70th Anniversary of WWII German Bombing of Dublin

CDfm

A survivors story from todays Indo.

Memories of south's darkest wartime hour burn brightly for bomb survivor


By Ken Sweeney

Tuesday May 31 2011

SHE was only five years old when the bombs fell. That was 70 years ago, but Betty Keogh remembers it like it was yesterday.
Thirty-four civilians lost their lives and 50 more were wounded as a result of the German attack on the night of Tuesday, May 31, 1941, the worst wartime atrocity south of the border during World War II.
Betty's family lost everything in the raid -- except their lives.
Yesterday, she returned to the house in North Strand, Dublin, where her family lived at the time of the tragedy and which is just 100 yards from where the last -- and biggest -- bomb detonated.
"It brings back so many memories being outside this house again," she told the Irish Independent.
"I was five at the time and too young to realise how lucky we were. This anniversary makes me sad for my late mother and father because they lost everything and didn't receive any compensation until years later."
It was on the last weekend of May, 1941, the start of a warm Whit bank-holiday weekend, that a single low-flying German bomber dropped four bombs on Dublin.
The first fell at the junction of North Circular Road and North Richmond Street, the second landed in Summerhill and the third in the Phoenix Park.
Betty's family lived at 10 Charleville Mall.
"We heard the bang of the first bomb," she said. "I remember waking up in the pitch dark and my mother and father at the window. Everyone was confused about what was going on.
"My father left the house to investigate. He was gone for so long, my mother got anxious, so she put myself and my brother Noel, who was eight, into bed and went out to look for him."
A short while later, the German plane's fourth and largest bomb, a 500lb landmine believed to have been dropped by parachute, landed nearby.
Tremor
Such was the ferocity of the explosion, a tremor was reported to have been felt as far away as Mullingar.
"It was a huge bang all right," said Betty. "The whole back fell off our house. In fact, the backs of the whole row of houses fell out. I can still see the rubble like it was last night.
"I can't remember what happened next but my brother remembers this boy who was minding us leading us down the stairs of the house to get to the air-raid shelter," she said.
Betty's parents panicked when they returned home to find the house in ruins and their children missing.
"They thought we'd been harmed so they were delighted to find us in the air-raid shelter," she said.
Now living in Booterstown, Co Dublin, the grandmother said she had no bitterness towards the German pilot who dropped the bomb
"What happened was history and that's that," she said.
After the war, Germany paid compensation to Ireland for a "military error".
Today, at Marino College, Dublin, Councillor Ray McAdam and German Ambassador Busso von Alvensleben will officially re-open a refurbished memorial garden commemorating the 70th anniversary of the Dublin bombing.
- Ken Sweeney
Irish Independent



http://www.independent.ie/national-news/memories-of-souths-darkest-wartime-hour-burn-brightly-for-bomb-survivor-2661552.html

Morlar

There was also a walking tour about this event mentioned on the WWII forum ;

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056265598

Kalimah

There was a story in my family that my great great grand father's house was one of those bombed. My family were long gone out of it by that time. I did look it up and found that the story was true and that the house was very badly damaged and one woman very badly injured. About 5 years ago I suggested my niece do a project on it for her Leaving Cert history. Now there are books out on the whole event which is great for those of us with an interest in the subject.

On another related subject bombs fell in Terenure during the war though I'm not sure if it was May 1941. My mother was a child of 5 and she and her small brothers and sister were put under the oak kitchen table for safely. they were living in Harolds Cross at the time. my grandfather went out as he was an ARP warden and didn't come back for hours!

Morlar

Kalimah wrote: »

There was a story in my family that my great great grand father's house was one of those bombed. My family were long gone out of it by that time. I did look it up and found that the story was true and that the house was very badly damaged and one woman very badly injured. About 5 years ago I suggested my niece do a project on it for her Leaving Cert history. Now there are books out on the whole event which is great for those of us with an interest in the subject.

On another related subject bombs fell in Terenure during the war though I'm not sure if it was May 1941. My mother was a child of 5 and she and her small brothers and sister were put under the oak kitchen table for safely. they were living in Harolds Cross at the time. my grandfather went out as he was an ARP warden and didn't come back for hours!

Also fell on Dun Laoghaire direction. This account is probably not definitive. There was a history talk about some of this in Dun Laoghaire last year. A WW2 fire brigade person was there who gave a personal recollection. Hair raising stuff.

http://www.carlow-nationalist.ie/tabId/392/itemId/3952/The-WWII-bombing-of-the-North-Strand.aspx

The WWII bombing of the North Strand

Last Updated Aug 2010
By: WILLIE WHITE

AT THE beginning of World War II, the then taoiseach Eamon de Valera declared this nation’s neutrality, calling it an emergency.

Ireland was not to escape totally the effects of war, with the German Luftwaffe pounding British cities, including Belfast, and a small number of bombs landed in the Republic.

On 26 August 1940, a German warplane dropped four bombs on the railway station at Duncormack, County Wexford, narrowly missing its target and creating large craters in an adjacent turnip field. However, the nearby village of Campile, which was also attacked, was not so lucky. Three women were killed when the Shelburne Co-op was bombed. They were sisters Mary Ellen (30) and her 26-year-old sister Catherine Kent from Terrerath, and Kathleen Hurley (27) from Garryduff.

This did not seem a random attack and various reasons have been put forward as an excuse, such as captured British soldiers on the battlefields of Europe were carrying butter wrappers from the creamery. Another theory is that it was to stop Harland & Wolff developing a proposed deep-sea facility in the area. Whatever the reason, Germany paid compensation of £9,000 in 1943. On 20 December, bombs hit Carrickmacross, County Monaghan, Sandycove Railway Station and Dun Laoghaire, injuring seven people.

