MƒH Eight Days in May ~ The Liverpool Blitz 1 - 8 May 1941 ~ Introduction

Moments from History

Eight Days in May

An Introduction

Castle Street into Lord Street Liverpool L1 ~ May 1941

THE TRAM LINES carry me along Castle Street, round to the left and down the long sloping Lord Street into the City centre, my city Liverpool. As I turn into Lord Street, to my right is the Victoria Memorial.

Liverpool is my adoptive City. It is cantankerous on a bad day, but sublime and beautiful on a good day, a mirror of its sister City Newcastle-upon-Tyne further up and across the other side, on the Northeast coast of Britain. Two port cities. Both are vital to the well-being of this Nation and I speak of Britain, not England. In just the same way as are the Ports of Aberdeen and Glasgow, Belfast and the five collective Ports of Wales just across the estuary from me, Barry, Cardiff, Newport, Port Talbot and Swansea (today, the ABP South Wales).

I came across this image a few weeks ago. It took me aback. I knew of the wider panoramic devastation, a city centre flattened except for the Victoria Memorial, and will feature later in this new Eight Days in May Series commencing on 1 May 2023.

But this image zooms in and traces my steps or my ride, and it takes me to where I like to have coffee on the wide pavement and watch the world go by. I find myself suddenly thinking, I knew we were flattened, but somehow this image makes it very personal, a sense of being raped. How dare they think they can invade and conquer!

The sentiment quickly gave a new perspective to the broadcast by Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris from his desk in 1942 and that cold utterance …

… they have sown the wind, now they are going to reap the whirlwind …

What? Do you mean old Butcher? Is that what you’ve read?

That’s fine, but be careful, friend, with what you are about to say. You may not have even been even alive in 1982.

So, what’s your point?

My point is this, my well-read friend. In 1982 two officers stood in Royal Air Force Number 1 Dress Uniform holding RAF regulation white cups of tea, both discussing the Strategic Air Offensive (SAO). One, the highest rank, Marshal of the Royal Air Force; the other one, one of the lowest ranks, a flight lieutenant (yeah, that’s right, the same as an army captain). My point? Good question. I was that junior. Harris was the Marshal with whom I was engaging, not only about the SAO but also of two operations in 1943 and 1945 that saw my uncles pay their part in the price paid by 55,573 of their fellow airmen that guaranteed that I now live; and I listened as sensible young people do when they find themselves out of their depth at the knowledge, depth and breadth of wisdom not only about the SAO of which Air Chief Marshal Harris was the architect but also about those two operations.

Birkenhead-Liverpool. Dieser Luftaufklärungs-Fotograf von der Luftwaffe (aerial-reconnaissance photograph) was taken on 4 September 1940, it being Plate No. 1050 R 36 GB 5681 b.

GB 5681 b confirms that these are the coordinates for Birkenhead Großbrittanien. The Royal Liver building is marked on the north bank of the Mersey River. The principal targets are marked in red, including the anti-craft battery guarding Birkenhead and Liverpool on the south bank of the Mersey (Flak).

D indicates the vitally important Birkenhead Docks. This Fotograf, one of the thousands, testifies as to why Birkenhead on the Wirral was a major target. We tend to think of Liverpool as the City. But, and it is still true today within the population, we have Birkenhead, Wallasey, New Brighton, Liverpool and Bootle. KTW 2023

In 2022 and now 2023, we witness the horror of war. We learned this week from Quentin Somerville, one of our BBC journalists embedded with the Ukraine Armed Forces in Bakhmut, that the fatality ratio between both sides (I speak of armed forces, not the killing of civilians caught up, even targeted by Russian forces) is 1:7. For every Ukrainian soldier killed, seven Russian soldiers are killed. Starkly, 20,000:140,000, 30,000:210,000, 40,000:280,000.

I look at images of the Blitz on Britain in 1940-1941, and then the rocket strikes in 1944-1945 with Hitler’s wonder weapons, the V1 and V2 rockets and the devastation upon London by V2s that took only four minutes to arrive and did so without warning, and I see the parallel with Russia’s missile strikes on the whole infrastructure of Ukraine, country-wide. News reporting now talks of attacks on infrastructure. It gives us that very false, almost cosy feel that infrastructure such as people-less power stations and electricity grids are being targeted. But the photographs we see of the results of missile strikes on Ukraine’s cities are every bit as devastating as the images of the Blitz, every bit as devastating as the reaping whirlwind on Nazi Germany. In short, there are thousands of people on the receiving end.

Eight Days in May is a quiet reminder to us all that we must remain vigilant, that we must recognise and fully support the People of Ukraine, and that we must all work until that day when Russia is pushed back into its own borders.

If we do not, Ukraine will disappear. A long night will descend upon Ukraine that will devastate the whole world way beyond what we currently experience, and we will be a toenail’s tip away from World War Three. For Vladimir Putin, that is a shrug of the shoulders. Vladimir Putin is the 21st Century’s Adolf Hitler and Joseph Salin all rolled up into one ~ a nightmare.

17 March 2023
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© Kenneth Thomas Webb 2023