3
Grim and Gay — Passion in the United States — The London Drains — Danger o f Epidemics — Broken Windows — The Delayed-Action Bombs — Minutes Thereupon — The U.X.B. Detachments — The Peril Mastered — Heavy Parachute Mines — The Question of Reprisals — Later German Experiences Compared with Ours — Need of Security for the Central Government — “Paddock” Rehearsal — Herbert Morrison Succeeds John Anderson as Home Secretary — The Incendiary Attacks Begin — The National Fire Service — Civil Defence, a Fourth Arm of the Crown — Power of London to Take Punishment — Permanent Arrangements for Safeguarding the War Machine — I Am Placed in Safety in Piccadilly Underground — Return to the Annexe — Another Change of the German Plan — The Provincial Cities — Coventry — Birmingham — Attacks on the Ports — Great Burning of the City of London, December 29, 1940 — The King at Buckingham Palace — His Majesty’s Mastery of Business — A Thought for the Future.
THESE WERE THE TIMES When the English, and particularly the Londoners, who had the place of honour, were seen at their best. Grim and gay, dogged and serviceable, with the confidence of an unconquered people in their bones, they adapted themselves to this strange new life, with all its terrors, with all its jolts and jars. One evening when I was leaving for an inspection on the east coast, on my way to King’s Cross the sirens sounded, the streets began to empty, except for long queues of very tired, pale people, waiting for the last bus that would run. An autumn mist and drizzle shrouded the scene. The air was cold and raw. Night and the enemy were approaching. I felt, with a spasm of mental pain, a deep sense of the strain and suffering that was being borne throughout the world’s largest capital city. How long would it go on? How much more would they have to bear? What were the limits of their vitality? What effects would their exhaustion have upon our productive warmaking power? 1
Away across the Atlantic the prolonged bombardment of London, and later of other cities and seaports, aroused a wave of sympathy in the United States, stronger than any ever felt before or since in the English-speaking world. Passion flamed in American hearts, and in none more than in the heart of President Roosevelt. The temperature rose steadily in the United States. I could feel the glow of millions of men and women eager to share the suffering, burning to strike a blow. As many Americans as could get passages came, bringing whatever gifts they could, and their respect, reverence, deep love and comradeship were very inspiring. However, this was only September, and we had many months before us of this curious existence.
Under the pressure of the bombardment, the shelters and defences grew continually. I was worried principally on three counts. The first was the drains. When you had six or seven million people living in a great built-up area, the smashing of their sewers and water supply seemed to me a very great danger. Could we keep the sewage system working or would there be a pestilence? What would happen if the drains got into the water supply? Actually, early in October the main sewage outfall was destroyed and we had to let all our sewage flow into the Thames, which stank, first of sewage and afterwards of the floods of chemicals we poured into it. But all was mastered. Secondly, I feared that the long nights for millions in the crowded street-shelters – only blast-proof at that – would produce epidemics of influenza, diphtheria, the common cold, and what-not. But it appeared that Nature had already provided against this danger. Man is a gregarious animal, and apparently the mischievous microbes he exhales fight and neutralise each other. They go out and devour each other, and Man walks off unharmed. If this is not scientifically correct, it ought to be. The fact remains that during this rough winter the health of the Londoners was actually above the average. Moreover, the power of enduring suffering in the ordinary people of every country, when their spirit is roused, seems to have no bounds.
My third fear was a glass famine. Sometimes whole streets had every window-frame smashed by the blast of a single bomb. In a series of Minutes I inquired anxiously about this, and proposed to stop all export of glass forthwith. I was, however, reassured by facts and figures, and this danger also never came to pass.
* * * * *
In the middle of September, a new and damaging form of attack was used against us. Large numbers of delayed-action bombs were now widely and plentifully cast upon us and became an awkward problem. Long stretches of railway line, important junctions, the approaches to vital factories, airfields, main thoroughfares, had scores of times to be blocked off and denied to us in our need. These bombs had to be dug out, and exploded or rendered harmless. This was a task of the utmost peril, especially at the beginning, when the means and methods had all to be learned by a series of decisive experiences. I have already recounted in Volume I the drama of dismantling the magnetic mine, but this form of self-devotion now became commonplace while remaining sublime. I had always taken an interest in the delayed-action fuze, which had first impressed itself on me in 1918, when the Germans had used it on a large scale to deny us the use of the railways by which we planned to advance into Germany. I had urged its use by us both in Norway and in the Kiel Canal. There is no doubt that it is a most effective agent in warfare, on account of the prolonged uncertainty which it creates. We were now to taste it ourselves. A special organisation to deal with it was set up under General King, a highly capable, energetic officer, whom I interviewed myself at Chequers. In a series of Minutes I tried to stimulate the work.
