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15 October 2014
WW2 - People's War

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Birmingham blitz

by morpethadultlearning

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Archive List > The Blitz

Contributed by听
morpethadultlearning
People in story:听
John Wright
Location of story:听
Alexander Road, Birmingham
Background to story:听
Civilian
Article ID:听
A4495386
Contributed on:听
20 July 2005

John William Wright was 14 when there was a blitz on Birmingham. He lived at 62 Alexander Road with his Mum (Kathleen), his Dad (George William), his little sister (Mary Kathleen) and his little brother (Peter George).

In November 1940, there was a 14-hour air raid. The alert was sounded about 5:30pm and the all clear was given about 7:30am. At about 10pm, everyone was in the house trying to take their minds off the sounds of the aircrafts, when they heard the 鈥減lopping鈥 sound of an incendiary bomb landing in the garden. They weighed about 2kg and included phosphorus and a small detonating charge. Phosphorus ignites when exposed to the air and the explosive charge was meant to scatter elements of phosphorus to spread the fires.

Because they didn鈥檛 know if the bomb had exploded or not, they stayed indoors for about 10 minutes to avoid being hit by fragments of the bomb.

A few fragments had landed on the coal shed, which contained the coal that was used for domestic things such as fires and ovens. Using a stirrup pump, they tried to extinguish the fire but were unsuccessful at first. There was a draft that threw bits of air and coal and reignited the fire. Eventually, by using the sand kept in buckets they managed to extinguish the fire properly.

They then walked around the front of the house and saw that an unoccupied house was on fire in the front bedroom (number 68). One person went down to the fire station and ARP post while everyone else tried to break down the front door. They had to do this as 68 was a mid-terrace house and the fire would spread either side and down the street. Number 68 was unoccupied because people often went in their cars away to the country to stay with family or even just to sleep in the car. People were too scared of the bombs.

They broke down the door and went up to the bedroom taking 2 buckets of water and the pump with them. The bomb was burning on the bed and had brought down the electric cables so the iron bed was live. They decided to throw the burning bedclothes out of the window. As they did this, an auxiliary fireperson arrived but their water pump refused to work, but they managed to get it under control.

They then turned their attention to the other incendiaries that has landed (harmlessly) out on the street, but they had burnt out.

When the owners of number 68 returned, they weren鈥檛 very happy to discover that their front door was broken down and their front bedroom burnt out. They complained about the damage that had been done on gaining entry. They received a short thrift and the family moved out shortly afterwards.

Mary remembers being given sixpence for being a very good girl and keeping out of the way!
The people that helped in this were (additionally):

Frank Grimes
Mr Westbury
Gordon Hodgetts

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