World War II London Blitz Diaries 1939-1945

2-10-45 This has been another bad week with any rockets falling. One at Hornchurch, near Emerson Park Station, very bad; two in Ilford, one falling just behind the Super Cinema, on a shirt factory, killing many, and the other on the Cranham Road. One fell on the bottling plant of the co-op milk depot, killing forty-seven men; the building had a complete glass roof, so the casualties were many. One fell on Bethnal Green Hospital, two hundred patients had to be removed under murderous conditions, and so it goes, night and day. We get about fifteen every twenty-four hours in this neighborhood alone, that is, counting only those I can hear; but they are falling all over London; probably a couple of hundred are launched against us every day, but only the officials know what happens in its immediate locality.

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World War ll London Blitz Diaries

Saturday February 10, 1945

This has been another bad week with any rockets falling. One at Hornchurch, near Emerson Park Station, very bad; two in Ilford, one falling just behind the Super Cinema, on a shirt factory, killing many, and the other on the Cranham Road. One fell on the bottling plant of the co-op milk depot, killing forty-seven men; the building had a complete glass roof, so the casualties were many. One fell on Bethnal Green Hospital, two hundred patients had to be removed under murderous conditions, and so it goes, night and day. We get about fifteen every twenty-four hours in this neighborhood alone, that is, counting only those I can hear; but they are falling all over London; probably a couple of hundred are launched against us every day, but only the officials know what happens in its immediate locality. No information is ever given on the wireless beyond the base statement that “enemy action over Southern England caused casualties and damage during the period ending at seven a.m. this morning.” The allies have launched a new offensive in this West this week; the Russians daily get closer to Berlin; yet still the Germans fight. How much longer can they go on? The big three- Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin is meeting in conference, “somewhere in the Black Sea area.” In the Pacific the Americans have re-taken Manila. The Burma Road has been re-opened. Possibly this year will see the end of the war, but guessing is futile.

Friday February 16, 1945

The war news is terrible. The collapse of Germany cannot be very far off now, but the daily battling is more than I can bear to think about. Death, death, death, all the time. Then when it is all over what is the living going to do? All these young men who have gloried in killing for so long, how are they going to resume normal peaceful lives? They wont be able to be Normal ordinary men, to live lives without excitement. The present can’t be thought about, nor can the future. I think nowhere in Europe is life going to be tolerable, even when the war ends. I hope to get out of it, to get away home to America. Meanwhile I think of the war as little as ever I can; that is the only way to stay sane, not to think about it. Instead I think about D.H.Lawrence, about Miriam Henderson, about Alice Searle, about Ruby Side…..

Tuesday February 20, 1945

What I want to say, right here is that in case any grandchild of mine, forty or fifty years hence, should read this record of my life and thoughts; this is only a record of my life and thoughts, not a record of my times. I see, what I have written today, may be considered very trivial, and in face of events, very unfeeling. I tell you now; I have to turn my attention to these comparatively trivial things, to save my reason. To think about the war is to think about Hell. I wont do it. For the record of the history of these days you must look elsewhere. For instance, Churchill and Eden returned to this country yesterday from the Crimean Conference with Roosevelt and Stalin at Yalta, and a visit to Athens and Cairo in addition; and today both of them went to Parliament and spoke there. I don’t care. They are great politicians, but I am sick of politicians and all of their words I am sick to death of them. On the Continent the war is more hellish then ever; men destroy each other without ceasing. Over the air we are told of deeds of gallantry, which entail such suffering that simply to hear of them, is to shudder. Right here in town we suffer assault by the rocket bombs day and night without ceasing. Our absurd “rulers” daily devise plans for the future of our society, which if put into effect, will destroy the liberty of the ordinary free individual; we shall be planned into a very convenient servile state; and this I wouldn’t think about because it makes me angry; I feel that even when the war is over life isn’t going to be worth living. So I deliberately distract myself with thoughts and interests, which have nothing whatever to do with the war, and the present hour. Luckily I am practiced in living from my own vitals. More than most women I have had to live from my own roots.

2-2-45 We have had four close by rockets already this morning. We usually get more on Fridays than any other day of the week, last Friday we had seventeen, so I suppose this locality is on the German program for Fridays. Berlin is preparing for battle. The Red Army is within forty miles of it. It is estimated that four and one half million Germans are on the roads, fleeing from the Russians. Good, they ought to suffer what they caused others to suffer; but who will be sorry for the Germans? No one. No one in the whole wide world will be sorry.