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Prime Minister to Secretary of State for War. |
13.IX.40. |
As I telephoned to you last night, it appears to be of high importance to cope with the U.X.B. [unexploded bombs] in London, and especially on the railways. The congestion in the marshalling yards is becoming acute, mainly from this cause. It would be well to bring in clearance parties both from the north and the west, and also to expand as rapidly as possible General King’s organisation. It must be planned on large enough lines to cope with this nuisance, which may soon wear a graver aspect.
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Prime Minister to Minister of Supply. |
21.IX.40. |
The rapid disposal of unexploded bombs is of the highest importance. Any failure to grapple with this problem may have serious results on the production of aircraft and other vital war material. The work of the bomb-disposal squads must be facilitated by the provision of every kind of up-to-date equipment. The paper, which I have received from the Secretary of State for War, shows the experiments on foot, and the equipment being planned. Priority 1 (a) should be allotted to the production of the equipment required, and to any further requirements which may come to light.
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Prime Minister to Secretary of State for War. |
14.IX.40. |
I hear that there is a special type of auger manufactured in the United States which is capable of boring in the space of less than an hour a hole of such a size and depth as would take two to three days to dig manually.
You should, I think, consider ordering a number of these appliances for the use of the bomb-disposal squads. The essence of this business is to reach the bomb and deal with it with the least possible delay.
These augers may perhaps be expensive, but they will pay for themselves many times over by the saving they will effect in life and property. Besides, I consider that we owe it to these brave men to provide them with the very best technical equipment.
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Prime Minister to Secretary of State for War. |
28.IX.40. |
I am told that there is good evidence to show that the system of dealing with time-bombs by trepanning 2 is proving very successful. In view of the serious and growing trouble that is being caused by these bombs, I should like to be assured that this method is being used on a large enough scale. Will you please let me have a report on the extent to which trepanning is being used.
Special companies were formed in every city, town and district. Volunteers pressed forward for the deadly game. Teams were formed which had good or bad luck. Some survived this phase of our ordeal. Others ran twenty, thirty, or even forty courses before they met their fate. The unexploded-bomb (U.X.B.) detachments presented themselves wherever I went on my tours. Somehow or other their faces seemed different from those of ordinary men, however brave and faithful. They were gaunt, they were haggard, their faces had a bluish look, with bright gleaming eyes and exceptional compression of the lips; withal a perfect demeanour. In writing about our hard times, we are apt to overuse the word “grim.” It should have been reserved for the U.X.B. disposal squads.3
One squad I remember which may be taken as symbolic of many others. It consisted of three people – the Earl of Suffolk, his lady private secretary, and his rather aged chauffeur. They called themselves “the Holy Trinity.” Their prowess and continued existence got around among all who knew. Thirty-four unexploded bombs did they tackle with urbane and smiling efficiency. But the thirty-fifth claimed its forfeit. Up went the Earl of Suffolk in his Holy Trinity. But we may be sure that, as for Mr. Valiant-for-Truth, “all the trumpets sounded for them on the other side.”
Very quickly, but at heavy sacrifice of our noblest, the devotion of the U.X.B. detachments mastered the peril. In a month I could write:
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Prime Minister to General Ismay. |
9.X.40. |
We have not heard much lately about the delayed-action bomb which threatened to give so much trouble at the beginning of September. I have a sort of feeling that things are easier in this respect. Let me have a report showing how many have been cast upon us lately, and how many have been handled successfully or remain a nuisance.
Is the easement which we feel due to the enemy’s not throwing them, or to our improved methods of handling? 4
* * * * *
About the same time the enemy began to drop by parachute numbers of naval mines of a weight and explosive power never carried by aircraft before. Many formidable explosions took place. To this there was no defence except reprisal. The abandonment by the Germans of all pretence of confining the air war to military objectives had also raised this question of retaliation. I was for it, but I encountered many conscientious scruples.
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Prime Minister to V.C.A.S. |
6.IX.40. |
I never suggested any departure from our main policy, but I believe that moral advantage would be gained in Germany at the present time if on two or three nights in a month a number of minor, unexpected, widespread attacks were made upon the smaller German centers. You must remember that these people are never told the truth, and that wherever the air force has not been they are probably told that the German defences are impregnable. Many factors have to be taken into consideration, and some of them are those which are not entirely technical. I hope, therefore, you will consider my wish, and make me proposals for giving effect to it as opportunity serves.
Among those who demurred was my friend Admiral Tom Phillips, Vice-Chief of the Naval Staff.
