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Birmingham air raids

brenda barr said:
David l wander if you remember my g/parents newsagents.known as the coateses...walking down Church Lane from Lichfield road on the right hand side no 61 i think by the lamp post...they were there for years and l think they closed up in the early 50s.my g/p Bill and Alice Coates both past away in 1947 my uncle took it over and kept it going untill the early 50s...my g/f was born in church Lane and died there only left it twice once for the great war and when my brother and l were evacuated....Brenda
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BRENDA I LIVED OPPOSIT THE NEWSAGENTS IN CHURCH LANE AND I REMEMBER IT WELL.
MY NAN LIVED AT No 84 THERE WAS A GROCERS THE OTHERSIDE OF THE ROAD (MRS HALL)
FURTHER DOWN WAS ASTONS WOODYARD AND ON THE OTHER SIDE THERE WAS A PAWN BROKERS
WITH THREE BRASS BALLS OUTSIDE ALSO A CHIP SHOP AND A SWEET SHOP.PA .ITS MY FIRST POST TEL
 
Tel. what a nice surprise knowing somebody who knows what l have been talking about my g/p Bill and Alice Coates, my gg/m also lived in Church Lane, also relatives of the Coates, lived very close in Witton Road , Victoria Road.....people didn't move around much in those days...l was always fascinated by the shop as not only did they sell newspapers nan had regular customers for snuff ugh!..firewood...and paraffin ..l still remember the smell...mom and l always visited Saturday mornings after shopping at thompsons the pork butchers..and my brother was the paper boy Sunday morning delivery, the lane was such a friendly place as everyone helped everyone out especially my nan as if anyone was in need she would be one of the first to help, happy memories....Brenda
 
Hi old Mohawk
Air raid 10th/11th April 1941
The award of the British Empire Medal went to Frederick William Alloyed, Driver Birmingham City Transport,,,,
Sidney Clifford Miller, Driver Birmingham City Transport,
During an air raid incendiary bombs fell on omnibuses parked on Garrison Lane
Recreation ground, one of the buses was set on fire, Alloyed got into the cabin of the burning bus
Whilst Miller moved the machine in front, Alloyed drove his bus out of the park,
But the fire spread so rapidly that on reaching the the road the vehicle Burnt out
Despite the efforts of the fire brigade. These men performed an out standing service
In a most courageous manner, disregarding the great danger, valuable rolling stock
Was saved from destruction,
Miller had already driven a burning bus out of the park,in the air raid of the 9th to the 10th
Of April 1941
Best wishes Astonian,,,,,,
,,
 
Well deserved medals they were too, driving a burning bus is no mean feat and at the time every available bus counted with new deliveries "frozen" or very carefully rationed out by the Ministry of Supplies. Many thanks for those details Astonian.

Simon
 
David Weaver said:
Know how you feel Nick, that's how I feel about the Freer family in Church Lane and it doesn't matter how long time passes they are still part of us eh. Some say move on and maybe they are right but a mate is a mate and memories are our own diamonds to cherish. Kind regards, David. Lest we forget.
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Hi Dav
I'm doing a bit of personal research purely out of interest about the bombing of Lichfield Rd , Church Lane and Pugh Road.
You mentioned the Freer Family do you how details of the house number.
I remember this bombing and seeing the destruction the following morningI lived four houses away in 4 Sandy Lane.
Talking to my nearly 90 year old Aunt a few days ago about the bombing mentioned a family killed in Church Lane but couldn't remember the names
The records I have found so suggest that the houses on the LHS started at no. 10 and I've got Freer's living at 18BK18 & 20 Church Lane.

As far as I'm aware these houses didn't get hit could they have been down c cellar which some had been reinforced.
We used to go down one of these cellars at 2 Sandy Lane.

Regards Ray
 
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Hi ray
Friday 22nd November 1940 a mr Arther Edward Snape,Hair Dresser, and war reserve constable
Was awarded an British Empire medal
When he was near the junction of Lichfield Road and Sandy Lane, two incendiary bombs fell.
Two men were making efforts to extinguish them with earth when they exploded
And one of the men sustained a compound fracture of the left leg,
Snape stopped his car.ran tonis assistance of the man,and afterwards took the injured man
In his car to the first aid post
Ray there is moreto this sdtory about snape but i nave not much time left to type
As i have to be in brum for one oclock if you want more i will speak later this eveningut snape he was well deserved guy whom risked his limbs and lifefor others
Alan,,,Astonian,,,,
 
My aunt Joyce once told me that my dad tried to put out an incediary by stamping on it, & even though his foot was badly burned he still went to work in the morning with his injured foot in a cardboard box. He was a hard man, & when he had toothache he would get my uncle Frank to pull the tooth out with a pair of pliers & a bodkin? I don`t take after him!!
 
sospiri said:
Smudger,

That story is giving me a bad attack of cowarditis! :)

Maurice
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Join the club Maurice, but you know, if push came to shove then i think most people would do a brave deed in an instant without thinking about it. It`s only after the event when you think, " I must have been barmy to have done that".
 
For the benefit of a few members or guests who may still be unaware, it might be appropriate at this stage to pay tribute to two of the major sources of information on which a fair proportion of this and similar discussions is based:

1. "Heroes of the Birmingham Air Raids" by Michael Minton, Brewin Books, 2002, - ISBN 1 85858 211 3
(The result of research by the late author into many Birmingham air raids and the acts of remarkable bravery by many people, civilian, ARP, AFS/NFS, Police, Home Guard etc. etc. which were acknowledged by various awards, sometimes posthumous).

