1 00:00:08,500 --> 00:00:12,460 Early in 1941, Hitler's bombers crossed the Channel. 2 00:00:12,460 --> 00:00:16,660 It was Wales' turn for the blitzkrieg, the lightning war. 3 00:00:23,140 --> 00:00:27,220 75 years ago, Britain came under the heaviest attack in its history. 4 00:00:29,180 --> 00:00:33,100 First, London endured 57 nights of intensive bombing. 5 00:00:36,180 --> 00:00:39,820 Then the terror spread, devastating 16 cities 6 00:00:39,820 --> 00:00:43,380 in England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. 7 00:00:48,740 --> 00:00:53,380 So we're going to do now, as it were, a sort of dummy bombing run. 8 00:00:53,380 --> 00:00:54,860 I'm John Humphrys 9 00:00:54,860 --> 00:00:58,420 and I'm taking to the skies above my home city of Cardiff 10 00:00:58,420 --> 00:01:02,660 to follow the flight paths of the Luftwaffe bombers. 11 00:01:02,660 --> 00:01:05,420 What we're looking at now was just wiped out. 12 00:01:07,380 --> 00:01:10,620 Their bomb went right through the shop, 13 00:01:10,620 --> 00:01:13,740 right through into the cellar, exploded. 14 00:01:13,740 --> 00:01:15,580 I'll also fly over Swansea, 15 00:01:15,580 --> 00:01:18,820 where the Three Nights' Blitz destroyed its centre 16 00:01:18,820 --> 00:01:22,140 and changed the landscape for ever. 17 00:01:22,140 --> 00:01:25,940 It was burning from Swansea Castle down to St Helens Road, 18 00:01:25,940 --> 00:01:28,140 and people were running for the beach, 19 00:01:28,140 --> 00:01:30,300 because if the worst came to the worst, 20 00:01:30,300 --> 00:01:32,380 they could get into the water, see? 21 00:01:32,380 --> 00:01:34,060 I'll see the reminders of the war, 22 00:01:34,060 --> 00:01:36,500 meet those who lived through the bombings 23 00:01:36,500 --> 00:01:39,420 and discover how they changed the face of our cities. 24 00:01:56,980 --> 00:02:00,260 I was born in Cardiff in 1943, a war baby. 25 00:02:02,300 --> 00:02:04,580 I came into a world ravaged by conflict 26 00:02:04,580 --> 00:02:06,700 and into a city shattered by bombs. 27 00:02:09,940 --> 00:02:13,420 The fighting and the fear would last for another two years. 28 00:02:26,100 --> 00:02:30,100 This is the house where I was born - 193 Pearl Street. 29 00:02:30,100 --> 00:02:32,700 The middle of five children. 30 00:02:32,700 --> 00:02:36,220 I THINK I remember the bombs dropping. 31 00:02:36,220 --> 00:02:39,060 Certainly, I learned about it later. 32 00:02:39,060 --> 00:02:42,060 And I know what happened to us when the bombs did fall. 33 00:02:42,060 --> 00:02:45,060 We were taken to the shop on the corner. 34 00:02:45,060 --> 00:02:47,940 It's a house now, but it was a shop then, a chemist's shop. 35 00:02:47,940 --> 00:02:49,980 Vivian Morgan's chemist's shop. 36 00:02:49,980 --> 00:02:53,860 And they had a cellar and that's where we took shelter. 37 00:02:53,860 --> 00:02:58,500 And I was told afterwards that they put me in a cardboard box... 38 00:02:58,500 --> 00:03:00,380 I was only a baby, after all. 39 00:03:00,380 --> 00:03:04,460 ..and took me down to the cellar and there we were safe from the bombs. 40 00:03:14,100 --> 00:03:15,980 Those bombs fell everywhere. 41 00:03:15,980 --> 00:03:18,220 First, causing carnage in London. 42 00:03:18,220 --> 00:03:19,740 Then throughout Britain. 43 00:03:19,740 --> 00:03:23,100 Any city with strategic or economic importance 44 00:03:23,100 --> 00:03:25,620 was on the Luftwaffe's target list. 45 00:03:25,620 --> 00:03:28,180 And that meant Cardiff was near the top. 46 00:03:30,860 --> 00:03:32,620 This port was the reason. 47 00:03:32,620 --> 00:03:34,140 In the years before the war, 48 00:03:34,140 --> 00:03:38,380 more coal passed through here than almost anywhere else in the world. 49 00:03:41,420 --> 00:03:44,180 Welsh coal was central to the British economy, 50 00:03:44,180 --> 00:03:46,460 powering industry, railways, shipping. 