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Prime Minister to General Ismay, for C.O.S. Committee. (Admiral Phillips to see.) |
19.IX.40. |
1. It was not solely on moral grounds that we decided against retaliation upon Germany. It pays us better to concentrate upon limited high-class military objectives. Moreover, in the indiscriminate warfare the enemy’s lack of skill in navigation, etc., does not tell against him so much.
2. However, the dropping of large mines by parachute proclaims the enemy’s entire abandonment of all pretence of aiming at military objectives. At five thousand feet he cannot have the slightest idea what he is going to hit. This, therefore, proves the “act-of-terror” intention against the civil population. We must consider whether his morale would stand up to this as well as ours. Here is a simple war thought.
3. My inclination is to say that we will drop a heavy parachute mine on German cities for everyone he drops on ours; and it might be an intriguing idea to mention a list of cities that would be black-listed for this purpose. I do not think they would like it, and there is no reason why they should not have a period of suspense.
4. The time and character of the announcement is a political decision. Meanwhile, I wish to know when the tackle could be ready. Let care be taken to make a forthcoming response to this. Let officers be set to propose the best method on a substantial scale in the shortest time. It would be better to act by parachute mines upon a number of German towns not hitherto touched, but if we have to use thousand-pound air-bombs which we have because otherwise the delay would be too long, let the case be stated.
5. I wish to know by Saturday night what is the worst form of proportionate retaliation, i.e., equal retaliation, that we can inflict upon ordinary German cities for what they are now doing to us by means of the parachute mine. Today we were informed that thirty-six had been dropped, but by tomorrow it may be a hundred. Well, let it be a hundred and make the best plan possible on that scale for action within, say, a week or ten days. If we have to wait longer, so be it, but make sure there is no obstruction.
6. Pending the above information I agree that we should not make a wail or a whine about what has happened. Let me have practical propositions by Saturday night.
A month later, I was still pressing for retaliation; but one objection after another, moral and technical, obstructed it.
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Prime Minister to Secretary of State for Air and C.A.S. |
16.X.40. |
I see it reported that last night a large number of land mines were dropped here, many of which have not yet gone off, and that great harm was done.
Let me have your proposals forthwith for effective retaliation upon Germany.
I am informed that it is quite possible to carry similar mines or large bombs to Germany, and that the squadrons wish to use them, but that the Air Ministry are refusing permission. I trust that due consideration will be given to my views and wishes. It is now about three weeks since I began pressing for similar treatment of German military objectives to that which they are meting out to us. Who is responsible for paralysing action?
It is difficult to compare the ordeal of the Londoners in the winter of 1940–41 with that of the Germans in the last three years of the war. In this latter phase the bombs were much more powerful and the raids far more intense. On the other hand, long preparation and German thoroughness had enabled a complete system of bomb-proof shelters to be built, into which all were forced to go by iron routine. When eventually we got into Germany, we found cities completely wrecked, but strong buildings standing up above the ground, and spacious subterranean galleries where the inhabitants slept night after night, although their houses and property were being destroyed all round. In many cases only the rubble-heaps were stirred. But in London, although the attack was less overpowering, the security arrangements were far less developed. Apart from the Tubes there were no really safe places. There were very few basements or cellars which could withstand a direct hit. Virtually the whole mass of the London population lived and slept in their homes or in their Anderson shelters under the fire of the enemy, taking their chance with British phlegm after a hard day’s work. Not one in a thousand had any protection except against blast and splinters. But there was as little psychological weakening as there was physical pestilence. Of course, if the bombs of 1943 had been applied to the London of 1940, we should have passed into conditions which might have pulverised all human organisation. However, everything happens in its turn and in its relation, and no one has a right to say that London, which was certainly unconquered, was not also unconquerable.
Little or nothing had been done before the war or during the passive period to provide bomb-proof strongholds from which the central government could be carried on. Elaborate plans had been made to move the seat of Government from London. Complete branches of many departments had already been moved to Harrogate, Bath, Cheltenham, and elsewhere. Accommodation had been requisitioned over a wide area, providing for all Ministers and important functionaries in the event of an evacuation of London. But now under the bombardment the desire and resolve of the Government and of Parliament to remain in London was unmistakable, and I shared this feeling to the full. I, like others, had often pictured the destruction becoming so overpowering that a general move and dispersal would have to be made. But under the impact of the event, all our reactions were in the contrary sense.
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Prime Minister to Sir Edward Bridges, General Ismay or Colonel Jacob, and Private Office. |
14.IX.40. |
1. I have not at any time contemplated wholesale movement from London of black or yellow Civil Servants.5 Anything of this nature is so detrimental that it could only be forced upon us by Central London becoming practically uninhabitable. Moreover, new resorts of Civil Servants would soon be identified and harassed, and there is more shelter in London than anywhere else.
