However Belfast was not mentioned again by the Nazis. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). to households. In Bristol, the bombed-out ruins of St Peter's Church were left standing with added memorial plaques to the civilians who were killed. The Blitz began at around 4 pm on September 7, 1940, when German bomber planes first appeared over London. Gring had insisted that such an attack was an impossibility, because of the citys formidable air defense network. Video, 00:01:09The Spitfire turns 80, The German bombing of Coventry. The period of the next moon from say the 7th to the 16th of April may well bring our turn." "We can still see the physical scars of the Blitz in Belfast, that is what is left. Nevertheless, for all the hardship it caused, the campaign proved to be a strategic mistake by the Germans. 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. Around 1am, Luftwaffe bombers flew over the city, concentrating their attack on the Harbour Estate and Queen's Island. The famous Harland and Wolff cranes are called Samson and Goliath. The most significant loss was a 4.5-acre (1.8ha) factory floor for manufacturing the fuselages of Short Stirling bombers. So had Clydeside until recently. Although there were some comparatively slight raids later in 1941, the most notable one on July 27, the May 1011 attack marked the conclusion of the Blitz. It became a city by royal charter in 1888. Corrections? The "Hiram Plan" initiated by Dawson Bates, the Home Affairs Minister, had failed to materialise. 2. workers. As many were caught in the open by blast and secondary missiles, the enormous number of casualties can be readily accounted for. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. The creeping TikTok bans. Guided by Davies, the people of the shelter created an ad hoc government and established a set of rules. Fighter Commands efforts were greatly aided by the lack of any consistent plan of action on the part of the Germans. Author Lawrence H. Dawson detailed the damage to Londons historic buildings for the 1941 Britannica Book of the Year: The following curtailed list identifies some of the better known places in inner London that have been damaged by enemy action. Morale did suffer amid the death and devastation, but there were few calls for surrender. Video, 00:00:46, Hong Kong skyscraper fire seen on city's skyline, Watch: Matt Hancock message row in 83 seconds. Also, on Queens Island, stood the Short and Harland Ltd. Aircraft Factory. In the New Lodge area people had taken refuge in a mill. Death had to a certain extent been made decent. Emma Duffin, a nurse at the Queen's University Hospital, (who previously served during the Great War), who kept a diary; Read about our approach to external linking. 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. While Anderson shelters offered good protection from bomb fragments and debris, they were cold and damp and generally ill-suited for prolonged occupancy. Belfast suffered a series of bombing raids in the spring of 1941, which became known as the 'Blitz of Belfast'. In clear weather, targets were easily identifiable. It was not the first time the alarm had sounded to signify the presence of Luftwaffe bombers over the city. Over a period of nine months, over 43,500 civilians were killed in the raids, which focused on major cities and industrial centres. department distributed more than two million Anderson shelters (named after Sir John Anderson, head of the A.R.P.) John Wood Dunlop invented the pneumatic tyre in Belfast in 1887. 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. Since most casualties were caused by falling masonry rather than by blast, they provided effective shelter for those who had them. The mortuary services had emergency plans to deal with only 200 bodies. Heinkel He 111 and Dornier Do 17 planes fitted with Zeiss cameras captured high-quality aerial imagery. On occasion, forces consisting of as many as 300 to 400 aircraft would cross the coast by day and split into small groups, and a few planes would succeed in penetrating Londons outer defenses. But these people all had families and friends and they had to deal with their loss for the rest of their lives.". Northern Ireland is a part of the United Kingdom . After his optician business was destroyed by a bomb, Mickey Davies led an effort to organize the Spitalfield Shelter. The creeping TikTok bans, Hong Kong skyscraper fire seen on city's skyline. As the UK was preparing for the conflict, the factories and shipyards of Belfast were gearing up. His report concluded with: "a second Belfast would be too horrible to contemplate". [25] He followed up with his "they are our people" speech, made in Castlebar, County Mayo, on Sunday 20 April 1941 (Quoted in the Dundalk Democrat dated Saturday 26 April 1941): In the past, and probably in the present, too, a number of them did not see eye to eye with us politically, but they are our people we are one and the same people and their sorrows in the present instance are also our sorrows; and I want to say to them that any help we can give to them in the present time we will give to them whole-heartedly, believing that were the circumstances reversed they would also give us their help whole-heartedly Frank Aiken, the