by Anne Bennett
When all was done, she went down to the cellar as Richard slipped out of the door. ‘No bombs yet,’ Violet said.
‘Plenty of incendiaries, though,’ Marion said. ‘I didn’t need to see them, I heard them well enough.’
‘Yeah, and they will light the way for the bloody bombers like daylight,’ Peggy said. ‘Little point in the blackout then.’
The words were hardly out of Peggy’s mouth when the faint whistle of the first bomb was heard, then another, and then a succession of them clumped so close together it was hard to distinguish between them and even in the cellar the drone of planes was so loud that it seemed all around them as if they were under attack from all sides.
As the hours dragged by, Marion’s fear increased and the tension in the cellar rose. She had been frightened before, but after reading about the gas-filled cellar the previous month, and what had been done to Coventry just a few nights before, her stomach was in knots and she felt as if she had ice running through her veins. She saw the twins were as terrified as she was, almost frozen with terror, and Tony’s eyes looked large and frightened in his white face.
Marion sat on the saggy old settee, held the twins tight and tried to keep the lid on her own panic as she saw Tony, kneeling on the mattress with Sarah, leaning against her while her arms went round him. Peggy, at the other end of the settee, had her arms around Violet, who had begun to weep quietly. Marion knew with a sort of dread certainty that this was Birmingham’s own Coventration.
A sudden explosion, very close, rocked the walls of the cellar and the twins both emitted primeval shrieks of terror and burrowed closer into their mother, who held their shuddering bodies even closer as they sobbed. Sarah was more frightened than she ever remembered being in her life. She saw that though Tony was trying to be brave and manly, his eyes were standing out in terror and he was shaking from head to foot. She tightened her arms around him as a bomb came hurtling down so close they bent their heads against the onslaught.
But the explosion didn’t happen, and they looked up surprised that they were all still alive, while the raid continued as fiercely as ever.
The cellar door was suddenly wrenched open and Richard was standing on the threshold. ‘Thank God you’re all right,’ he said.
‘Richard, what are you doing here?’ Marion gasped.
‘I’ve come to tell you that you have to get out,’ Richard said. ‘And quickly too.’
‘What are you saying?’
‘There’s an unexploded bomb in the road. ‘It’s a big one so the whole area is being evacuated.’
‘But where are we to go?’
‘Atkinson’s Brewery have opened their cellar,’ Richard said. ‘Come on! Take only what you can carry and let’s get out of here.’
Marion was the last one out of the cellar and was strangely reluctant to leave.
‘Come on, Mom! What are you waiting for?’ Richard’s voice came from the top of the cellar steps.
‘Nothing,’ Marion said. Tm coming.’
How could she expect Richard to understand how much she resented being forced from her home? She gazed all around her before following the others into the street and her heart was heavy because she felt as if she had just said goodbye to the house she loved.
None of them ever forgot that night. Immediately they stepped into the street they were aware of the arc lights raking the sky, pinpointing the droning German planes that the barking ack-ack guns were trying to bring down. The screams of the descending bombs and the crashing of explosions were much louder and more frightening outside, and the air stunk from the brick dust, mixed with cordite and gas. Smoke from the many fires and the smouldering incendiaries swirled about them and caught in the backs of their throats.
They all saw the bomb in a massive crater only yards from their home and though no one said anything they all knew they would have been killed if the bomb had gone off. ARP wardens and members of the Home Guard were urging all the residents of Albert Road to hurry. Mothers tried to catch hold of small children and soothe restless crying babies, and all around, disoriented people were scurrying along, carrying what they could.
As they neared the brewery they could see fires burning all over the city. Magda looked up to see even more German planes thronging the sky, flying in formation like gigantic menacing black beetles. So intrigued was she, she had unwittingly come to a stop on the pavement, flabbergasted when she actually saw the bomb doors open and the bombs tumble out and head downward with piercing whistles.