2. The BARRA/Swanshurst website, a wonderful, searchable resource which details all the casualties of the Birmingham blitz.

Neither of these resources does of course include the personal memories of those BHF members old enough to have lived through those nights; and may they long continue to record what they remember for the benefit of all of us - and for future historians!

Chris
 
I was looking at this photo of severe bomb damage in Burlington Road Small Heath and ....
126BurlingtonRd1940.jpg
Looking for information about where it was I could see a gap in a row of houses in this 1945 aerial photo.
Burlington 1945p.JPG
Looking on Google Earth today revealed four semi-detached houses built in that gap between much older houses.
126 Burlingtonp.JPG
Another view of those houses.
Burlnowp.jpg
A search led me to the following information in a post in an old thread about Burlington Road
expatriate said:
In 1953 or 1954 my family moved into a new house that had been built on a bombed site in Burlington Road. The new houses became 120/126 Burlington Road and had to have deeper foundations because of the bombing. I had to dig bricks out of the garden and clean off the old morter and with these we built 3 garages at the back of 126. Two of these were rented out to neighbours. Looking up the house site on Google the garages appear to have been converted to accommodation.
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The BARRA (http://barra.historynut.co.uk/) site has information about a raid on Burlington Road but not about the address mentioned above.
 
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Poss Tyburn Road.JPG A bomb damage WWII photo from the Shoohill Gallery: https://damsdeepzoom.shoothill.com/

This one is marked as unknown location, however I was wondering if we could sort it out.

At first glance it looks like Tyburn Road to me, as these are pre-war system built municipal houses. The tape on the windows show it may be near the factory’s expecting bombing.

There are only a few areas in Birmingham with system built houses like these, around Tyburn Road, Dovedale Road and there were a few around Yarldey Wood.
 
mort have a look at minstead road which is next to tyburn road...2 of my rellies died at bo 19 minstead road as a result of an air raid

lyn
 
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It struck me as being Tyburn Road, but I could not say why. Google Earth with the 1945 picture does not help.

Long shot. Maybe it is the way that the roofs of the distant house seem to be going in a curve?
 
pedro that is why i suggested it could be minstead road as it starts to curve at about no 17..my rellies died at no 19...very difficult to know for sure..
 
Hi Froth ... I've just noticed your new avatar ... I also survived a bomb ...:D
oldMohawk said:
Our shelter had not yet been built and we usually shared our next door neighbour's Anderson shelter, but one night my sister and me were sleeping under a concrete slab in our small pantry. Out of the dark sky, 'jerry' decided to drop a bomb and it smashed through the roof of our house. Suddenly awoken, we were surprised to see our dad getting large pieces of wood and a shovel from the coalhouse while shouting to our neighbour to get us into their shelter. Our neighbour pulled us out and rushed us up the garden into their Anderson shelter.
Luckily the bomb was an early type slow-burning phosphorus incendiary which only partially burnt a wardrobe, chair, and bedding before dad picked it up with the shovel and chucked it out the bedroom window while neighbours soon doused the bedroom flames with stirrup pumps.
We did not get much sleep that night and we thought we would have a day off from school but no such luck !
A few months later the Luftwaffe must have realised many people were shovelling up incendiary bombs and throwing them outside, so they started putting explosives and magnesium in the bombs causing immediate blinding fierce flames which could not be extinguished.
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Hi guys
IT appears for some reason or the other during the birmingham raids we had it seems that sparhill, balsal heath, and
Small Heath, had taken the blunt of a bashing for some reaon or another by the enemy
A continued and persistant bombing for the period of August ,
August 26/ 27 1940,
August 27 /28 1940 , 28/29 ,30/31 st 1940 . 31 st / 1st sept 1940
September 2nd 1940 , 109 incidents reported

23 september Luffwatte reconnaissance of birmingham
27 th of september Fort Dunlop day light Attack
15/16th october 1940 , Heavvy raids on birmingham, start of weeks of raids 59 dead
18th 19th november 1940 raid lasting nine hours and forty minutes B S A works badly damaged 53 dead
26 october /27 th 1940 bomb explodes in front of screen at the Carlton cinema spark
 
My dad worked at the Dunlop making tyres for the aircraft industry. As he wasn't called up he was on fire watch duty after he finished work. It meant that we, my mother and me, were alone most nights. Bedtime was an experience I have never forgotten. I must have slept downstairs until it was time for mom to call it a day.
She would get me ready for bed, I slept in her bed, she then dragged a tallboy, large chest over 3 drawers - heavy, against the bedroom door, then she put the bedroom Lloyd loom chair and the linen basket on top of it.
'There we are, now let to the b...... get us.' Never mind that if there was the possibility of escape, after 'Jerry' managed to find our house with a bomb, we might not make it out of that bedroom!!

You can imagine the panic there would have been if the siren went while we were asleep.

We lived in Witton and apart from Kynochs which was the obvious target, I don't recall seeing any bomb damage. The nearest was in Lozells which we saw when we went shopping, queueing for cigarettes for dad.
 
One of the main things in this discussion is the spirit of the people who lived through these dreadful times. We had an elderly aunt living with us in Sparkbrook and as I've mentioned elsewhere our house was damaged on a couple of occasions. Said aunt wouldn't join us in the air raid shelter but would sit in an armchair and shout up to the German raider's " Go round again you Baa Lambs.
I was only a kid during the war and my father was a fireman with the AFS and NFS as it was later called. I have vague memories of going through Digbeth with him on the bus and as we passed a flattened, smoldering building him telling us "That's one of our saves !". This dry humor was lost on me but maybe shared with fellow passengers.
Cheers Tim
 
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