Forums Forums Wirral History : Chasing the Past History Information Request Blitz Maps?

Apart from the bombing maps, Beech and Milton Rds(down near Christchurch Claughton School)were extensively damaged. Right up to the 60's there were still "prefabs" in those roads. We lived at 12 Dingle Rd which is at the bottom of Beech Rd, opposite Brattan Rd, alongside said school, Brattan Rd at Borough Intersection was severley damaged and also was the said school. When the school got hit, my mum said the house next door, No. 10, just fell down and the block was empty up until I left Birkenhead in 1969. Bit of luck for us as there was a Service Station at the bottom of our garden on Borough Rd,beats fairies, one bomb there and you wouldn't be reading this.

This picture from "Birkenhead at War" by Ian Boumphrey will interest you, mindplayer. Looking down Brattan Rd. after the raid of 12/13 March 1941. You can see the petrol station you mention & could that be your house in the background?

We would still be reading it, its just, you wouldn't be writing it.

St Saviour's church in Oxton got damaged when the Carvarvon Castle got hit by an aerial mine 14 March 1941. That was a bomb site till 1957 when it was rebuit, lost a playground !! Other properties in Silverdale Road also got damaged. Also I think a property on the corner of Shrewbury Road & Gerald Road got it. Looked like it.
The Hermitage on Mill Hill got it I think, certainly a bit of a wreck in the 50's

without me having to trawl through the topics can anyone tell me how much warning folks had of bombers coming and what
shelters/ protection people had who lived in the back to back houses in the streets off Grange Rd - thinking of bomb hits nearby on the Adelhi, Savoy and by the Waterloo pub (there's a pic on a wall in there saying how the main electricity line to Camell Lairds was cut off and pub rebuilt)

During the war my Mum lived in Beckwith St, almost at the junction with Livingstone St. Their house was bombed out and they moved a couple of doors up, to the second house along (with the white door). The land where her original house was was never built on again and throughout the sixties was just mud and rubble. Now, it's a patch of green with a few trees.



She told me some stories about air raids but never mentioned how much warning they had.
Apparently St James' Church was the landmark that German pilots flying in from the Irish Sea would look for.
From there they had a straight run down Laird/Conway St to Cammel Lairds.
Mum told me how the bombers would fly at rooftop height down Conway St, sometimes with machine guns peppering the shops.
On one occasion she was late getting to a shelter and was running up Conway St, a bomber must have let his bombs go early and the explosion blew my Mum through the air. She woke up in a shop doorway, shaken but otherwise unharmed.
Another time she was walking home from a dance at the Kingsland on Borough Rd when the air raid sirens started.
They both ran into Birkenhead Park and took cover with a few other people in one of the shelters there.
They all remarked on how loud and near the bombing seemed.
When the all clear sounded she looked up to see the roof of the shelter was gone

The warning times of air raids were variable, but normally within a decent time, planes were picked up on radar and also visual and sound detection, a relay system would have been in place between Police and civil defence forces. At the start of night time bombing the government expected people to sleep in their air raid shelters, then they would already be protected before the raids started.

https://www.wikiwirral.co.uk/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/305221/Air_Raid_Protection.html#Post305221

That is my old house attached to number 14 on the right. Great photo Chris Kay.

Does anyone know if Doctor Frick still posts on here?

He had a website with links to a blitz map of Wirral that was a work in progress back in 2008. I went to find the page it was on and the site is no more.

TIA

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