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Air raid shelters

Hi Journeyman, I have had many experiences of Bombs in the Blitz, Saw Bulpitts go up in flames, Heard the Landmine that hit Brookfields School (Ellen Street) saw the Landmine that was dropped at the same time and landed in Lodge Road just a little way down from Scribbans Bakeries, of course this was after it had been diffused by the bomb disposal squad and was still hanging from the rafters in this house. The bombers tried like hell to get me, everywhere I went they seemed to be targetting me, thank God they missed. At the very beginning of the Blitz I was playing in Clissold Street when the sirens went off, it was a very bright moonlight night and as I ran home I looked to the skies and saw the German bombers, my little legs ran twice as fast.
Brookieboy
 
Hi maypolebaz,
Yes, I did live in Warstock as a nipper. We lived in maisonettes in Shawbrook Grove, by Grendon school. They have been pulled down now, but I remember the years there as very happy, and the flat was my parents first home of their own. Grendon was my first school, and later Brandwood S.M.
The kids in the grove, and from Moundsley and the tower blocks, also now gone, that we all used just call, `The flats`, would form a football team and we would spend hours up at Daisy Farm Park, as it was then called, in all weather, loved it, so wish I could go back in time - same as a lot of people I suppose!.
Ring any bells, cheers, cresser.
 
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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cresser said:
Hi maypolebaz,
Yes, I did live in Warstock as a nipper. We lived in maisonettes in Shawbrook Grove, by Grendon school. They have been pulled down now, but I remember the years there as very happy, and the flat was my parents first home of their own. Grendon was my first school, and later Brandwood S.M.
The kids in the grove, and from Moundsley and the tower blocks, also now gone, that we all used just call, `The flats`, would form a football team and we would spend hours up at Daisy Farm Park, as it was then called, in all weather, loved it, so wish I could go back in time - same as a lot of people I suppose!.
Ring any bells, cheers, cresser.
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You've certainly rung a lot of bells cresser, I grew up in Sladepool Farm Rd and Daisy Farm park was on my doorstep. I reckon you are a bit younger than me though. I am so ancient that I used to do a paper round on the Druids Lane prefab estate before Druids Heath was even thought of ! Some of my mates went to Grendon Rd / Yardley Wood schools but I went to Highters Heath/ Wheelers Lane.
 
I was talking to my Cousin the other day about air raid shelters, she recalled going into one underneath the Museum and Art Gallery. She said she didn't like it it much, there was a strange smell and not like the earthy smell of the Anderson in Grandad's back garden!
rosie.
 
rosie said:
I was talking to my Cousin the other day about air raid shelters, she recalled going into one underneath the Museum and Art Gallery. She said she didn't like it it much, there was a strange smell and not like the earthy smell of the Anderson in Grandad's back garden!
rosie.
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I have been told that there was a mortuary under the museum and art gallery, maybe that was the source of the smell?
 
At my home in Selly Oak we had an Anderson shelter and when the family used it our dog always made sure he was with us. One night of severe bombing we went to the shelter and some how the dog was left out. He had the intelligence to walk over a mile to relations at Bournville who had a similar shelter. He apparently scratched at the door and was let in to the shelter. Wonderful intelligence I think.
 
If my memory serves me correctly I think the smell depended on how close the bombs were falling. Kind regards, David.
rosie said:
I was talking to my Cousin the other day about air raid shelters, she recalled going into one underneath the Museum and Art Gallery. She said she didn't like it it much, there was a strange smell and not like the earthy smell of the Anderson in Grandad's back garden!
rosie.
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I used to live on Eachelhurst Road in Sutton Coldfield, next door to the entrance for Pype Hayes golf course. We had a large air raid shelter in the back garden but it was underground, it had been filled in before i ever had the chance to go down but after so many years the ground sank revealing two large iron runners and old bottles often came to the surface, often full of liquor. My Dad told me that the shelter was very large and had bunk beds and a bar!
 
An air raid shelter produced in Erdington in the 1940s for 'key personnel' !! Viv.
 

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I have always wondered where that type of air raid shelter came from. Apparently there is one on the beach in Dorset, likely spot for the German invasion.
 
Many people had the outside Anderson shelters during the war but some including us had the Morrison indoor shelter (a 'do it your self' steel table) which replaced your dining room table. When the sirens sounded you were all supposed to sit under the table. It had a metal top and base and 4 angular steel legs I wonder what the deciding factor of who got which. Nothing to do with not having a garden, as we had quite a long one. ???
 
It is possible that Key Personnel here did not mean the top brass but anyone required to be out and about at night like fire watchers, night watchmen, railway men etc.
 
Morturn and David - like others my first reaction was that the Consol shelter was meant for a select few. But it looks like it only allows one person inside. So, yes, it probably was for lookouts etc. maybe that's why there's one on the beach in Dorset.


Eric that's an interesting point as to how were Anderson and Morrison shelters allocated. Maybe someone has the answer. Viv.
 
We had an Anderson shelter buried in the back garden.....but a neighbor across the street had a Morrison l always thought it was because they didn't have a back garden, just paving...
having lived in a cul-de-sac most of the people used the cellar as a shelter, but dad would have none of that as he said all the mains were in the cellar....Brenda
 
My best friend, Isabel Instone, who lived in Vicarage Road, Handsworth, had both a Morrison shelter in her kitchen and an Anderson shelter in her back garden. We used to play in both after the war. We had big cellars in my house and used those for shelter.

Judy
 
Thanks for the link Morturn. Interesting info about the Consol. I think the advert in the link makes the shelter look space-age!

Hi Brenda. Like many others your Anderson shelter was buried. But these pictures of ones from the Shoothill site show them at ground level covered with bricks. Viv.
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Air raid shelters were a big part of my early life but I've mentioned it elsewhere on the forum. Briefly, we did not get our shelter until after spending many nights in next door's Anderson and after being in our house when a bomb hit it.
They eventually built a brick shelter for us, 12" thick walls and 6" thick reinforced concrete roof.

After the war many people used Andersons as garden sheds, but our brick one could have done with a bomb to demolish it. It took a long time to break it up and the rubble was buried under a new raised part of the garden.

A photo of me on it when it was operational.
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I too remember a brick shelter with a thick concrete roof. However, in my memory it was used by my Grandfather as a tool store - it had a hole for a window but no frame or glass (obviously) and a hole for the doorway. As a small child I was not keen on going in as it was cold and dark - at least to me. I do remember being puzzled by the thick roof as I did not really understand its original use.

Janice
 
when I as a lad most houses had, "Andersons" in or at the bottom of their gardens, most were utilized as garden sheds well into the early 60's.Paul
 
We had an Anderson which I suspect was never assembled and left in the gardn for many years. I remember it still there in the late 1950s. At one point it was used as a fence to divide up our very long garden, decorative garden/ pond/flowers one side and vegetables and fruit trees the other. Mind you the corrugated iron - two great arches of iron as I remember - was very rusty. Not pretty by any means. Viv.
 
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