2. The movement of the high control from the Whitehall area to “Paddock” or other citadels stands on a different footing. We must make sure that the centre of Government functions harmoniously and vigorously. This would not be possible under conditions of almost continuous air raids. A movement to “Paddock” by échelons of the War Cabinet, War Cabinet Secretariat, Chiefs of the Staff Committee, and Home Forces G.H.Q. must now be planned, and may even begin in some minor respects. War Cabinet Ministers should visit their quarters in “Paddock” and be ready to move there at short notice. They should be encouraged to sleep there if they want quiet nights. Secrecy cannot be expected, but publicity must be forbidden.
We must expect that the Whitehall-Westminster area will be the subject of intensive air attack any time now. The German method is to make the disruption of the Central Government a vital prelude to any major assault upon the country. They have done this everywhere. They will certainly do it here, where the landscape can be so easily recognised, and the river and its high buildings afford a sure guide, both by day and night. We must forestall this disruption of the Central Government.
3. It is not necessary to move the Admiralty yet. They are well provided for. The Air Ministry should begin to get from one leg to the other. The War Office and Home Forces must have all their preparations made.
4. Pray concert forthwith all the necessary measures for moving not more than two or three hundred principal persons and their immediate assistants to the new quarters, and show how it should be done step by step. Let me have this by Sunday night, in order that I may put a well-thought-out scheme before the Cabinet on Monday. On Monday the Cabinet will meet either in the Cabinet Room or in the Central War Room, in accordance with the rules already prescribed.
* * * * *
On the line of sticking it out in London it was necessary to construct all kinds of strongholds under or above ground from which the Executive, with its thousands of officials, could carry out their duties. A citadel for the War Cabinet had already been prepared near Hampstead, with offices, bedrooms, and wire and fortified telephone communication. This was called “Paddock.” On September 29, I prescribed a dress rehearsal, so that everybody should know what to do if it got too hot. “I think it important that ‘Paddock’ should be broken in. Thursday next, therefore, the Cabinet will meet there. At the same time, other Departments should be encouraged to try a preliminary move of a skeleton staff. If possible, lunch should be provided for the Cabinet and those attending it.” We held a Cabinet meeting at “Paddock” far from the light of day, and each Minister was requested to inspect and satisfy himself about his sleeping and working apartments. We celebrated this occasion by a vivacious luncheon and then returned to Whitehall. This was the only time “Paddock” was ever used by Ministers. Over the War Room and offices in the basement of the Annexe we floated-in six feet of steel and concrete, and made elaborate arrangements for ventilation, water supply, and above all telephones. As these offices were far below the level of the Thames, only two hundred yards away, care had to be taken that those in them were not trapped by an inrush of water.
* * * * *
October came in raw and rough. But it seemed that London was adapting itself to the new peculiar conditions of existence or death. Even in some directions there was an easement.
Transport into and out of the Whitehall area became an outstanding problem, with the frequently repeated daily raids, the rush hour, and the breakdowns on the railways. I cast about for some solution.
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Prime Minister to Sir Horace Wilson. |
12.X.40. |
About a fortnight ago I directed that the talk about four days a week for Civil Servants should stop, because I feared the effect in the factories of such an announcement. I am, however, now coming round to the idea of a five-day week, sleeping in for four nights (and where possible feeding in), and three nights and two days away at home. This, of course, would apply only to people who work in London and live in the suburbs. I see such queues at the bus stops, and no doubt it is going to become increasingly difficult to get in and out of London quickly. Each Department should work out a scheme to suit their own and their staff’s convenience. The same amount of work must be crowded into the five days as is now done. Efforts should also be made to stagger the hours of arrival and departure, so as to get as many away as possible before the rush hour and spread the traffic over the day.
Let me have your views on this, together with proposals for action in a circular to Departments.
Nothing came of this plan, which broke down under detailed examination.
* * * * *
The retirement of Mr. Chamberlain, enforced by grave illness, led to important Ministerial changes. Mr. Herbert Morrison had been an efficient and vigorous Minister of Supply, and Sir John Anderson had faced the Blitz of London with firm and competent management. By the early days of October, the continuous attack on the largest city in the world was so severe and raised so many problems of a social and political character in its vast harassed population that I thought it would be a help to have a long-trained Parliamentarian at the Home Office, which was now also the Ministry of Home Security. London was bearing the brunt. Herbert Morrison was a Londoner, versed in every aspect of metropolitan administration. He had unrivalled experience of London government, having been leader of the County Council, and in many ways the principal figure in its affairs. At the same time I needed John Anderson, whose work at the Home Office had been excellent, as Lord President of the Council in the wider sphere of the Home Affairs Committee, to which an immense mass of business was referred, with great relief to the Cabinet. This also lightened my own burden and enabled me to concentrate upon the military conduct of the war, in which my colleagues seemed increasingly disposed to give me latitude.
