BELFAST
By 29 March the German Blitz against British cities had been running for nearly seven months. Many had expected a raid by none had come. On Thursday 13th March 1941, over 200 bombed Clydeside in Glasgow, slightly further north than Belfast. John MacDermott, Minister of Public Security in the devolved Stormont Government, wrote to Prime Minister of Northern Ireland John Miller Andrews. He said that ‘up to now we have escaped attack. So had Clydeside [Glasgow, Scotland] until recently. Clydeside got its blitz during the period of the last moon…The period of the next moon, from say, the 7th to the 16th of April, may well bring our turn’.[1] His words were prophetically accurate.
ABOUT
Between 7th April and 6th May 1941, four aerial bombing raids on Belfast killed over 900 people, injured 1,500 and damaged about half of the city’s homes. Thousands were made homeless and over 100,000 residents fled to the country. This period in Belfast’s history has become known as the Belfast Blitz. To mark the 81st anniversary, key events each day over the Blitz period are being retold here on this website and also on Twitter (@drtomstours). For information on tours see:
[1] Brian Barton, Belfast in the War Years, Belfast in the War Years (Belfast: Blackstaff Press, 1989), p.73.