Irish Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures was in Boston, Massachusetts at the time. Churches destroyed or wrecked included Macrory Memorial Presbyterian in Duncairn Gardens; Duncairn Methodist, Castleton Presbyterian on York Road; St Silas's on the Oldpark Road; St James's on the Antrim Road; Newington Presbyterian on Limestone Road; Crumlin Road Presbyterian; Holy Trinity on Clifton Street and Clifton Street Presbyterian; York Street Presbyterian and York Street Non-Subscribing Presbyterian; Newtownards Road Methodist and Rosemary Street Presbyterian (the last of which was not rebuilt). By 6am, within two hours of the request for assistance, 71 firemen with 13 fire tenders from Dundalk, Drogheda, Dublin, and Dn Laoghaire were on their way to cross the Irish border to assist their Belfast colleagues. The Germans, however, saw Belfast as a legitimate target due to the shipyards in the city that were contributing to Britain's war efforts. On the 60th anniversary of the Belfast Blitz, Luftwaffe Pilot Gerhardt Becker spoke to BBC Northern Ireland about his mission over Belfast in 1941. "But there is no such equivalent in Belfast. The next took. The initial human cost of the Blitz was lower than the government had expected, but the level of destruction exceeded the governments dire predictions. Video, 00:01:23Watch: Matt Hancock message row in 83 seconds, One-minute World News. An earlier flight on Oct. 18 allowed the crew to plot several targets in the city. (Great War casualties) had died in hospital beds, their eyes had been reverently closed, their hands crossed to their breasts. Despite the military and industrial importance of the city, the Luftwaffe described the defences asweak, scanty, insufficient. 50,000 houses, more than half the houses in the city, were damaged. After the bombing began on September 7, local authorities urged displaced people to take shelter at South Hallsville School. Outside of London, with some 900 dead, this was the greatest loss of life in a night raid during the Blitz. Weighing 46,328 tonnes, Titanic was to be the largest manmade moveable object the world had ever seen. The past doesnt change, its just over.. Many of those who died as a result of enemy action lived in tightly packed, poorly constructed, terraced housing. The offensive came to be called the Blitz after the German word blitzkrieg (lightning war). Blitz Fibre UK Blitz Fibre UK Published Mar 1, 2023 + Follow Fact 1- Small but Mighty . 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." NI WW2 veterans honoured by France. 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. He believed that key targets identified across the city were hit. His death (along with preceding ill-health) came at a bad time and arguably inadvertently caused a leadership vacuum. There were Heinkel He 111s, Junkers Ju 88s and Dornier Do 17s. He was replaced by 54-year-old Sir Basil Brooke on 1 May. Belfast was bombed by the Nazis in World War II. Davies also set up medical stations and persuaded off-duty medical personnel to treat the sick and wounded. All were exhausted. Indeed, on the night of the first raid, no Royal Air Force (RAF) aircraft took to the air to intercept German planes. The danger faced in London was greatly increased when the V2 attacks started and the casualty figures mirrored those of the Blitz.. Tragically 35 were crushed to death when the mill wall collapsed. James Craig, Lord Craigavon, had been Prime Minister of Northern Ireland since its inception in 1921 up until his death in 1940. 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. By the middle of December it had reached nearly 1,700,000 (adjusted for inflation, this was the equivalent of roughly 100 million in 2020). The town of Dromara saw its population increase from 500 to 2,500. [citation needed]. By British mainland blitz standards, casualties were light. Contributions poured in from every part of the world in such profusion that on October 28 its scope was extended to cover the whole of the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland. 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. "Through cross-referencing a number of different sources I have been able to get the most accurate number of people who died in the Blitz," he says. At the core of this book is a compelling account of the Luftwaffe's blitz on Belfast in April-May 1941. The government was blamed by some for inadequate precautions. 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. Three vessels nearing completion at Harland and Wolff's were hit as was its power station. There were still 80,000 more in Belfast. More than 500 German planes dropped more than 700 tons of bombs across the city, killing nearly 1,500 people and destroying 11,000 homes. High explosive bombs predominated in this raid. 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. 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. [21] Mass graves for the unclaimed bodies were dug in the Milltown and Belfast City Cemeteries. 