I therefore invited these two high Ministers to change their offices. It was no bed of roses which I offered Herbert Morrison. These pages certainly cannot attempt to describe the problems of London government, when often night after night ten or twenty thousand people were made homeless, and when nothing but the ceaseless vigil of the citizens as fire guards on the roofs prevented uncontrollable conflagrations; when hospitals filled with mutilated men and women were themselves struck by the enemy’s bombs; when hundreds of thousands of weary people crowded together in unsafe and insanitary shelters; when communications by road and rail were ceaselessly broken down; when drains were smashed and light, power, and gas paralysed; and when, nevertheless, the whole fighting, toiling life of London had to go forward, and nearly a million people be moved in and out for their work every night and morning. We did not know how long it would last. We had no reason to suppose that it would not go on getting worse. When I made the proposal to Mr. Morrison, he knew too much about it to treat it lightly. He asked for a few hours’ consideration; but in a short time he returned and said he would be proud to shoulder the job. I highly approved his manly decision.
In Mr. Chamberlain’s day a Civil Defence Committee of the Cabinet had already been set up. This met regularly every morning to review the whole situation. In order to make sure that the new Home Secretary was armed with all the powers of State, I also held a weekly meeting, usually on Fridays, of all authorities concerned. The topics discussed were often far from pleasant.
* * * * *
Quite soon after the Ministerial movements, a change in the enemy’s method affected our general policy. Till now the hostile attack had been confined almost exclusively to high-explosive bombs; but with the full moon of October 15, when the heaviest attack of the month fell upon us, about 480 German aircraft dropped 386 tons of high-explosive and in addition 70,000 incendiary bombs. Hitherto we had encouraged the Londoners to take cover, and every effort was being made to improve their protection. But now “To the basements” must be replaced by “To the roofs.” It fell to the new Minister of Home Security to institute this policy. An organisation of fire-watchers and fire-services on a gigantic scale and covering the whole of London (apart from measures taken in provincial cities) was rapidly brought into being. At first the fire-watchers were volunteers; but the numbers required were so great, and the feeling that every man should take his turn upon the roster so strong, that fire-watching soon became compulsory. This form of service had a bracing and buoyant effect upon all classes. Women pressed forward to take their share. Large-scale systems of training were developed to teach the fire-watchers how to deal with the various kinds of incendiaries which were used against us. Many became adept, and thousands of fires were extinguished before they took hold. The experience of remaining on the roof night after night under fire, with no protection but a tin hat, soon became habitual.
* * * * *
Mr. Morrison presently decided to consolidate the fourteen hundred local fire brigades into a single National Fire Service, and to supplement this with a great fire guard of civilians trained and working in their spare time. The fire guard, like the roof-watchers, was at first recruited on a voluntary basis, but like them it became by general consent compulsory. The National Fire Service gave us the advantages of greater mobility, a universal standard of training and equipment, and formally recognised ranks. The other Civil Defence forces produced regional columns ready at a minute’s notice to go anywhere. The name Civil Defence Service was substituted for the pre-war title of Air-Raid Precautions (A.R.P.). Good uniforms were provided for large numbers, and they became conscious of being a fourth arm of the Crown. In all this work Herbert Morrison was ably assisted by a brave woman whose death we have lately mourned, Ellen Wilkinson. She was out and about in the shelters at all hours of the day and night and took a prominent part in the organisation of the fire guard. The Women’s Voluntary Services, under the inspiring leadership of Lady Reading, also played an invaluable part.
* * * * *
I was glad that, if any of our cities were to be attacked, the brunt should fall on London. London was like some huge prehistoric animal, capable of enduring terrible injuries, mangled and bleeding from many wounds, and yet preserving its life and movement. The Anderson shelters were widespread in the working-class districts of two-storey houses, and everything was done to make them habitable and to drain them in wet weather. Later the Morrison shelter was developed, which was no more than a heavy kitchen table made of steel with strong wire sides, capable of holding up the ruins of a small house and thus giving a measure of protection. Many owed their lives to it. For the rest, “London could take it.” They took all they got, and could have taken more. Indeed, at this time we saw no end but the demolition of the whole metropolis. Still, as I pointed out to the House of Commons at the time, the law of diminishing returns operates in the case of the demolition of large cities. Soon many of the bombs would only fall upon houses already ruined and only make the rubble jump. Over large areas there would be nothing more to burn or destroy, and yet human beings might make their homes here and there, and carry on their work with infinite resource and fortitude. At this time anyone would have been proud to be a Londoner. The admiration of the whole country was given to London, and all the other great cities in the land braced themselves to take their bit as and when it came and not to be outdone. Indeed, many persons seemed envious of London’s distinction, and quite a number came up from the country in order to spend a night or two in town, share the task, and see the fun. We had to check this tendency for administrative reasons.