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Friday February 2, 1945

We have had four close by rockets already this morning. We usually get more on Fridays than any other day of the week, last Friday we had seventeen, so I suppose this locality is on the German program for Fridays. Berlin is preparing for battle. The Red Army is within forty miles of it. It is estimated that four and one half million Germans are on the roads, fleeing from the Russians. Good, they ought to suffer what they caused others to suffer; but who will be sorry for the Germans? No one. No one in the whole wide world will be sorry.

Saturday February 10, 1945

Friday February 16, 1945

1-29-45 Mrs. Cape’s came in before Ted had finished his lunch, full of distress. She had just heard that her young sister, and her sister’s husband, had been bombed yesterday, and were both in the hospital. Also she had received and express letter for Bob, telling him that his mother’s house had been hit, and she was hurt, and asking him to come at once. There were over two hundred casualties through a bomb, which hit Eastham last Friday, and now this was yesterdays. I have lost count now of the actual people known to me who have been bombed out, injured, or killed.

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Monday January 29, 1945

Mrs. Cape’s came in before Ted had finished his lunch, full of distress. She had just heard that her young sister, and her sister’s husband, had been bombed yesterday, and were both in the hospital. Also she had received and express letter for Bob, telling him that his mother’s house had been hit, and she was hurt, and asking him to come at once. There were over two hundred casualties through a bomb, which hit Eastham last Friday, and now this was yesterdays. I have lost count now of the actual people known to me who have been bombed out, injured, or killed.

Friday February 2, 1945

Saturday February 10, 1945

1-17-45 It is reported on the B.B.C. that just before five o’clock this afternoon Marshal Stalin broadcast from Moscow that the Red Army under Marshal Zhukov has taken Warsaw; and a little later the announcement was made of the capture of Czestochowa, a German defense base only fifteen miles from the Silesian Frontier, and of two other Polish towns. Rudomesko and Pryedbory.

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Tuesday January 16, 1945

We had two awful rockets in the night; one at eleven-fifteen, just as I was going up to bed; the reverberations seemed to go on a very long time; I was on the staircase, and every stair seemed to tremble; the concussion claps were deafening, and the other was at three o’clock this morning. The last one, very close, seemed to lift the house from its sockets and then drop it back again. I have just learnt via Mrs. Capes, via Mr. Harden who boards with Mrs. Capes, who is clerk of the works at the town hall, that the eleven o’clock one fell in Rainham, on a group of houses of a new estate, killing many; and the three o’clock one fell near Gallows’ Corner, Straight Road, in the direction of Noah Hill. This last, absolutely terrific, luckily killed no one, for it fell on open ground. A near-by farm had its roof taken off, and all windows blown out, but nobody or animal hurt. It could have destroyed scores, for it was an extra big one, but apart from damaging the farmhouse it has only caused two immense craters.

Wednesday January 17, 1945

It is reported on the B.B.C. that just before five o’clock this afternoon Marshal Stalin broadcast from Moscow that the Red Army under Marshal Zhukov has taken Warsaw; and a little later the announcement was made of the capture of Czestochowa, a German defense base only fifteen miles from the Silesian Frontier, and of two other Polish towns. Rudomesko and Pryedbory.

Thursday January 18, 1945

Late last night the Lublin wireless announced that Cracow, the second city in Poland, had been liberated. Five million Russians are moving on the Reich. Pray God this is at last the beginning of the end. In Parliament Mr. Churchill is making a statement on Greece, and on the general movement of the war. When the war is over I think nothing will ever trouble me again, nothing.

Sunday January 21, 1945

Yesterday after a day of quietness we received, 14 rockets in this locality. Last night Stalin announced that the Red Army had taken Tilsit, and several other German and East Prussian and Polish towns, whose names I did not know and cannot remember. The Red Army is advancing on a sixteen hundred mile front. Von Rumsdet is retreating in the West.

1-6-45 I am saying Damn the war, and damn the war, and damn the war! Last night at ten-twenty p.m. we had an alert, and the all clear was not sounded until eleven p.m. Many doodles went over, I lost count of them. One seemed to trundle exactly over our chimney pots. I held my breath, and then when it continued past, going on towards the city, I vomited. Ted had already retired for the night and did not bother to come downstairs. He thinks its funny to be callous about the bombs, so I stick this war alone. So here I am, an old woman alone in a little room, sick with terror and anger and exasperation. You live your life alone, that’s positive. Do churches and masses help me? Not a whit. Dogmas? Evangelicals? What use are any of them against the flying bombs, the rockets, Hitler and all his gang? Did Christ save the world He did not.