11 churches, two hospitals and two schools were destroyed. By 1940, Short and Harland could shelter its entire workforce and Harland and Wolff had provision to shelter 16,000 workers. For two hours on the first day, 348 German bombers and 617 fighters blasted London. The first attack was against the city's waterworks, which had been attacked in the previous raid. Nevertheless, through sheer weight of numbers, the Germans were on the brink of victory in late August 1940. The Luftwaffe crews returned to their base in Northern France and reported that Belfast's defences were, "inferior in quality, scanty and insufficient". In The Blitz: Belfast in the War Years, Brian Barton wrote: "Government Ministers felt with justification, that the Germans were able to use the unblacked out lights in the south to guide them to their targets in the North." A Luftwaffe pilot gave this description "We were in exceptional good humour knowing that we were going for a new target, one of England's last hiding places. On Nov. 30, 1940, a lone Luftwaffe plane flew across the Ards Peninsula unobserved and reported back to Berlin. Very early in the German bombing campaign, it became clear that the preparationshowever extensive they seemed to have beenwere inadequate. 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. The creeping TikTok bans. The raid so infuriated Hitler that he ordered the Luftwaffe to shift its attacks from RAF sites to London and other cities. The nights of November 3 and 28 were the only occasions during this period in which Londons peace was unbroken by siren or bomb. Belfast's Albert Clock tower is sinking - it leans by four feet. Humanity knows no borders, no politics, no differences of religious belief. Air power alone had failed to knock the United Kingdom out of the war. Read about our approach to external linking. 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. Roads out of town are still one stream of cars, with mattresses and bedding tied on top. Brides, Fleet St.; St. Lawrence Jewry; St. Magnus the Martyr; St. Mary-at-hill; St. Dunstan in the East; St. Clement [Eastcheap] and St. Jamess, Piccadilly). He successfully busied himself with the task of making Northern Ireland a major supplier of food to Britain in her time of need.[5]. Nearby were the citys main power station, gasworks, telephone house and the Sirocco Engineering works. The first was on the night of 7-8 April 1941, a small attack which probably took place only to test Belfast's defences. The period of the next moon from say the 7th to the 16th of April may well bring our turn.. The city has been a leader in women's rights. Incendiary bombs predominated in this raid. Revised estimates made decades later indicated that close to 600 men, women, and children had been killed in the bombing. Reviewed by: Geoffrey Roberts. Major O'Sullivan reported that "In the heavily 'blitzed' areas people ran panic-stricken into the streets and made for the open country. They remained for three days, until they were sent back by the Northern Ireland government. The "pothole blitz" is a common short-term initiative to combat storm weather damage. The World's Most-Famous Ship, The Titanic, was constructed here. For eight months the Luftwaffe dropped bombs on London and other strategic cities across Britain. Nine were registered on three separate occasions, and from the start of the Blitz until November 30 there were more than 350 alerts. 10 Facts about Belfast City. Fewer than 4,000 women and children were evacuated. 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. 7. This part of Belfast was the only one required to provide air raid shelters for workers. 10,000 "officially" crossed the border. During the whole period, although the citys operation was disrupted in ways that were sometimes serious, no essential service was more than temporarily impaired. 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. When the bombing began, 76-year-old William and 72-year-old Harriette took refuge under the stairs along with Dorothy, Dot and Isa. By then most of the major fires were under control and the firemen from Clydeside and other British cities were arriving. This view was probably influenced by the decision of the IRA Army Council to support Germany. KS3 History (Environment and society) The Belfast Blitz learning resources for adults, children, parents and teachers. On September 1, 1939, the day World War II began with Germanys invasion of Poland, the British government implemented a massive evacuation plan. [6] It was MacDermott who sent a telegram to de Valera seeking assistance. Over 150 people died in what became known as the 'Fire Blitz'. 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. 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. The famous places damaged include the palace of Westminster and Westminster hall, the County hall, the Public Record office, the Law Courts, the Temple and the Inner Temple library; Somerset house, Burlington house, the tower of London, Greenwich observatory, Hogarths house; the Carlton, Reform, American, Savage, Arts and Orleans clubs; the Royal College of Surgeons, University college and its library, Stationers hall, the Y.M.C.A. It was not the last time Belfast would suffer. Despite the attacks, Belfast continued to contribute to the war effort, and within less than a year the city witnessed the arrival of thousands of American troops. Singer-songwriter Van Morrison was born here. Between April 7 and May 6 of that year, Luftwaffe bombers unleashed death and destruction on the cities of Belfast, Bangor, Derry/Londonderry and Newtownards.