* * * * *
As we could see no reason why the hostile bombing of London should not go on throughout the war, it was necessary to make long-term plans for safely housing the central Government machine.
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Prime Minister to Sir Edward Bridges. |
22.X.40. |
We now know the probable limits of the enemy air attack on London, and that it will be severe and protracted. It is probable, indeed, that the bombing of Whitehall and the centre of Government will be continuous until all old or insecure buildings have been demolished. It is, therefore, necessary to provide as soon as possible accommodation in the strongest houses and buildings that exist, or are capable of being fortified, for the large nucleus staffs and personnel connected with the governing machine and the essential Ministers and Departments concerned in the conduct of the war. This becomes inevitable as a consequence of our decision not to be beaten out of London, and to release to the War Office or other Departments the accommodation hitherto reserved in the West of England for the Black Move. We must do one thing or the other, and, having made our decision, carry it out thoroughly.
2. The accommodation at Paddock is quite unsuited to the conditions which have arisen. The War Cabinet cannot live and work there for weeks on end, while leaving the great part of their staffs less well provided for than they are now in Whitehall. Apart from the citadel of Paddock, there is no adequate accommodation or shelter, and anyone living in Neville Court would have to be running to and fro on every Jim Crow warning. Paddock should be treated as a last resort, and in the meantime should be used by some Department not needed in the very centre of London.
3. Nearly all the Government buildings and the shelters beneath them are either wholly unsafe or incapable of resisting a direct hit. The older buildings, like the Treasury, fall to pieces, as we have seen, and the shelters beneath them offer no trustworthy protection. The Foreign Office and Board of Trade blocks on either side of King Charles Street are strongly built and give a considerable measure of protection in their basements. I have approved the provision of a substantial measure of overhead cover above the War Room and Central War Room offices, and Home Forces location in the Board of Trade Building. This will take a month or six weeks with perpetual hammering. We must press on with this. But even when finished, it will not be proof. Richmond Terrace is quite inadequately protected, and essential work suffers from conditions prevailing there. The Board of Trade have been invited to move to new premises, and certainly the bulk of their staff should find accommodation out of London. However, this move of the Board of Trade must be considered as part of the general plan.
4. There are several strong modern buildings in London, of steel and cement construction, built with an eye to air-raid conditions. These should immediately be prepared to receive the War Cabinet and its Secretariat, and also to provide safe living accommodation for the essential Ministers. We need not be afraid of having too much proof accommodation, as increasing numbers will certainly have to be provided for. It is essential that the central work of the Government should proceed under conditions which ensure its efficiency.
5. I have already asked for alternative accommodation for Parliament, but no satisfactory plan has yet been made. The danger to both Houses during their sessions is serious, and it is only a question of time before these buildings and chambers are struck. We must hope they will be struck when not occupied by their Members. The protection provided below the Houses of Parliament is totally inadequate against a direct hit. The Palace of Westminster and the Whitehall area is an obvious prime target of the enemy, and I dare say already more than fifty heavy bombs have fallen in the neighbourhood. The Cabinet has already favoured the idea of a trial trip being made by the Houses of Parliament in some alternative accommodation. I propose to ask for an adjournment from Thursday next for a fortnight, by which time it is hoped some plan can be made in London for their meeting.
6. I consider that a War Cabinet Minister, who should keep in close touch with the Chancellor of the Exchequer, should be entrusted with the general direction and supervision of the important and extensive works which are required, and that Lord Reith and his Department should work for this purpose under Cabinet supervision. If my colleagues agree, I will ask Lord Beaverbrook, who has already concerned himself in the matter, to take general charge.
Lord Beaverbrook was thus entrusted with the task of making a large number of bomb-proof strongholds capable of housing the whole essential staffs of many Departments of State, and a dozen of them, several connected by tunnels, survive in London today. None of these were finished till long after the aeroplane raids were over, and few were used during the pilotless-aircraft and rocket attacks which came in 1944 and 1945. However, although these buildings were never used for the purposes for which they were prepared, it was good to feel we had them under our lee. The Admiralty on their own constructed the vast monstrosity which weighs upon the Horse Guards Parade, and the demolition of whose twenty-foot-thick steel and concrete walls will be a problem for future generations when we reach a safer world.
