The Joys of Guiding

One of the many joys of guiding is the "surprise factor" brought to the party by our guests - when starting out with a group, whether it be from the Army, RAF, a school or college group, overseas visitors or a home-based group of history lovers, one never knows what to expect and this certainly helps to keep me as the guide, on my toes!

The Hungerford Bridge parachute mine made safe (author's collection)

A recent walk with a London-based group of history enthusiasts brought one of the biggest and most pleasant surprises in my thirteen-year guiding "career".

The group's organiser had requested a bespoke walk starting at Hungerford Bridge, which for non-Londoners is a bridge that carries the railway from Charing Cross Station across the Thames and which also doubles up as a footbridge. To be brutally honest, this isn't the most picturesque part of London but is one which has a wartime history, so I had a suspicion that at least one member of the group might have a connection in some way.

So when the group met on a dank Sunday morning in March, I began by explaining the wartime history of Hungerford Bridge, which began on the night of 16/17 April 1941, when a parachute mine settled on to the tracks just outside the station. Incendiary bombs were also falling and had started a major fire in the signal cabin at the end of platform one, with the flames creeping towards the mine, which had failed to explode.

Lieut. Cdr. Ernest Oliver "Mick" Gidden GC, RNVR (fotostock)

As parachute mines were adapted anti-shipping weapons, they were always dealt with by the Royal Navy who had the necessary expertise to deal with them and accordingly, a team led by Lieutenant Commander Ernest "Mick" Gidden RNVR. 

Gidden worked on the mine for over six hours, breaking it free from the live rail, from which it had welded itself and forcing it back into some sort of shape with a large hammer, so that he could unscrew the fuse from the weapon and in doing so, earned himself a George Cross into the bargain. While Gidden was working on the mine, he was aware of the large fire burning in the signal cabin and noticed that two Auxiliary Firemen were tackling the fires, seemingly oblivious to their own safety - he later spoke of these men thus:

“When I arrived at the incident on Hungerford Bridge I found about half a dozen firemen working within 15 feet of the unexploded mine. This had already lost its filling plate, exposing the explosive to the naked fire should it have reached it. Luckily for the bridge and several important Government offices the firemen were able to prevent this happening. I warned the men of their imminent peril but they seemed not to care a jot and I had to order them away. They left with great reluctance.”

The two firemen in question were Station Officer George Watling, a London Fire Brigade "regular" with 21 years service and Auxiliary Fireman Alf Blanchard, a chef in civilian life, who had joined the Auxiliaries shortly before the outbreak of war in 1939. The men were based at Holloway in North London and in keeping with the work of the Auxiliaries, had been summoned down from their usual base of operations to assist in Westminster. 

Auxiliary Fireman Alfred Blanchard BEM (Kevin Ireland)

For their work on the night, Blanchard and Watling were awarded the British Empire Medal, which was gazetted on 3 October 1941. 

After explaining this incident to the group and the subsequent near-destruction of the bridge in a V-1 incident in July 1944, one of the group stepped forward and informed me that he was Alf Blanchard's grandson and had some mementos of his late grandfather to show me.

Alf's grandson was called Kevin Ireland and produced Alf's B.E.M. as well as a souvenir that his grandfather had secured for himself once the mine had been made safe - this was a piece of one of the cables that suspended the mine from the parachute. For once in my life, I was speechless!

Kevin Ireland with his grandfather's souvenirs (author's photograph)

To say that I went into geek mode would be an understatement and many photographs were taken at the time and after the walk, when e-mail addresses were also exchanged.

Close up of Alf's BEM (author's photograph)

Close up of Alf's BEM (author's photograph)

The section of parachute cable (author's photograph)

After the walk, the group kindly invited me to join them for a curry and as mentioned above, email addresses were exchanged. I was able to obtain Alf's Fire Service record card from the London Fire Brigade archives, as well as his British Empire Medal citation. In return, Kevin sent me some copies of letters that Alf had received from his then employers informing him of his impending medal award and perhaps rather sadly, a letter informing him of his release from the Fire Service in early 1945. After the war, Alf returned to his old occupation and passed away, aged 73 in 1982.

Alf's letter of release from the Fire Service (Kevin Ireland)

I am indebted to Kevin Ireland and indeed to the rest of the group for a memorable afternoon and for providing me with yet another reason to love the job that I do.

The Navy was here too.....

