The Wednesday and The Saturday: Birthday Presents from Hell

The week following Easter 1941 saw London enjoying a short lull in the Blitz. The raids had died down from the intensity of nightly raids and though there had been raids throughout the early months of 1941, there had not been a serious raid on London since the 19th March. Londoners were not to know it but Hitler's thoughts were beginning to turn towards the invasion of the Soviet Union, for which task he would need to divert a considerable amount of his Luftwaffe resources from the Blitz on British towns and cities.

However, all this was in the future and before the worst was over London was to suffer three more heavy raids, culminating in the heaviest of them all on the night of 10th/11th May 1941, which we have examined previously in this blog.

In this short article, we shall examine what proved to be the penultimate two raids of the First Blitz, on the nights of 16th/17th April and 19th/20th April. These raids were so heavy that they became known in Londoners' folklore as 'The Wednesday' and 'The Saturday' respectively. Both of these raids were laid on as a strange sort of present to commemorate Hitler's birthday on 20th April, although 'The Wednesday' was also a revenge raid for damage caused to the Berlin State Opera House on the 9th April, in one of the RAF's early raids on the German capital. Indeed, a forewarning of the raid that would go down in history as 'The Wednesday' was given by William Joyce, aka 'Lord Haw Haw' in one of his 'Germany Calling' broadcasts from Hamburg, when he announced "There's going to be a bombing" although naturally, he did not give away the actual date of the planned raid.

These raids were savage in their intensity and affected parts of London that had hitherto only received light attention from the Luftwaffe, as well as re-visiting other areas that had already seen plenty of damage inflicted. So it was that as well as the East End and southeastern suburbs of London, areas such as Chelsea, the West End and St Marylebone were heavily hit in these two raids and though there is insufficient space in a blog of this nature to visit every target, we can at least examine some of the more notorious incidents across London on these two nights.

One famous London landmark destroyed on 'The Wednesday' was Chelsea Old Church, the home of Sir Thomas More's private chapel. Apart from the near total loss of a fine historic building, today happily restored, this tragic incident also saw the loss of five Fire Watchers, including the Canadian AFS volunteer, Yvonne Green, whose story has been told in a previous post in this series. Elsewhere in Chelsea, the famous Royal Hospital, home of the Chelsea Pensioners was also severely damaged on 'The Wednesday' when the Infirmary was destroyed by a Parachute Mine. These deadly blast weapons, converted from naval mines were used in large numbers during these later raids of the Blitz and it was one of these which cost the lives of fifteen in pensioners and Royal Hospital staff in this one incident. One of those killed was 101 year old Henry Augustus Rattray, a veteran of the Zulu Wars who had served with the 24th Regiment of Foot. The building itself had been designed by Sir John Soane and built in 1809 and had the damage been incurred today, then probably this fine historic building would have been restored. As it was, damaged buildings in wartime London, now matter how historic were invariably pulled down as unsafe. The site was cleared and is now the location of the excellent National Army Museum; a new infirmary was finally opened on a new site within the Hospital grounds in 2008.

Moving away from Chelsea, we move to the West End, which like Chelsea had suffered relatively little until now. The City of Westminster, then as now encompassed the bustling West End as well as the seat of government and it was in the former part of the borough that we examine our next incident, which resulted in the death of one of Britain's singing stars of the day. Al Bowlly was a major star of stage and screen, whose popularity had transcended national barriers which had made him popular on both sides of the Atlantic, which was quite an unusual achievement for a British star in those days. On 'The Wednesday', Bowlly had played a concert in High Wycombe and had been given the opportunity of staying overnight in the Buckinghamshire town but had eschewed this offer in order to catch the last train home to Marylebone in order to sleep at his own apartment in Duke Street, just off Jermyn Street. It was to prove a fatal decision as in the early hours of the morning another deadly Parachute Mine exploded outside. When rescuers found his body, it was unmarked and in a final touch of irony, it was discovered that he had died from a severe blow to the head, caused by the heavy bedroom door being blown off it's hinges and striking him a fatal blow.

We move now to 'The Saturday', the second of the raids to commemorate The Fuhrer's birthday and travel across London to the historic Borough of Greenwich, already heavily hit during the earlier raids of the Blitz. As now, this borough was the home of such historic buildings as the Royal Naval College, The Queen's House and National Maritime Museum, in 1941 it was also the home to a considerable amount of industry and another of these historic buildings was located in what was then a somewhat run down part of the town centre. The parish church of St Alfege has been located on the current site since the year 1012, where it reputedly marked the site of the martyrdom of Alfege, Archbishop of Canterbury who was murdered at that location by Danish Vikings on the 19th April 1012. The second church, dating from 1290 was the location of the future King Henry VIII's baptism in 1491. The present church, designed by Nicholas Hawksmoor, dates from 1718 and is the site of the tombs of amongst others, Thomas Tallis and General James Wolfe, victor of the Battle of Quebec in 1759 and whose statue looks down over Greenwich from the heights of Greenwich Park.