* * * * *
Towards the middle of October, Josiah Wedgwood began to make a fuss in Parliament about my not having an absolutely bomb-proof shelter for the night raids. He was an old friend of mine, and had been grievously wounded in the Dardanelles. He had always been a single-taxer. Later he broadened his views on taxation and joined the Labour Party. His brother was the Chairman of the Railway Executive Committee. Before the war they had had the foresight to construct a considerable underground office in Piccadilly. It was seventy feet below the surface and covered with strong, high buildings. Although one bomb had penetrated eighty feet in marshy subsoil, there was no doubt this depth with buildings overhead gave safety to anyone in it. I began to be pressed from all sides to resort to this shelter for sleeping purposes. Eventually I agreed, and from the middle of October till the end of the year, I used to go there once the firing had started, to transact my evening business and sleep undisturbed. One felt a natural compunction at having much more safety than most other people; but so many pressed me that I let them have their way. After about forty nights in the railway shelter, the Annexe became stronger, and I moved back to it. Here during the rest of the war my wife and I lived comfortably. We felt confidence in this solid stone building, and only on very. rare occasions went down below the armour. My wife even hung up our few pictures in the sitting-room, which I had thought it better to keep bare. Her view prevailed and was justified by the event. From the roof near the cupola of the Annexe there was a splendid view of London on clear nights. They made a place for me with overhead cover from splinters, and one could walk in the moonlight and watch the fireworks. In 1941 I used to take some of my American visitors up there from time to time after dinner. They were always most interested.
* * * * *
On the night of November 3, for the first time in nearly two months no alarm sounded in London. The silence seemed quite odd to many. They wondered what was wrong. On the following night the enemy’s attacks were widely dispersed throughout the island; and this continued for a while. There had been another change in the policy of the German offensive. Although London was still regarded as the principal target, a major effort was now to be made to cripple the Industrial centres of Britain. Special squadrons had been trained, with new navigational devices, to attack specific key-centres. For instance, one formation was trained solely for the destruction of the Rolls-Royce aero-engine works at Hillington, Glasgow. All this was a makeshift and interim plan. The invasion of Britain had been temporarily abandoned, and the attack upon Russia had not yet been mounted, or expected outside Hitler’s intimate circle. The remaining winter months were, therefore, to be for the German Air Force a period of experiment, both in technical devices in night-bombing and in attacks upon British sea-borne trade, together with an attempt to break down our production, military and civil. They would have done much better to have stuck to one thing at a time and pressed it to a conclusion. But they were already baffled and for the time being unsure of themselves.
These new bombing tactics began with the blitz on Coventry on the night of November 14. London seemed too large and vague a target for decisive results, but Goering hoped that provincial cities or munition centres might be effectively obliterated. The raid started early in the dark hours of the 14th, and by dawn nearly five hundred German aircraft had dropped six hundred tons of high-explosives and thousands of incendiaries. On the whole this was the most devastating raid which we sustained. The centre of Coventry was shattered, and its life for a spell completely disrupted. Four hundred people were killed and many more seriously injured. The German radio proclaimed that our other cities would be similarly “Coventrated.” Nevertheless, the all-important aero-engine and machine-tool factories were not brought to a standstill; nor was the population, hitherto untried in the ordeal of bombing, put out of action. In less than a week an emergency reconstruction committee did wonderful work in restoring the life of the city.
On November 15, the enemy switched back to London with a very heavy raid in full moonlight. Much damage was done, especially to churches and other monuments. The next target was Birmingham, and three successive raids from the 19th to the 22d of November inflicted much destruction and loss of life. Nearly eight hundred people were killed and over two thousand injured; but the life and spirit of Birmingham survived this ordeal. When I visited the city a day or two later to inspect its factories, and see for myself what had happened, an incident, to me charming, occurred. It was the dinner-hour, and a very pretty young girl ran up to the car and threw a box of cigars into it. I stopped at once and she said: “I won the prize this week for the highest output. I only heard you were coming an hour ago.” The gift must have cost her two or three pounds. I was very glad (in my official capacity) to give her a kiss. I then went on to see the long mass grave in which so many citizens and their children had been newly buried. The spirit of Birmingham shone brightly, and its million inhabitants, highly organised, conscious and comprehending, rode high above their physical suffering.