Bomb Disposal Officers were and are a special breed. It takes a special kind of courage to work calmly and quietly on an unexploded bomb knowing that one false move could mean disaster. It was during the Second World War that these men really came into the public consciousness with some acts of outstanding bravery coming to light.

It is perhaps not widely known that during the War bomb disposal in Britain was undertaken by both the Army and the Royal Navy. Apart from the usual mix of High Explosive (HE) and Incendiary (IB) bombs, the Luftwaffe also had in their armoury another lethal weapon - the Parachute Mine. As with all bombs, a fair number of those dropped were 'duds' to use the terminology of the time and these 'UXBs' had to be dealt with by the Bomb Disposal Squads. The conventional bombs were dealt with by the Army's Corps of Royal Engineers but the Parachute Mines, being identical to naval mines dropped at sea were dealt with by the Royal Navy.

These mines were truly terrifying weapons which being dropped by parachute, often descended quietly and then, being entangled in trees, overhead cables or street lamps exploded with a tremendous airburst effect, causing a huge amount of blast damage over a very wide area. Unlike conventional UXBs which were usually to be found at the bottom of a crater, unexploded parachute mines were often to be found draped in the most inaccessible places, hanging from trees, chimney pots, telephone wires and on one occasion, welded to the live conductor rail of a railway line. This particular mine, located on Hungerford Bridge just outside Charing Cross Station and over the River Thames, was successfully defused on 17th April 1941 after a six hour struggle by Lieutenant Ernest Giddens RNVR, who deservedly won a George Cross for his efforts, some of which entailed hitting the mine with a hammer and chisel in order to remove it from the live rail to which it had welded itself, so as to access the fuse.

Another two George Crosses were awarded to Sub Lieutenant Jack Easton RNVR and his assistant, Ordinary Seaman Bennett Southwell for their efforts in attempting to defuse a mine in Clifton Street, Hoxton on 17th October 1940. The outcome here was very different to that of the mine on Hungerford Bridge although the award of the medals was no less deserving.

Easton and Southwell were called to the scene and found the mine suspended through a hole in the ceiling of a house, with one end of it within about six inches of the floor. Easton looked up and saw that the parachute was partially wrapped around a chimney pot and also partially around an iron bedstead in the bedroom above. The two men set to work, having first plotted an escape route should the mechanism of the mine start to tick again, for if this were to happen, they knew that they had a mere twelve seconds to try and escape.

To make matters worse, when Easton started to work on the mine, he found that the fuse housing had been damaged as it crashed through the house and try as he might, he could not unscrew the the 'keep ring' beneath which was located the fuse. Suddenly, as he was trying to detach this ring, the mine slipped as the chimney above collapsed and above the sound of the falling brickwork, Easton heard the whirring of the mine's mechanism - it had come back to life.

He bellowed at OS Southwell to run and then ran himself. As he left the house, Easton briefly saw Southwell running up the street as he threw himself behind the structure of a brick and concrete surface air raid shelter. Easton heard no explosion but was briefly blinded by the flash of the detonation but that was all he experienced. The next thing he knew was that he was buried deeply beneath bricks and mortar; his head was between his legs and he thought that his back was broken but he could not move an inch as he was totally embedded beneath the rubble.

Easton later said; "To this day, I do not know how long I spent in my grave. Most of the time I was unconscious. The conscious moments were of horror and utter helplessness."

He was eventually dug out by the Rescue Squad and spent the next twelve months in hospital whilst his two broken legs, fractured pelvis and skull slowly healed. His assistant, Bennett Southwell was not so lucky - his decapitated body was eventually discovered and dug out six weeks later. The blast had destroyed Clifton Street and six adjoining streets and left a scene of utter devastation.

In January 1941, as he lay in his hospital bed, Easton was surprised to receive three cases of champagne sent to him by the Admiralty and was advised to listen to the radio at 9 p.m. that evening. It was then that he learned of his award of the George Cross. Bennett Southwell was also given the same award posthumously. Jack Easton eventually received his decoration from King George VI and Bennett Southwell's widow received her late husband's medal at the same investiture.

Jack Easton later returned to mine clearance - this time at Dartmouth, where he was appointed to motor minesweepers, eventually taking command of MMSs 6 and 22. He led a minesweeping flotilla on D-Day, when he was again injured by a German mine exploding beneath his ship.

After the war, Easton returned to his peacetime occupation as a solicitor with the family firm, William Easton's in London and died in 1994, aged 88.

Published Sources:

Navy News - October 2007
The War at Sea - John Winton, Hutchinson 1967
The London Gazette - 23rd January 1941