2013-06-16T06:51:00.000-04:00

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Saturday January 6, 1945

I am saying Damn the war, and damn the war, and damn the war! Last night at ten-twenty p.m. we had an alert, and the all clear was not sounded until eleven p.m. Many doodles went over, I lost count of them. One seemed to trundle exactly over our chimney pots. I held my breath, and then when it continued past, going on towards the city, I vomited. Ted had already retired for the night and did not bother to come downstairs. He thinks its funny to be callous about the bombs, so I stick this war alone. So here I am, an old woman alone in a little room, sick with terror and anger and exasperation. You live your life alone, that’s positive. Do churches and masses help me? Not a whit. Dogmas? Evangelicals? What use are any of them against the flying bombs, the rockets, Hitler and all his gang? Did Christ save the world He did not.

Monday January 8, 1945

It is a dreadful day. It is Very wintry weather, icy pavements, impossible for me to go out. There is very bad war news. I can’t bear to listen to the war reports; the sufferings of the troops are beyond words. Twelve rockets here today between ten forty this morning and ten-thirty tonight. We may get a couple more before midnight. Several have fallen in Chadwell Heath, on e, I hear, opposite The Plough; the damage and death is awful. The Americans have been informed that they may expect flying bombs or rockets on New York and Washington, as those can be fired from U-boats.

Friday January 12, 1945

News today of the signing of an armistice in Athens between General Scobie and E.L.A.S. Well that is something.

1-3-45 We had nine rockets yesterday, four today, and this evening two doodle-bug raids; the first alert came at seven-ten, and the bombs flying over almost immediately; one went immediately over this housetop and traveled in the direction of Collier Row. The second alert sounded at eight-ten, just one hour later; we counted four passing, but heard none of them fall, so probably they went all the way to London. Ted went outside to look at them, but I stayed within to be sick. I get angrier and angrier about this war. What is it all for? The stupidity of man, the malicious stupidity of man.

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January 1, 1945

So now we’re in 1945. Shall we see peace before the year is out?

No peace in this house. Just now at dinnertime I had words with Ted. Suddenly he was so exasperating I flared out at him. It is a bad beginning for the New Year. He is so autocratic and over bearing, well, patience gives out. The match to the tinder today was his taking up the subject of the Capes’s. Both Mr. and Mrs. Cape came calling yesterday evening, and they had done the same on Christmas Eve. Ted began: “Don’t encourage the Cape’s around here evenings. I don’t want to see them all the time. They are vey nice people, but I don’t want them around here, see? Don’t encourage them to talk. When they come to an end of a topic, say nothing, don’t encourage them to start off on another.”

Wednesday January 3, 1945

We had nine rockets yesterday, four today, and this evening two doodle-bug raids; the first alert came at seven-ten, and the bombs flying over almost immediately; one went immediately over this housetop and traveled in the direction of Collier Row. The second alert sounded at eight-ten, just one hour later; we counted four passing, but heard none of them fall, so probably they went all the way to London. Ted went outside to look at them, but I stayed within to be sick. I get angrier and angrier about this war. What is it all for? The stupidity of man, the malicious stupidity of man.

Friday January 5, 1945

We had ten rockets yesterday and two already this morning. In this week “Listener” there is a photograph showing Mr. Churchill with Archbishop Damaskinos and Greek representatives in Athens. Except for the Archbishop the Greeks are in ordinary civilian morning business clothes: Churchill and his aides are in soldier uniforms. The Archbishop is an anachronism. He is swathed in black draperies from his neck to his toes, and on his head is a tall pillow-box black hat from which hang black veils down his back. Around his neck is a chain from which a large pendant hangs just about his navel, and in his hand is a long black staff, and his face is covered with a large square white beard. In that group of modern men he looks preposterous. He is preposterous. He is the complete symbol of the dead and the vanished past yet he is the man now made Regent of Greece. Probably inside his head he has a modern mans brains. Who knows? The picture shouts his futility. He is not even impressive to look at; he is merely a silly antique. What can he do for Greece? It is not his ideas, or the ideas of any priest, which will have validity, for our world of today.

12-26-44 I was surprised at midday to hear on the news that Mr. Churchill and Mr. Eden are in Athens. They flew there yesterday. They are convening a conference, with all parties, to try and settle the troubles, the Archbishop to preside.