During the last week of November and the beginning of December, the weight of the attack shifted to the ports. Bristol, Southampton, and above all Liverpool, were heavily bombed. Later on Plymouth, Sheffield, Manchester, Leeds, Glasgow, and other munitions centres passed through the fire undaunted. It did not matter where the blow struck, the nation was as sound as the sea is salt.
The climax raid of these weeks came once more to London, on Sunday, December 29. All the painfully gathered German experience was expressed on this occasion. It was an incendiary classic. The weight of the attack was concentrated upon the City of London itself. It was timed to meet the dead-low-water hour. The water-mains were broken at the outset by very heavy high-explosive parachute mines. Nearly fifteen hundred fires had to be fought. The damage to railway stations and docks was serious. Eight Wren churches were destroyed or damaged. The Guildhall was smitten by fire and blast, and St. Paul’s Cathedral was only saved by heroic exertions. A void of ruin at the very centre of the British world gapes upon us to this day. But when the King and Queen visited the scene, they were received with enthusiasm far exceeding any Royal festival.
During this prolonged ordeal, of which several months were still to come, the King was constantly at Buckingham Palace. Proper shelters were being constructed in the basement, but all this took time. Also it happened several times that His Majesty arrived from Windsor in the middle of an air raid. Once he and the Queen had a very narrow escape. I have His Majesty’s permission to record the incident in his own words:
Friday, September 13, 1940.
We went to London [from Windsor] and found an air raid in progress. The day was very cloudy and it was raining hard. The Queen and I went upstairs to a small sitting-room overlooking the Quadrangle (I could not use my usual sitting-room owing to the broken windows by former bomb damage). All of a sudden we heard the zooming noise of a diving aircraft getting louder and louder, and then saw two bombs falling past the opposite side of Buckingham Palace into the Quadrangle. We saw the flashes and heard the detonations as they burst about eighty yards away. The blast blew in the windows opposite to us, and two great craters had appeared in the Quadrangle. From one of these craters water from a burst main was pouring out and flowing into the passage through the broken windows. The whole thing happened in a matter of seconds and we were very quickly out into the passage. There were six bombs: two in the Forecourt, two in the Quadrangle, one wrecked the Chapel, and one in the garden.
The King, who as a sub-lieutenant had served in the Battle of Jutland, was exhilarated by all this, and pleased that he should be sharing the dangers of his subjects in the capital. I must confess that at the time neither I nor any of my colleagues were aware of the peril of this particular incident. Had the windows been closed instead of open, the whole of the glass would have splintered into the faces of the King and Queen, causing terrible injuries. So little did they make of it all that even I, who saw them and their entourage so frequently, only realised long afterwards, when making inquiries for writing this book, what had actually happened.
In those days we viewed with stern and tranquil gaze the idea of going down fighting amid the ruins of Whitehall. His Majesty had a shooting-range made in the Buckingham Palace garden, at which he and other members of his family and his equerries practised assiduously with pistols and tommy-guns. Presently I brought the King an American short-range carbine, from a number which had been sent to me. This was a very good weapon.
About this time the King changed his practice of receiving me in a formal weekly audience at about five o’clock which had prevailed during my first two months of office. It was now arranged that I should lunch with him every Tuesday. This was certainly a very agreeable method of transacting State business, and sometimes the Queen was present. On several occasions we all had to take our plates and glasses in our hands and go down to the shelter, which was making progress, to finish our meal. The weekly luncheons became a regular institution. After the first few months His Majesty decided that all servants should be excluded, and that we should help ourselves and help each other. During the four and a half years that this continued, I became aware of the extrordinary diligence with which the King read all the telegrams and public documents submitted to him. Under the British Constitutional system the Sovereign has a right to be made acquainted with everything for which his Ministers are responsible, and has an unlimited right of giving counsel to his Government. I was most careful that everything should be laid before the King, and at our weekly meetings he frequently showed that he had mastered papers which I had not yet dealt with. It was a great help to Britain to have so good a King and Queen in those fateful years, and as a convinced upholder of constitutional monarchy I valued as a signal honour the gracious intimacy with which I, as First Minister, was treated, for which I suppose there has been no precedent since the days of Queen Anne and Marlborough during his years of power.
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This brings us to the end of the year, and for the sake of continuity I have gone ahead of the general war. The reader will realise that all this clatter and storm was but an accompaniment to the cool processes by which our war effort was maintained and our policy and diplomacy conducted. Indeed, I must record that at the summit these injuries, failing to be mortal, were a positive stimulant to clarity of view, faithful comradeship and judicious action. It would be unwise, how-ever, to suppose that if the attack had been ten or twenty times as severe – or even perhaps two or three times as severe – the healthy reactions I have described would have followed.