On New Year’s Day 1941, the Meath villages of Duleek and Julianstown were hit, with no casualties. On the following day, attacks were carried out at Terenure in Dublin, where several houses were destroyed and seven people injured. Other locations to suffer the same fate included The Curragh Racecourse, Kildare and Ballymurn, County Wexford. And tragically in Knockroe, Borris, a bomb hit a house, killing three members of the Shannon family – sisters Mary Ellen (40) and Bridgid (38), along with their niece 16-year-old Kathleen.

The German government claimed – as they did in most of the Irish bombings – that this was a case where pilots mistook the coastline for that of Britain. The popular belief is that they were jettisoning their loads in order to make a safe journey home.

At this point, let us just cross the border and comment briefly on Belfast’s worst night of bombings during the war. This took place on Tuesday 15 April 1941, the end of the Easter weekend, when more than 180 German aircraft attacked the city for over six hours, dropping more than 203 tonnes of bombs and 800 firebomb canisters on the city. A British Hurricane squadron was wiped out, while there were no German losses. On the ground, more than 1,000 people died, with over 1,500 injured. Almost 100,000 were left homeless.

Lord Haw Haw (William Joyce), famous for his propaganda speeches from Germany, had earlier promised that Easter eggs would be delivered to Belfast. Just a bit about Joyce – he was born in New York to an Irish father and English mother. He lived in England from 1921 to 1933, where he joined the British fascists. An admirer of Hitler, he moved to Germany with his wife Margaret in 1939 and began his broadcasts from a Berlin radio station. In 1944 he was awarded the German War Cross of Merit. He was arrested on the Danish border attempting to flee Germany at the end of the war.

He was charged with high treason at the Old Bailey, convicted and hanged in Wandsworth Prison on 3 January 1946 and was buried in an unmarked grave. Margaret lived in Hamburg until 1962. She then moved back to London and died an alcoholic ten years later at the age of 60. Joyce’s daughter, Heather, obtained permission to exhume his body and brought it to Ireland for burial in Bohermore Road Cemetery, Galway.

Back to the bombing ... with Belfast burning and bombs dropped on Derry and Bangor (causing 20 deaths), the minister for security John McDermott contacted de Valera for assistance, which the Dublin government agreed to provide. And within two hours, 71 firemen and 13 tenders from Dundalk, Drogheda and Dublin were dispatched to the stricken city. This is important, as it may be the reason why the North Stand area of Dublin was bombed six weeks later.

Friday 31 May was the start of the June Bank Holiday weekend. Just after midnight, the drone of approaching aircraft could be heard, as was the sound of explosions in the distance. Search lights could be seen sweeping the sky and, a short time later, anti-aircraft batteries commenced firing, which was in line with our armed neutrality position.

At 1.30am, the bombs began to fall on Dublin. North Richmond Street and Rutland Place were hit, as was Dublin Zoo, where neither human or animal casualties were suffered. Aras an Uachtarain (Dr Douglas Hyde was president) was also damaged by this bomb, with its windows blown out.

The most devastating incident happened on the North Strand just after 2am when an apparently low-flying bomber dropped a landmine between the Five Lamps and New Common Bridge. This was a very destructive weapon and ripped the area apart, leaving it in ruins. Thirty-four people died and 90 were injured; 300 houses were destroyed and more than 400 people left homeless. Emergency services, including the LDF, fire service, civil defence and ambulance crews were quickly on the scene, facing utter destruction like they had never encountered before.

The dead and injured were removed to nearby hospitals. Arrangements were made to find shelter for those whose homes were destroyed. These people were helped by family, friends and government services.

On 5 June, a Mass was held for 12 of the victims, and was attended by de Valera and other members of the government. A complaint was made to Germany, which accepted responsibility for the raid, and agreed to pay compensation, which it then failed to do.

In 1958, West Germany paid £327,000. Neither East Germany nor Austria, which were part of Germany at the time, paid any compensation. More than 2,000 claims were processed by the Irish government, with the final payout reaching £344,000.

German radio stated it would not bomb Ireland intentionally, it must have been a navigational error, yet Lord Haw Haw had broadcast during the aftermath of the Belfast bombings that Amiens Street railway station (now Connolly Street) would be bombed because of the masses of Belfast refugees arriving there. Another contention is that it was a warning to Ireland to stay out of the war, a reference to the fact that aid and assistance had been sent to Belfast.

Two other towns were bombed in July 1941 with no casualties: Arklow on the 2nd, and Dundalk two days later. These raids were also flagged by Lord Haw Haw, who stated that cattle were being sent to England from the towns.

CDfm

Here is a good link with some names of the casualties etc.

http://www.skynet.ie/~dan/war/bombings.html

Was there also something about a guy either killed in a field or falling from a ladder in Wexford.

johnny_doyle

Kalimah wrote: »

On another related subject bombs fell in Terenure during the war though I'm not sure if it was May 1941. My mother was a child of 5 and she and her small brothers and sister were put under the oak kitchen table for safely. they were living in Harolds Cross at the time. my grandfather went out as he was an ARP warden and didn't come back for hours!

my father, aged 5, and his family were in Mountain View Ave, Harold's X at the time of the Terenure b0mb. Dublin Council has some info re the damage etc.

http://www.dublincity.ie/RecreationandCulture/libraries/Heritage%20and%20History/Dublin%20City%20Archives/Collections%20Post%201840/Pages/donore_bombing_archives.aspx

Dublin Libraries site has a number of photos and other info re the North Strand

http://www.dublinheritage.ie/historic_photographs/north_strand_bombing.html

Kalimah

Thanks for all that everyone!!