Bombs in St Pancras
One of my neighbours on Chalk Farm Road told me of the large crack in the wall of his basement. When he asked his landlord where it had come from, the answer was a V2 rocket which had hit another house on the street during the final months of World War Two.
Its difficult now to imagine that the area I live in, Hawley Mews/Road/Street, was the scene of some of the worst bombing raids during the Second World War. Now, I end up moaning to myself about the people urinating on my doorstep. So, I'd really like to talk to someone who lived through that experience in this area, to hear what it was really like and put my complaints into perspective.
According to the Camden historian, and former borough councillor John Richardson, this area was paricuarlly badly hit because of its proximity to vital railway interlinks. During 1944 flying bombs carried 1-ton warheads into the heart of St Pancras. Charles Allen Newbury, who served as an Air Raid Precautions officer at the time, describes how one fell on a surface shelter in Hawley Road, leaving several people dead and a huge crater.
The worst bombing came of course during the blitz between the summer of 1940 until the spring of 1941. Bombs fell in St Pancras from Highgate to Euston, but the worst of the incidents was on April 16, 1941, when 16 people were killed at Montague Tibbles House on Prince of Wales Road (now Penshurst). Crogsland Road and Haverstock Hill were also hit.
In total there were 1278 air raid incidents in St Pancras, according to Richardson. 957 people had been killed and 1,443 people had been seriously injurred. 1,576 houses were demolished, 1,744 uninhabitable and 13,825 had blast damage.
References:
Charles Allen Newbury, "Wartime St Pancras: A London Borough defends itself" (Camden History Society, 2006)
John Richardson, "Kentish Town Past", (Historical Publications, 1997)
Its difficult now to imagine that the area I live in, Hawley Mews/Road/Street, was the scene of some of the worst bombing raids during the Second World War. Now, I end up moaning to myself about the people urinating on my doorstep. So, I'd really like to talk to someone who lived through that experience in this area, to hear what it was really like and put my complaints into perspective.
According to the Camden historian, and former borough councillor John Richardson, this area was paricuarlly badly hit because of its proximity to vital railway interlinks. During 1944 flying bombs carried 1-ton warheads into the heart of St Pancras. Charles Allen Newbury, who served as an Air Raid Precautions officer at the time, describes how one fell on a surface shelter in Hawley Road, leaving several people dead and a huge crater.
The worst bombing came of course during the blitz between the summer of 1940 until the spring of 1941. Bombs fell in St Pancras from Highgate to Euston, but the worst of the incidents was on April 16, 1941, when 16 people were killed at Montague Tibbles House on Prince of Wales Road (now Penshurst). Crogsland Road and Haverstock Hill were also hit.
In total there were 1278 air raid incidents in St Pancras, according to Richardson. 957 people had been killed and 1,443 people had been seriously injurred. 1,576 houses were demolished, 1,744 uninhabitable and 13,825 had blast damage.
References:
Charles Allen Newbury, "Wartime St Pancras: A London Borough defends itself" (Camden History Society, 2006)
John Richardson, "Kentish Town Past", (Historical Publications, 1997)
