´óÏó´«Ã½

On the night of the air raid on Nottingham, my father, mother, grandfather and I went down to the cellar of 23 Park Avenue, West Bridgford, where we sat under the stairs.

Soon we heard the unsynchronised engines of the German bombers and not long afterwards we heard the whistle and explosion of bombs. We then heard more explosions and noise in Park Avenue, so we all went up the cellar stairs and just as we got outside in the garden we were showered with dirt and stones.

Later we found that two bombs had landed very close. One had blown a crater in the old bowling green (now the putting green) in front of the former West Bridgford Urban District Council Offices and a second one, much larger, had blown a hole where the greenhouses used to stand behind the croquet green. All the windows of the shops on Central Avenue were broken and the road was lettered with gravel from the two explosions.

A train had halted going into Nottingham on the former L.M.S. line with the engine just over the railway bridge over Bridgford Road, with the trucks behind it standing parallel to Stratford Road. Two ‘bread baskets’ of incendiary bombs were aimed at it. Many fell near the train and a few fell on some trucks but bounced off, without any damage to the train.

Many of the incendiary bombs landed in Park Avenue. Of twenty-three houses in the avenue, ten were hit including our house. My father was putting out a blaze in one house when we were told that our house was on fire. The bomb had landed on a wooden joist and was burning the roof, so my father hacked at the joist with an axe until the bomb fell into a bucket of sand and was finally extinguished. (The smell of magnesium persisted in the bedroom for about 10 years). All the incendiary bombs, which landed in the Park Avenue area, were extinguished by the residents.

Another bomb dropped and damaged part of the railway embankment in the corner of the playing field at the back of the houses on Edward Road.

A stick of high explosive was dropped, presumably to hit the railway and bridge (now the new road bridge over the Trent near the Forest Football Ground). Two houses near the corner of Loughborough Road and Wilford Lane, namely 24 and 26, were demolished. Part of the site is now a county council car park. Also demolished were a chemist and two other shops on Musters Road near Rushworth Avenue, numbers 22, 24 and 26 (now Rushworth Court).

2, 4, 6, 10 and 12 Musters Road (8 was left standing) and 6 Bridgford Road were all demolished. The Rushworth family were all killed in this block except Mr. Rushworth who was standing in the front doorway and the lintel of the door saved his life.

Other houses demolished were 19 and 21 Fox Road, numbers 80 to 90 Trent Boulevard and 78 was damaged. The frontage of Mrs. Bee’s shop at 117 Trent Boulevard was damaged. 56 and 58 Lady Bay Road were demolished and there was a large crater in the garden of Mr. Rooke at 110 Julian Road. A further bomb landed in the Grantham canal and showered one or two houses in Ropsley Crescent with mud.

Finally many incendiary bombs landed around St. Giles’ Church but the church itself was not hit.

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.