51 00:03:48,740 --> 00:03:51,340 The docks were a vital part of the war effort. 52 00:03:53,540 --> 00:03:56,580 The Germans wanted to destroy them. 53 00:03:56,580 --> 00:03:59,540 They didn't succeed, but they got perilously close. 54 00:04:12,860 --> 00:04:16,340 On January 2nd 1941, around 100 of their planes 55 00:04:16,340 --> 00:04:19,220 took off from airfields in occupied France 56 00:04:19,220 --> 00:04:21,620 heading directly for South Wales. 57 00:04:27,140 --> 00:04:31,300 The pilots were well briefed. They had clear targets in mind. 58 00:04:31,300 --> 00:04:34,860 And the reason for that was simple - they'd done their research. 59 00:04:38,980 --> 00:04:41,580 The tools of the trade, if you like. Yeah. 60 00:04:41,580 --> 00:04:44,140 These are the documents they took with them. 61 00:04:44,140 --> 00:04:47,380 You've got the docks, you've got the steelworks. 62 00:04:47,380 --> 00:04:49,660 'Chris Going is an aerial archaeologist. 63 00:04:49,660 --> 00:04:52,340 'He has the reconnaissance photographs the Nazis took, 64 00:04:52,340 --> 00:04:55,220 'rather chillingly, even before the war started.' 65 00:04:55,220 --> 00:04:59,700 This is Cardiff, and they have very clearly delineated the targets 66 00:04:59,700 --> 00:05:04,340 that they were going, ultimately, to try to hit. 67 00:05:04,340 --> 00:05:07,180 It was a bureaucratic process, the creation of these things. 68 00:05:07,180 --> 00:05:09,220 The graphics are being printed up, 69 00:05:09,220 --> 00:05:13,380 they're going into a filing cabinet somewhere, in a buff envelope, 70 00:05:13,380 --> 00:05:15,180 stamped "GB". 71 00:05:15,180 --> 00:05:18,500 This one is labelled "4561". 72 00:05:18,500 --> 00:05:23,180 Now, 45 is the code for dock targets. Hence what we're seeing down here. 73 00:05:23,180 --> 00:05:25,420 Hence exactly what you're seeing down there. 74 00:05:25,420 --> 00:05:28,780 They are analysing and pulling apart very carefully 75 00:05:28,780 --> 00:05:30,900 the dock facilities and so on. 76 00:05:30,900 --> 00:05:34,020 Obviously, they've got the steelworks there. 77 00:05:34,020 --> 00:05:36,980 And I have a particular interest in those steelworks, 78 00:05:36,980 --> 00:05:41,620 because my father was ordered to work in them during the war, 79 00:05:41,620 --> 00:05:45,300 because he'd lost his sight as a young man and as a boy. 80 00:05:45,300 --> 00:05:47,740 And they made people like him work in the steelworks. 81 00:05:47,740 --> 00:05:49,860 He was working in the works. Which is what he did. 82 00:05:49,860 --> 00:05:52,220 He was working there. So, he was a target. 83 00:05:52,220 --> 00:05:56,900 Your father worked in target GB 7032. There we are. 84 00:05:56,900 --> 00:06:00,740 And could easily have been, one night, under the aiming point. 85 00:06:00,740 --> 00:06:03,580 And I wouldn't have been here. And you wouldn't have been there. 86 00:06:03,580 --> 00:06:05,700 A sobering thought. Very true. 87 00:06:05,700 --> 00:06:10,780 So, let's go to this picture, then, and if I'm right... 88 00:06:10,780 --> 00:06:14,740 And you'll certainly tell me if I'm wrong! My home... 89 00:06:14,740 --> 00:06:18,060 Can't quite see the house! But that's Pearl Street. 90 00:06:18,060 --> 00:06:20,860 That's Pearl Street, in Splott, which is... 91 00:06:20,860 --> 00:06:25,980 Not that far from lots of targets, which would explain, of course, 92 00:06:25,980 --> 00:06:29,060 why many bombs dropped within the neighbourhood. 93 00:06:29,060 --> 00:06:31,140 We're talking about, what? One kilometre. 94 00:06:31,140 --> 00:06:34,500 You're talking about three-quarters of a second of flying time, really. 95 00:06:34,500 --> 00:06:37,100 Mm. No wonder some of the bombs went astray. 96 00:06:37,100 --> 00:06:38,860 Indeed, a lot of them went astray. 97 00:06:39,940 --> 00:06:42,340 The Luftwaffe certainly had strong intelligence 98 00:06:42,340 --> 00:06:44,340 and lots of accurate information 99 00:06:44,340 --> 00:06:46,540 about the port and industrial targets. 