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Friday December 23, 1944

We received today a card from Cuthie, dated the Twentieth of October. It reads:

Dear Folks, Just a card to wish you a good Christmas and New Year. I would not be surprised to get home before then but I send this in case I shall still be here. (Then there are three lines blacked out. When we can decipher again, he goes on) I am now reading “Dombey and Son” and have just finished “Barnaby Rudge.”

Cuth

That’s all. The poor prisoner boys are still in prison.

Monday December 25, 1944 Christmas Day

This is the first Christmas Day in many years that I have got through without a fit of the weeps. Artie and Hilda made a short call around noon. They had the baby with them, in arms; they had all been to mass. The baby is a lovely infant. I had not seen him since early November so I could see how he had thrived. He really is a beautiful baby. Hilda was pleasant, Artie in uniform, to celebrate the day, he said. I had been feeling badly these last few days because Artie didn’t come to see me; but he did remember me today, so I feel much happier about him. No rockets or doodles.

Tuesday December 26, 1944 Boxing Day

I was surprised at midday to hear on the news that Mr. Churchill and Mr. Eden are in Athens. They flew there yesterday. They are convening a conference, with all parties, to try and settle the troubles, the Archbishop to preside.

Saturday December 29, 1944

It is three-thirty p.m. and the B.B.C. has just announced that on the advice of Mr. Churchill the King of Greece has agreed to permit Regency in Greece, and has signified his sanction by cable to the Archbishop of Athens, Damashinos, whom he has appointed as Regent. So yet another King has stepped down, perhaps only temporarily, perhaps permanently.

12-17-44 The war news is bad, especially the news from Greece. I have not noted this before, but Civil War has been going on in Greece these past two weeks, and our troops firing on the “rebels”. It is a shameful story. I will leave it for the history books.

2013-06-14T06:31:00.000-04:00

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Thursday December 14, 1944

Well what ever my mental resolutions may be my body know I’m an old woman. What I am up against is the inescapable fact of old age. Today I am so tired I hardly know how to hang together. Yesterday I cleaned the top floor, this morning I’ve been out to the library, and now I’m groaning with the pain in my knees. Maybe its rheumatism; but no maybe about it, it's pain. I look affright. Yesterday I had a session with Lillian Young. She set my hair in the newest style; that is, a waved roll across the front and top of the head, than parting down the entire back of the head, the hair combed east and west from the part, meeting a comb back from the face and neck, and rolled into two long side rolls, tapering together into the nape of the neck. Very sophisticated but damned uncomfortable. It looked smart, according to the mode, but I couldn’t stand the feel of it; consequently I have combed it all out this morning and re-combed it down, in my usual style, but the result is rather wild. So yesterday’s money was wasted. I don’t intend to ever have my hair cut again.

Sunday December 17, 1944

The war news is bad, especially the news from Greece. I have not noted this before, but Civil War has been going on in Greece these past two weeks, and our troops firing on the “rebels”. It is a shameful story. I will leave it for the history books.

Thursday December 21, 1944

True women, in love or out of love, wish to live for themselves, and the possession and domination of them by their husbands is what they most resent in the world. The assumption by the husband is that he owns the wife, naturally, is what drives women into hatred and madness. Why should a woman “love” to keep a house, wash clothes, cook food, shop, sweep, etc. for a man, because she has chosen to marry him? If poverty can kill love so can housekeeping. When a man gets a wife he gets comfort, but when a woman gets a husband she gets work, unremitting, unending work. There is no forty-eight hour week in housekeeping. I am so tired of housekeeping and so bored with it, I would like not to have a house at all, and as to getting meals I am sick to death of that.

11-26-44 A rocket fell early this morning on Longbridge Road, Barking; fifteen houses were down, casualties not yet known. Worse yesterday, for one fell on Woolworths’s store in New Cross, when it was filled with Saturday shoppers, mostly mothers and children, hundreds killed. Last night I found myself reciting the Hail Mary! Over and over.

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World War II London Blitz Diaries 1939-1945

12-26-44 I was surprised at midday to hear on the news that Mr. Churchill and Mr. Eden are in Athens. They flew there yesterday. They are convening a conference, with all parties, to try and settle the troubles, the Archbishop to preside.

12-17-44 The war news is bad, especially the news from Greece. I have not noted this before, but Civil War has been going on in Greece these past two weeks, and our troops firing on the “rebels”. It is a shameful story. I will leave it for the history books.

11-1-44 In the course of a speech in the House yesterday Mr. Churchill said that militarily we couldn’t look for the end of the war before Christmas, or perhaps before Easter. Of course someday the war will end, but I begin to be afraid I may end before the war does. Au-Revoir.