• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team

Air raid shelters

My mother and her sister keep having difference of opinions and I wondered if anyone on here could solve it. My Aunt says there were air raid shelters on Stratford Road, Hall Green but my mother has no recollection of these. Does anyone know?
Post 161 of this thread refers to one opposite Hall Green Church. I am sure many were built on derelict or unused house lots in the suburbs. Bombing, as most here, know was not restricted to the industrial areas and city centre.
 
My Grandparents had a shelter like that - when I remember it in the 1950s Grandad used it for his gardening tools and storing veg (like potatoes). It looks as if it is still there joined to the neighbour's shelter

Hi,That pic looks very like the one that was in our garden in common lane sheldon, it was also joined the the neighbours, it had a very, very thick concrete pebbled flat roof . When I was a child in the 60's it had no door just open access. My Dad also used it for storage, it was still there when we left uk back in 1983, I have recently googled our old house it is quite clearly still standing at the bottom of the garden.
 
Excavating the canal arms under the Easy Row car park in August 1939 to provide air raid shelters. Viv.

22641F1C-374F-4BDC-82AE-F851D2860B8C.jpeg
 
Shelters arriving by train in February 1939 for onward transport to Birmingham homes. Viv.
C2368851-C9D8-47A6-93BC-518B1D79FF71.jpeg
 
The caption accompanying this image talks of ‘trenches’, the one in the photo being on waste land at Berkeley Road off Coventry Road. It also mentions 7 miles of trenches.

There’s something slightly surreal about the men in raincoats and hats emerging from this shelter. Viv.

8D94AC89-20BB-4759-8D55-4084715B969E.jpeg
 
It is curious to note that these air raid precautions were taking place in early 1939, some months before the infamous appeasement saga. The months are also prior to the air display featured in a the latest post on the Elmdon thread.
 
Not Birmingham, but it seems to be a rather unusual shelter I decided to post it.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...tml?ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490&ito=1490

Wow, that is amazing I have never seen one like it before, thank you for sharing it.
Ours was a reinforced concert square building, the roof i remember had pebbles in the concrete. I think I have posted in another post that I can see it on google maps still standing in the garden where we lived growing up.
 
Last edited:
A shelter for 200 neighbours in Victoria Place, September 1939. Hope someone knew what they were doing on this shelter. Would they have needed some sort of approval ? Viv.

2B0E1F94-1994-4D23-A374-EEC3F93F243C.jpeg
 
yer i wonder Viv did they have planners.or could you just build or dig one. when we moved in aston dad was digging the old garden.and come to concrete. we spent time clearing the soil,and it was a shelter. lifting the lid.we saw metal steps. down we went, in there was wooden seats. old rotton rubber gas masks, comics,etc all left by last folks down there. rotting away,
 
yer i wonder Viv did they have planners.or could you just build or dig one. when we moved in aston dad was digging the old garden.and come to concrete. we spent time clearing the soil,and it was a shelter. lifting the lid.we saw metal steps. down we went, in there was wooden seats. old rotton rubber gas masks, comics,etc all left by last folks down there. rotting away,

I wonder how many other residents have found the old shelters buried /hidden under the earth in their gardens over the years since the war.
 
It is curious to note that these air raid precautions were taking place in early 1939, some months before the infamous appeasement saga. The months are also prior to the air display featured in a the latest post on the Elmdon thread.

I suppose there is almost nobody around now who was an adult in 1939 and could confirm it. But it seems pretty clear that many people knew exactly what was coming and this included the authorities, fortunately. Even if we were woefully unprepared in some ways, in others we were ready: these ARP measures; industrially, with shadow factories ready for the "off"; early warning radar stations; fighter production gearing up.

The invasion of the rest of Czechoslovakia by Hitler in March was the the last straw. But to many it was just a confirmation of existing fears. My own father was building our air-raid shelter in the back garden in the winter of 1938/39, prior to all that. He had visited Germany in 1937/38, could see what was going on, remembered hanging up his own uniform less than 20 years earlier.....

(One of my earliest memories is standing on the edge of a big hole, watching him pour concrete to construct one of the walls. Happy days?????)

Chris
 
A 3 minute video clip showing an extract from a longer BFI film released 6 months before the outbreak of WW2. It is noisy and dramatic as such films were at that time. In 1932 the Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin stated that 'the bombers will always get through' so by 1939 people were worried.
 
hi. when i see these sheets of iron for sale.in the farm supply stores. i think,of the time i worked for bham parks dept and allotments. pulling down and removing the old shelters,from allotments.that was rusted and was dangerous.
 

Attachments

  • sheet.jpg
    sheet.jpg
    561.4 KB · Views: 3
A 3 minute video clip showing an extract from a longer BFI film released 6 months before the outbreak of WW2. It is noisy and dramatic as such films were at that time. In 1932 the Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin stated that 'the bombers will always get through' so by 1939 people were worried.
I think it must have been terrifying stuck down those air raid shelters when you can hear the whistle of the bombs falling, holding your breath when they fall too close for comfort. I was too young to remember air raids, though a house just 50 yards from ours in Doidge road received a direct hit & the occupants killed. I`m told my Dad had his feet badly burned when trying to stamp out an incendiary device.
 
My Nan built the air raid shelter in their garden, she came from a building family and was good at stuff like that!
I think they were quite lucky and nothing was bombed in the surrounding area as the house was opposite Perry Barr park where there were anti aircraft guns so I doubt planes would want to get too close!
 
i could not do it. a quick look is enough. no way could i stay down there.
is bof what i think it means. lol
 
Back
Top