of the reasons behind the preference for getting people to construct Anderson shelters in their back gardens. The authorities in London, after being put under very considerable pressure from public opinion and from organized Left wing movements, did make use of about 80 underground Tube stations to house about 177,000 people. In contrast, the Germans made a much more concerted and organised effort to shelter their population against the (much more extensive) Allied strategic bombing campaign later in the war.

Another frequent response to bombing was what became known as "trekking". Many thousands of civilians slept far from their homes and travelled several hours into work and several hours out again every day. Official sources often denied this was happening.

A recent television documentary (English title: Ramon Perera, The Man Who Saved Barcelona) - produced by TV3, Catalonia's public service broadcaster - sheds new light on British civil defense preparations for the Blitz. A Catalan engineer, Ramon Perera, supervised the building of some 1,400 public shelters in Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War. They proved a great success, with no one being killed in the shelters despite frequent heavy air raids on the city. The measures impressed the British structural engineer Cyril Helsby who went to Barcelona in December 1938 on an official fact-finding visit sponsored by the Labour Party. When the Republican government fell little over a month later, Helsby persuaded British secret services to help Perera reach London shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War. However, the British authorities refused to act on Perera and Helsby's advice and build simple but effective public shelters, opting instead for makeshift Anderson shelters for family protection. The decision cost thousands of lives, as a contemporary confidential report featured on the program reveals. The historian Paul Preston appears in the documentary and argues that the British government failed to take its duty to protect civilians seriously enough.

Blitz Scouts in 1942.
Blitz Scouts in 1942.

During the blitz, Scouts guided Fire Engines to the places they were most needed, and became known as the Blitz Scouts.[3]

Great improvements were made to air defences during the Blitz. The air defences and the stoicism of the British people were used for propaganda; for example the 1940 propaganda film London Can Take It, made by Humphrey Jennings.

American radio journalist Edward R. Murrow was stationed in London at the time of the Blitz and made live radio broadcasts to the United States during the bombings. Live broadcasts from a theatre of war had not been heard by radio audiences before, and Murrow's London broadcasts made him a celebrity. His broadcasts were enormously important in prompting the sympathy of the American people for Britain's resistance to Nazi aggression.

[edit] Baedeker Blitz

Main article: Baedeker Blitz

The Baedeker Blitz was a series of raids conducted in mid-1942 as reprisals for the RAF bombing of the German city of Lübeck. The Baedeker raids targeted historic cities with no military or strategic importance such as Bath, Canterbury, Exeter, Norwich and York between February to May 1942. Churches and other public buildings of interest were often the targets of these raids in an attempt to break civilian morale. Major targets particularly cathedrals were missed.

[edit] Baby Blitz

In November 1943, Reichmarschall Hermann Göring ordered Oberst Dietrich Peltz to form a bomber force to relaunch operations against southern England (the Luftwaffe's Operation Steinbock). During December and early January, the Luftwaffe gathered some 500 aircraft of widely differing types on French airfields; 447 bombers, including Ju 88s, Ju 188s, Do 217s, Me 410s and the new He 177 were used on the first mass attack on London on 21 January 1944. The bomber crews' general lack of night flying experience and the very different performances of the aircraft types required pathfinder aircraft to be used to mark targets within the London area. The raid was a disaster for the Luftwaffe, and only 32 tons of bombs of the 282 dropped fell on London that night.

For the following four months, further raids were made, resulting in the loss of 329 aircraft, to little effect. And these aircraft were not available to defend against the forthcoming Allied invasion of continental Europe. Peltz had just 144 operational aircraft left by May 1944 when the raids ceased.

[edit] V-1 Offensive

On 12 June 1944, the first V-1 Flying Bomb attack was carried out on London. The British defence against the V-1 was codenamed Operation Diver. The V-2 Rocket was first used against London on 8 September, and on 17 September, the blackout was replaced by a partial 'dim-out'.

[edit] Major sites and structures damaged or destroyed

St. Paul's Cathedral in London during a fire bomb raid on December 29, 1940.
St. Paul's Cathedral in London during a fire bomb raid on December 29, 1940.

[edit] In popular culture

The Blitz has often been referenced or parodied in popular culture today:

  • The 1987 Academy Award nominated film Hope and Glory is a semi-autobiographical account of writer/director John Boorman's early life as a young boy and his family's experiences growing up during The Blitz.
  • The short story writer William Sansom, who served as a London firefighter throughout The Blitz, wrote extensive fictionalized accounts inspired by his experiences.
  • Return to Never Land is set in London in 1940, in the early years of The Blitz which occurred in 1940.
  • Mrs. Miniver (film) is a 1942 American film which tells the story of an English housewife and her family during the opening of World War II.
  • In The Chronicles of Narnia, the story of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe begins with the four Pevensie children being relocated from the London suburb of Finchley to the English countryside to avoid the Blitz.
  • In the film Bedknobs and Broomsticks, three children are evacuated to an English seaside town to escape The Blitz. They learn the woman they are staying with, Eglantine Price (Angela Lansbury), is a witch who in the film's climax uses witchcraft to repel a German raid on the town.
  • In Quatermass and the Pit the alien ship found under Hobb's End is initially explained away by the military as a UXB left over from The Blitz.
  • Danger UXB was a 1979 British ITV television series about a squad of Royal Engineers with the duty of defusing unexploded ordnance in England during The Blitz.
  • Mrs Henderson Presents, starring Dame Judi Dench tells the story of London's infamous Windmill Theatre, where performances included nude reviews. The theatre was famous for its motto "We never closed", a reference to the fact that the theatre remained opened for the most part, despite nightly bombing of London associated with The Blitz in 1942.
  • In the Doctor Who two-part story "The Empty Child" and "The Doctor Dances", the London Blitz served as the backdrop of the story.
  • The Pink Floyd album “The Wall” contains a song entitled "Goodbye Blue Sky" that may be interpreted as a reflection upon the Battle of Britain. The song makes references to “frightened ones” and “falling bombs”, as well as “running for shelter.” The song opens with a young child innocently noting, over the ominous hum of a bomber, “…there’s an airplane up in the sky.” The film version of the album contains a cartoon segment of the bombing of Britain by English artist Gerald Scarfe. It shows a dove exploding revealing a Nazi eagle (Reichsadler), which grabs at the earth and leaves a trail of blood. It glides around England creating a warlord releasing planes. We see naked, gas masked people moving about like animals and hiding from the danger (the frightened ones) and a Union Jack turning into a bleeding cross. Scarfe has admitted his own childhood experiences of growing up during the Blitz as the inspiration for his artwork in the film.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Some authorities say 57 nights in a row, and some say 76, depending on how one accounts for November 2, which was too cloudy for bombing.[1][2]
  2. ^ Stallwood, Oliver. Bungling pilot 'triggered blitz' , Metro, 10 October 2006 page 24. citing papers to be auctioned at Ludlow Racecourse on 25 October 2006
  3. ^ An Official History of Scouting. Retrieved on 2007-05-01.

[edit] External links

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