‘For God’s sake, child, what are you doing?’ Marion cried, giving Magda’s arm a yank just as the bombs found their mark with horrifying blasts and booms. These were followed by the unmistakable sound of falling masonry. Suddenly Magda wanted to be anywhere underground where this death and destruction could be muffled a little.
Inside the cellar the noise at first was horrendous. Many babies and toddlers continued to keen and grizzle, and they weren’t the only ones. Children and adults were doing the same, while others were praying. There were shouts from some and even laughter, and the Whittakers were pushed further forward as more and more came into that brewery cellar that night.
When Marion spotted Polly with her daughters and Jack she was so pleased. The two sisters hugged one another, Sarah and the twins hugged their cousins, while Jack, with a wide smile on his face, punched Tony on the arm and said, ‘What ho, Tone,’ and Tony grinned back at him.
‘Right bugger this, ain’t it?’ Polly said. ‘They took us all out the shelter in the park, said it weren’t safe with that big bomb.’
‘Where’s Pat?’
‘Out helping,’ Polly said. ‘Him and Colm, and I’m that worried about them.’
‘I feel the same about Richard,’ Marion said. ‘Part of me wants him to come into the cellar and be relatively safe, like the rest of us, and part of me is proud that he won’t even consider that. And maybe I should look out for Mammy and Daddy and see if they have been brought here too.’
‘No need,’ Polly said. ‘Orla and Siobhan spotted them. I thought they might be shook up and that, you know, so I went over.’
‘And they weren’t?’
‘Daddy was a bit,’ Polly said. ‘But Mammy wasn’t upset in the slightest. She was just bloody angry and letting everyone know about it as well. Daddy said she didn’t want to leave the house and they had to carry her out.’
‘I didn’t want to leave my house,’ Marion said. ‘Most people would feel the same, but you have to be sensible about these things.’
‘Yeah,’ Polly said, ‘and I suppose even Mammy will settle down eventually. Till then I should leave her well alone.’
‘Yeah,’ Marion wearily. ‘I’m not up to Mammy’s temper at the moment. I’m fair jiggered, to tell you the truth, and the children must be worse, and there ain’t even anywhere to sit down.’
‘Well, it’s a brewery cellar, ain’t it?’ Polly pointed out reasonably. ‘They’re not geared up for people. But we can use the blanket.’ She spread out the one that she had carried from the shelter as she spoke. ‘We can sit on that.’
‘And we’ll do the same,’ Marion said, ‘and do our best to cheer ourselves up.’
After that they made the most of their time in Atkinson’s Brewery cellar, pooling their food and drink. Then when someone began a singsong they sang any song they knew.
When the all clear sounded Marion wakened from a doze, though she couldn’t remember falling asleep, to find Sarah gently tapping her arm.
‘The bomb has been detonated safely, Mom,’ she said. ‘We can go back home.’ Marion gave a brief nod before stumbling stiff-legged to her feet.
There was a gaping hole in the middle of the road just in front of the Whittakers’ house. Inside, the whole place was covered in fine grey dust. Marion knew that they had been more than lucky to have a house to come back to. Some of her neighbours hadn’t fared so well and houses either side of the street just a little further on were just smouldering piles of rubbish
.
‘Where will those poor sods sleep tonight?’ Peggy said, indicating the desolate people looking askance at what had once been their homes.
‘Who knows?’ Marion said with a sigh. ‘Maybe they’ll go back to the cellar.’
‘Not that much of the night left, anyway,’ Violet said. ‘And I’m away to my bed to sleep till the alarm goes off.’
Marion, though, waited for Richard, knowing she wouldn’t settle till she knew he was in and safe.
SEVENTEEN
The next day on the early news on the wireless, the Whittakers learned of the three hundred and fifty bombers that had attacked a ‘Midlands town’ the previous night causing widespread devastation. Many people were dead or badly injured.
‘I’m not surprised at the damage,’ Peggy said decidedly. ‘We’ve never had a raid so fierce.’