In a strange quirk of history, the interior of this fine church was to be largely destroyed on the 929th anniversary of Alfege's murder when incendiary bombs lodged in the roof timbers and brought the whole structure blazing into the main body of the building where it burned out of control. The aftermath can be seen in the photograph at the head of this page. Fortunately, the sturdy stone structure survived and the church was rebuilt after the war and rededicated in 1953. Today, the church stands proudly over the busy, rejuvenated town centre and is well worth a visit.

Following these two heavy raids, London again enjoyed a short lull before what was to prove the last and largest raid was unleashed on the night of 10th/11th May 1941.

Published Sources:

A Wander through Wartime London - Clive Harris & Neil Bright, Pen & Sword 2010
London at War 1939-1945 - Philip Ziegler, Pimlico 2002
Westminster in War - William Sansom, Faber & Faber 1947

The Wednesday, Chelsea Old Church and a heroine from Canada

This weekend marks the seventieth anniversary of one of the largest as well as one of the last raids of the London Blitz. So heavy and destructive was the raid of the night of the 16th/17th April 1941 that it became known to Londoners as 'The Wednesday'. Whilst most parts of London were affected by this raid, on this occasion it was the western side of the capital that suffered most and large swathes of Chelsea, the West End and St Marylebone were pounded with many lives lost and famous old buildings destroyed. It was also the night that the singer Al Bowlly was killed as he slept in his flat in Jermyn Street, having eschewed the offer of a hotel in High Wycombe after having played a concert there for the comfort of his own bed.

Although Londoners were not to know it at the time, the First Blitz was drawing to a close; Hitler was about to turn his attention eastwards and would require his Luftwaffe resources for Operation Barbarossa - the attack on the Soviet Union and the quest for lebensraum or living space for the German people. Despite this impending attack, a large proportion of the German air force would remain in the west but Hitler had decided against further attacks on London once his onslaught against the Russians had started and no amount of entreaties by the head of the Luftwaffe, Hermann Goring and his senior commanders, Sperrle and Kesselring could change his mind.

This was still in the future though and before the attack to the east, the Fuhrer's 53rd birthday on 20th April was approaching and needed to be celebrated in style. Goring decided on staging two huge raids on the capital, perhaps to flatter Hitler but also to demonstrate to him once and for all that given a free reign, his Luftwaffe could indeed flatten London.

So it was that the two raids on 16th/17th April and then on 19th/20th April were the two heaviest raids thus far of the Blitz and would only be surpassed by what proved to be the last raid on the night of May 10th/11th 1941. As mentioned briefly earlier, the west of London suffered the most in this raid; no area more than the Metropolitan Borough of Chelsea as it then was and inspecting the Civil Defence Incident Log today, one is struck by the number of times that 'The Wednesday' recurs when taking stock of the damage inflicted on the borough by enemy action and indeed, when walking the borough today, there are several memorial plaques located here and there for those in the know that confirm the record.

The Royal Hospital, home of the Chelsea Pensioners, was devastated this night when the Infirmary was destroyed by a Parachute Mine that detonated in the road outside and caused the deaths of fifteen pensioners and hospital staff. Amongst those killed was 101 year old Henry Rattray, a veteran of the 24th Regiment of Foot and survivor of many earlier campaigns.

The Infirmary itself had been an 1809 addition to Wren's original Royal Hospital buildings and had been designed by Sir John Soane. Although heavily damaged, there was arguably enough left of the building to warrant rebuilding but sadly the remains were demolished, with the site today being occupied by the National Army Museum.

Further along Royal Hospital Road was Station 6W of the Auxilary Fire Service or AFS, located in the garages of Cheyne Place. A clue to the location of this station can still be seen today in the form of a large '6W' carved in the stone wall in front of the apartments that now stand on the site. Another Parachute Mine detonated here, killing three Auxiliary Firemen, whose names are recorded on a memorial plaque, erected by the charity 'Firemen Remembered' at the present day Chelsea Fire Station in the King's Road. Another bomb, this time one of the conventional High Explosive variety caused the deaths of a further four AFS men at the Brompton Fire Station, located in Chelsea Square and these men too, are remembered on the plaque at King's Road.

Nor had the night finished with the men and women of the AFS, for when we reach the site of Chelsea Old Church in Cheyne Walk, we can discover perhaps the most poignant story of them all, which concerns a visitor from Canada whose story deserves to be told.

