City refuses to be beaten by bombs; Throughout World War II, Liverpool took more hits from German bombers than any other British town outside London. Emma Johnson looks back at how the city reacted in association with LIVERPOOL.

Byline: Emma Johnson 

WHILE the horrors of World War II touched everyone across the United Kingdom, Liverpool was without a doubt one of its greatest victims.

As the main gateway between Britain and the USA, Liverpool was a key target for Hitler and, after enjoying the quiet period of the "phoney war" which allowed preparations to be made to evacuate children from Merseyside, aerial bombardment was heavy and sustained from the summer of 1940.

Thousands of youngsters were sent to stay with complete strangers in the relative safety of North Wales and Cheshire.

Unfortunately the lack of fighting lulled people into a false sense of security and many children returned home just in time for the real war to begin, only for them to flee the city once more.

By the time the German Luftwaffe retreated from its attack over British soil in 1942, almost 4,000 people had been killed and 3,500 seriously injured across Merseyside, the most lives lost in provincial England.

When the bombing stopped, some 554 unidentified bodies were interred in a communal grave at Anfield cemetery 

The death toll was twice that of Birmingham, and compared to the 30,000 lives lost in all of London.

Streets and neighbourhoods across the city were razed, ships were sunk and the docks were badly damaged.

Many of the city's best-known buildings also took devastating hits including the Customs House, the Cotton Exchange and Lewis's department store.

And, to add insult to injury (in an effort to keep up morale across the rest of the country), much of Liverpool's Blitz devastation was hushed up by the Government, for fear of feeding the German propaganda machine.

After suffering serious losses in daylight raids on Britain, the German Luftwaffe switched instead to a campaign of night-time bombing in the late summer of 1940. Major port cities like Liverpool were top of the list of targets as Hitler tried to strangle Britain's wartime supply gateway

Liverpool first felt the force of the German hostility on the evening of August 28, 1940. With docks, railways and factories sought out for destruction, it was a terrifying time for all.

Blackouts were enforced across the city in an attempt to mask the buildings from the determined German bombers but the Luftwaffe found their way in following radio beams and the lights along the Irish coast at Dublin.

RAF anti-aircraft guns were stationed at Speke; meanwhile, RAF fighters based along the Dee estuary lit decoy fires to detract the raiders and over Liverpool gigantic barrage balloons were hoisted to prevent the bombers dropping below 5,000ft.

There was little peace for Liverpudlians from 1940, however. Of all the horror the German Luftwaffe brought to Merseyside over the 18-month period, it was the May Blitz of 1941 that would really test the spirit and the stamina of the city and its people. It lasted just eight nights, but for the people praying in Anderson shelters and digging with their bare hands through rubble for lives and loved ones lost, it was the most horrific, devastating and heartbreaking week anyone could ever have imagined then or since.

The first bombs fell on May 1, just as people were settling in for the evening and hoping that night they would not hear the ear-piercing shriek of the air raid sirens again.

At just after 10pm, as the city should have been going to sleep, the terrifying wail sounded over the water soon followed by the "ack-ack-ack" of anti-aircraft guns.

The raid began with an attack on Wallasey.

Explosives whistled down destroying buildings and for the next two hours around 50 planes bombarded both sides of the river piercing the night sky with flashes oforangeandred.

Barely had the dust cleared and people begun to pick their way through the rubble, than the bombers were back for a second night's onslaught.

This time, aided by a full moon, the attack lasted for four hours destroying whole neighbourhoods, schools churches and offices.

More than 100 people died on the second night of the May Blitz and a string of city landmarks were razed to the ground.

Little was left of the Corn Exchange and part of the Overhead Railway collapsed. In Bootle, more than 200 people were left homeless by the raids.

The worst night of the May Blitz, however, was the third.

This time, around 300 of the Luftwaffe's bombers dropped everything from aerial torpedoes to oil bombs and anti-personnel bombs along with parachute mines which exploded on impact and were capable of taking out entire blocks of houses.

Less than three hours into the attack on May 3, more than 60 fires were blazing through the streets of Liverpool.