‘They didn’t get the clock at Aston Cross, though,’ Richard said. ‘It was still there, sort of surrounded by a sea of rubble, and this bloke said to me it was like a beacon of defiance to Hitler.’
‘Would have been a shame if they had destroyed it,’ Marion said. ‘It’s been there as long as I remember.’
‘Yeah,’ Richard agreed. ‘But even worse is the sad and helpless look on people’s faces when they come out the shelters and find their houses gone. Some of them were crying, and not just kids but grown-ups as well, and others just stand there, like they can’t really believe it, or start searching the rubble of where their houses had once stood for anything they can salvage. And often the numbers of people dead or injured brings tears to my eyes.’
‘I’m not surprised,’ Marion said. ‘But aren’t you ever frightened for yourself?’
Richard shook his head. ‘Not at the time. There are so many needing help that I’m too busy to be scared. Afterwards it sometimes comes back to haunt me. Anyroad,’ he went on, getting to his feet, ‘I shall have to be off soon. They’ll be no trams running along Albert Road today because as well as the great pit left by the unexploded bomb, the heat was so fierce it melted the tar and that, of course, buggered up the tramlines.
‘I wonder when they will get them fixed.’
‘Ages, I should say. Shouldn’t think they’ll see Albert Road as high priority. I think it’s shanks’s pony for me for a bit.’
‘Maybe they’ll be some trams running along the Lichfield Road?’ Marion said.
Richard shook his head. ‘I doubt it. Aston generally took one hell of a pasting after you went into Atkinson’s cellar, and Lichfield Road didn’t get away scot-free either.’
‘We heard it,’ Sarah said. ‘Only it wasn’t as scary because it was muffled.’
‘Yeah, and there was a lot of noise in the cellar as well,’ Peggy put in. ‘But when we did come out there were so many fires it was like daylight and there was a bright orange glow all over the sky.’
‘Yes,’ said Richard quietly. ‘That was Birmingham burning.’
There was a small silence as this fact was digested. Marion felt suddenly very depressed and she sighed as she said, ‘I sometimes wonder if Birmingham will ever be the same again.’
‘We’ll get a paper on the way home, if you like,’ Peggy said, ‘and just see what damage has been done.’ She added to Richard, ‘We may as well walk along with you as far as Rocky Lane, anyroad.’
‘Come on then, or I’ll be late,’ Richard said. ‘At least you’ll not need your torches today. You’ll be able to save your batteries.’
Richard was right, for the red and orange glow in the sky lit their way. Peggy and Violet took time to wrap their scarves around their faces before they set out because there was still sour stinking smoke billowing in the air.
They came home with the Evening Mail and the Despatch.
‘We thought we’d buy two papers and maybe get more detail than we heard on the wireless this morning,’ Peggy said.
‘I’m as anxious as you are to read about that,’ Marion said, ‘but have your wash first and I’ll get the meal on the table as quickly as possible in case Jerry is going to pay us another visit tonight.’
They passed the papers over to Sarah and Richard. They both read of the destruction of many homes and businesses, factories and shops, and the estimated six hundred and fifteen dead and many hundreds more seriously injured. The dispossessed and the homeless had bedded down any place they could get. Those not lucky enough to have friends or relatives able to take them in slept in the cellars they had just emerged from, or halls belonging to churches or schools, and the WVS were doing a sterling job keeping them all fed and trying to find clothes and blankets.
‘That news report only gave us the tip of the iceberg this morning,’ Sarah said to her mother. ‘But reading about it is heartbreaking.’
‘New Street was hit again,’ Richard said. ‘I heard about that last night. New Street station copped it as well, and it says here just one naval mine destroyed the Prudential Insurance building in Colmore Row and badly damaged Boots, the Great Western Arcade, the Bank of England in Temple Row and Grey’s in Bull Street.’
‘What’s a naval mine?’ Magda asked.
Richard knew full well what a naval mine was: a powerful bomb that was carried by parachute and programmed to explode near the ground to maximise damage, but he didn’t think he should share that with an eight-year-old and so he said, ‘It’s just another name for that type of bomb.’