Yvonne Marie Green was a 30 year old thirteenth generation Canadian from Montreal who had recently been divorced from Tyrou Nichol, a British actor. She had re-married, this time to Leonard Green, an officer of the Canadian Army who had been posted on attachment to the Royal Tank Regiment shortly after the outbreak of war. The family home was at 24 Old Church Street, Chelsea but like all worried husbands who were in a position to do something about it, Leonard had tried to move Yvonne to the relative safety of the country and for a while, she dutifully lived with him near his barracks at Farnham in Surrey but being the fiercely independent and fiesty character she was, Yvonne was having none of this and soon moved back to London and later joined the AFS as a Firewatcher based at Chelsea Old Church.

Yvonne had left her baby daughter Penelope, in the safety of Canada with her mother and from her regular correspondence to 'Maman Cherie' which survive in the archives of the Imperial War Museum, we can see just how independent this remarkable lady was. Her letter dated 8th October 1940 demonstrates exactly what she thought of life in the country:

'Here I am back in London again, to your honor and my satisfaction. Honestly, Farnham was a simply dire place and I'd rather face Goering's worst than die from pernicious boredom. I take no chances, believe me, and when I'm not on duty I sleep downstairs very snugly in the basement. Don't alarm yourself when you don't hear from me because I have given instructions that if anything should happen to me you should be informed - so no news is good news - remember that.'

Yvonne's letters are all like that - newsy, common sense, matter of fact and with an unshakeable belief in the final victory of the British Empire and her Allies. By 23rd February 1941, she was writing home to report on her first night stationed at the top of the tower of Chelsea Old Church:

'I had quite an exciting experience on Wednesday night - my first night as a fire watcher. I was as high as one could get in Chelsea Old Church tower being shown around; where the buckets of sand, stirrup pumps and water were. And the bombs dropped! The first we'd seen in our district since September. I tell you, I have never descended a spiral staircase as fast in all my life! It was only a stick of three bombs in the next street which luckily did little damage and only one man hurt-a broken leg. So my experience was not disastrous luckily, but its going to take a lot to inveigle me up to the top of that tower again while a Blitz is in progress. I have never had a head for heights anyway.'

Chelsea Old Church dates from 1157 and includes Sir Thomas More's private chapel that was added in 1528, with the nave and the tower that Yvonne took a dislike to being added in 1670.

On the night of 16th/17th April 1941, Yvonne was not originally meant to have been on duty but had swapped shifts with one of her colleagues. At about 1.00 a.m., whilst the raid was at its height, she and five of her Fire Watching colleagues set off on a patrol along Chelsea Embankment. Whilst one of the team, a Mr Mallett was examining some shell fragments in the road, he became aware of something floating down behind him. He quickly realised that this was a Parachute Mine and shouted at the others to run. His colleagues were about twenty feet away from him and began to run towards Chelsea Old Church. Mr Mallett was running too quickly to turn the corner and follow them, so instead ducked for shelter behind a fire alarm cover. At about the same time, a second Parachute Mine descended between the still running group of five Fire Watchers and the Church. This mine exploded, also setting off the first and in the resulting blast, most of the Church was destroyed and five out of the six Fire Watchers were killed, the only survivor being Mr Mallett.

One of those killed was Yvonne Green, the visitor from overseas known as 'Canada' to her colleagues and 'Papoose' to her Mother. She had written what proved to be her last letter home barely two days previously, on 15th April 1941:

'The Blitz hasn't affected London for some days now or nights. I should say now but I think it is a fair assumption to say that it is purely temporary and we'll be getting it again soon - maybe. Adolf has a little too much on his hands now though to try and defeat civilian morale as well as coping with the armed forces of Greece, Yugoslavia, Australia and us (not forgetting the Free French).'

Yvonne's mother would no doubt have received this final letter after she learned of her daughter's death. Yvonne is remembered today, along with her four colleagues killed on that tragic night by a plaque inside the rebuilt Chelsea Old Church, whilst Yvonne as the only member of the AFS amongst the group, has another plaque dedicated to her outside the church and installed by the excellent 'Firemen Remembered' charity which does so much to keep alive the memory of the men and women of the wartime fire services.

Yvonne's daughter, Penelope Nichol along with her daughter and grandson came over from Canada to unveil the plaque in 2007, providing a wonderful family connection with a heroine from overseas. Yvonne herself is buried at West Hoathly in Sussex.

Published Sources:

Blitz - M J Gaskin, Faber & Faber 2005
London at War 1939-45 - Philip Ziegler, Sinclair Stevenson 1995

Unpublished Sources:

Imperial War Museum Archives
Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea Archives