Virtually the whole of the city centre of Liverpool was destroyed with one of the greatest casualties in terms of buildings, being the grand Lewis's department store on Renshaw Street, which took a direct hit. Elsewhere, the library on William Brown Street was struck by 500lbs of explosives and the resulting fire swept through the neighbouring Liverpool Museum and Walker Art Gallery

The following night was a mild one by comparison with much of the bombers' attention once more focused on Bootle.

Most of Monday May 5, was spent clearing up but no sooner were the fires out than the bombers returned.

St Luke's Church, on Berry Street, was among the buildings struck by incendiary devices.

The penultimate night of the May Blitz, on May 7, proved to be the second worst. The bombers once more came in waves and there were more than 300 reported hits, with much of Bootle virtually wiped off the map.

Speaking in the aftermath of the bombing of Liverpool, Dr Richard Downey then the Roman Catholic Archbishop, had this to say of the city's indefatigable spirit.

"Liverpool has been tried by fire, and I think I may say we have not been found wanting.

"Indeed we have not, Merseyside has matched its naked determination against the assembled might of airborne Germany and Merseyside has won".

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Tommy Handley

BROADCASTING throughout the war years, this Liverpool comedian's radio show brought entertainment to the home front when times were dark.

Some of his characters' catch-phrases entered general parlance - such as "TTFN", and "I go, I come back."

News of his death in 1949 reached the BBC just as a recording of his 310th edition was going out on air, and listeners had not finished chuckling at his jokes when the news bulletin announced that he had passed away.

Shelter bombed

ONE of the biggest tragedies of the bombing of Liverpool came long before the May Blitz, in November, 1940. With around 300 people crammed into a shelter in the basement of the Edge Hill Training College, in Durning Road, a parachute mine came smashing into the building.

It caused the building to collapse into the shelter, crushing dozens of people trapped inside. As fire raged through the building, rescuers tried in vain to dig people out, but some 166 men, women and children perished.

Air raid terror

AUGUST, 1939: Preparations begin to evacuate children across Merseyside out to the safety of North Wales and Cheshire and the Phoney War is on.

September, 1939: Some 95,000 children are evacuated away from Merseyside.

August 9,1940: The first bombs are dropped on Prenton, Wirral.

December 20,1940: The so-called Christmas Raids begin, with 365 people killed over three nights.

March, 1941: Following a quiet two months at the start of the year, heavy bombing begins again and 174 people are killed in Wallasey.

April 25, 1941: Winston Churchill pays a visit to Liverpool and air raids are limited, but it appears the Luftwaffe are simply preparing themselves for an unprecedented onslaught in the following month.

May 1, 1941: The May Blitz begins.

May 3, 1941: The worst night of the May Blitz, in which up to 500 bombers swarm the skies in a relentless bombardment. The cargo ship the Malakand, carrying 1,000 tonnes of explosives, is blown up sending shock waves four or five miles. Yet miraculously only four people are killed on board.

May 5, 1941: St Luke's Church, on Berry Street, is destroyed by an incendiary bomb. Its burned-out shell still stands as a reminder of the time.

May 7, 1941: The May Blitz ends with a death total of almost 1,800 and some 75,000 people left homeless.

June, 1941: The Luftwaffe turn its full attention to Liverpool's docks.

January 10, 1942: Liverpool suffers its final air raid, which takes out a number of houses in Upper Stanhope Street.

Braverv award for Jet

IN A small grave in Calderstones Park lies a rescue dog who was awarded a medal for his bravery during World War II.

First stationed in Northern Ireland, Jet was owned by a family from Liverpool and was sent to Gloucester for training at the age of nine months.

The inscription on his memorial reads: "JET OF IADA. Dickin Medal & Medallion for Valour. First Rescue Dog Air Raids 2nd World War."

CAPTION(S):

Workmen clear away the debris of houses that were blown up by the Luftwaffe during bombing raids; St Luke's Church, in Liverpool, is a permanent reminder of the Blitz; Lewis's department store, in Liverpool, after it had been badly damaged during the 1941 May Blitz; Rescue workers search the rubble after the bombing of Durning Road air raid shelter, during the May Blitz of 1941