‘Anyroad,’ Sarah said, ‘it don’t matter what they call them, does it? They all do the same job.’
‘Yeah,’ Richard said. ‘Sorry as I am for the people, it’s the loss of the factories and equipment that’s a worry because it’s all war-related stuff and all needed.’
‘Like Kinloch’s and the BSA.’
Richard nodded. ‘The biggest factory attacked last night was the BSA. We should never underestimate the Germans; they are intelligent, and the bombing at the BSA just proved that. It was an odious thing to do and appallingly cruel, but still clever.’
Sarah had little time for saying anything positive about a race she considered barbaric and so she snapped out, ‘What did they do that was so clever?’
‘Well,’ said Richard, ‘it says in the paper that though the BSA had been bombed before, work was able to continue elsewhere almost immediately. That must have really annoyed the Germans ‘cos apparently, yesterday early on, a German plane dropped a ring of smoke over the BSA and our planes couldn’t get rid of it and all that damage was done by one bomber who came in low and dropped three highly explosive bombs through that ring.’
‘God,’ Marion said, ‘they must have known just where to drop them to do the most damage.’
‘Look at it now,’ said Richard, opening the paper up so that they all could see the mangled mess of bricks and masonry still burning fiercely, with twisted, buckled girders sticking up out of it.
‘The fires must have been terrible,’ Sarah said. ‘In the paper I read it said that they drained the canals and still didn’t have enough water to put out the fires.’
‘From what I heard you would have had to drain the sea to douse them,’ Richard said.
‘Was any of the workers hurt?’ Violet said, coming into the room. ‘I gather they had a big strong cellar underneath the factory.’
‘Not strong enough, I think,’ Marion said, and she picked up the paper and read the account aloud.
‘The southern block disintegrated in a roaring landslide of concrete, machinery and twisted girders with dust and black smoke. Soon the whole building was ablaze and had started to collapse into the basement where a lot of the workers were taking shelter and many were trapped under mangled wreckage. The firemen worked ceaselessly to douse the fires, though the bombs were still falling steadfastly and then a nearby ammunition dump went up, spraying the fleeing people with shrapnel.’
Marion thought of the panic and terror and pain that those poor trapped people would go through as they burned to death in the cellar meant to protect them, and she felt sick. ‘It must have been terrible,
truly terrible. Those poor, poor people.’
The words were barely out of her mouth when the sirens went again. There was a collective groan and Marion turned to Richard, ‘I suppose it’s no good asking you to have a night off duty? You look all in.’
‘I’d love to say yes because I’ve never felt so tired in my life,’ Richard confessed. ‘Every man who worked with me yesterday will feel the same way, and yet they’ll be there tonight as well, and that’s where I must be too.’
Marion didn’t bother arguing with Richard, knowing he was right. So with a sigh she turned off the gas under the meal she had been cooking and threw the makings for sandwiches in the shelter bag, which she began to prepare with a dread that seemed to touch her very soul.
In the cellar, as the screams of the siren died down, the first crashes were heard and the drone of the planes grew louder, she fed the children. Magda and Missie thought that if you could forget the noise of the raid, which so far was not as terrifying as the previous night, and ignore the smell of the paraffin stove, it was quite cozy wrapped up in the blankets on the mattress with a jam piece to eat and a mug of milk to drink.
It didn’t really help the tiredness, though, and when Marion suggested they all lie down on the mattress even Tony was willing. They soon dropped off to sleep against the backdrop of the descending bombs, and when the planes drew nearer the children barely stirred, though the women in the cellar were well aware of it.
Suddenly, from among the isolated crashes, there was one concentrated and very loud boom that caused the cellar walls to shake. It threw the women into a state of alarm and eventually roused the children.
What’s up?’ Tony asked as he struggled to sit up, rubbing his eyes in confusion. ‘I was asleep.’