100 00:06:50,740 --> 00:06:54,540 I want to see for myself how so many of the bombs could go astray, 101 00:06:54,540 --> 00:06:56,580 dropping on civilian homes. 102 00:06:59,100 --> 00:07:02,500 OK, everyone secure and happy? Secure and happy. 103 00:07:05,140 --> 00:07:08,940 Nearly 75 years after the German pilots flew over Cardiff, 104 00:07:08,940 --> 00:07:12,420 I'm following their flight path to see the city as they did. 105 00:07:36,700 --> 00:07:40,140 It's fantastic visibility. Isn't it just? Wonderful. 106 00:07:44,900 --> 00:07:50,060 That's the Millennium Stadium. This is Cardiff Castle grounds. Yep. 107 00:07:50,060 --> 00:07:53,380 I think it is, just there, by the river. It has to be. 108 00:07:53,380 --> 00:07:55,100 There's the river. 109 00:07:55,100 --> 00:08:00,140 So, we're going to do, now, as it were, a sort of... We'll go... 110 00:08:00,140 --> 00:08:02,220 ..a dummy bombing run. Yep. 111 00:08:02,220 --> 00:08:06,100 This is almost certainly how you'd have done it. 112 00:08:06,100 --> 00:08:08,660 Looking at it now from this angle, Chris, 113 00:08:08,660 --> 00:08:13,580 we can see the whole of the port over to the east. 114 00:08:13,580 --> 00:08:16,100 It is so compressed, isn't it? 115 00:08:16,100 --> 00:08:20,020 And you have so little time to get rid of your bombs. 116 00:08:20,020 --> 00:08:23,860 You have almost no time. Almost no time at all. 117 00:08:23,860 --> 00:08:27,700 You've got Victorian streets just there, you know, 118 00:08:27,700 --> 00:08:31,500 and they've been completely cleared and replaced to the north of them. 119 00:08:31,500 --> 00:08:33,780 But they were very heavily populated. 120 00:08:33,780 --> 00:08:36,140 They were very heavily populated. Yeah. 121 00:08:36,140 --> 00:08:39,820 So, this was the very reason why Cardiff was bombed. 122 00:08:39,820 --> 00:08:42,580 All of the docks here. 123 00:08:42,580 --> 00:08:46,700 You've got Queen Alexandra Dock just down below us, 124 00:08:46,700 --> 00:08:49,220 which was a major aiming point. 125 00:08:49,220 --> 00:08:54,140 But cheek by jowl, all of the workers' houses nearby, 126 00:08:54,140 --> 00:08:56,140 which became targets, too. 127 00:08:56,140 --> 00:08:58,700 What amazes me is that it looks so easy 128 00:08:58,700 --> 00:09:00,660 when you're looking at a map, doesn't it? 129 00:09:00,660 --> 00:09:02,180 You can imagine them 130 00:09:02,180 --> 00:09:04,980 sitting in Luftwaffe headquarters, or whatever it was, 131 00:09:04,980 --> 00:09:06,980 "We'll bomb that bit there 132 00:09:06,980 --> 00:09:09,420 "and then we'll move on and bomb that bit there". 133 00:09:09,420 --> 00:09:11,900 But it ain't like that, is it? It ain't like that. 134 00:09:11,900 --> 00:09:15,300 And what is cynically called collateral damage, 135 00:09:15,300 --> 00:09:21,020 a lot of this sort of description, masks the reality of what this was, 136 00:09:21,020 --> 00:09:24,700 and it was high explosives on civilians. 137 00:09:30,580 --> 00:09:32,420 Well, I'm trying to imagine 138 00:09:32,420 --> 00:09:35,180 that I'm flying a German bomber at this stage, 139 00:09:35,180 --> 00:09:38,100 and we're flying now at about 160mph. 140 00:09:38,100 --> 00:09:42,380 The Germans would have been flying a bit more than that - about 200, 220. 141 00:09:42,380 --> 00:09:44,620 We're at about 2,000 feet. 142 00:09:44,620 --> 00:09:47,220 They were way above that - 4,000 or 5,000 feet. 143 00:09:47,220 --> 00:09:49,020 Maybe even more than that. 144 00:09:49,020 --> 00:09:51,500 It's a beautiful, sunny day. 145 00:09:51,500 --> 00:09:54,740 Then, for them, of course, it was pitch dark. 146 00:09:54,740 --> 00:09:57,540 And they have... 147 00:09:57,540 --> 00:10:00,860 In fact, we're just over the docks now. 148 00:10:00,860 --> 00:10:05,020 They'd have had literally seconds to get rid of those bombs. Seconds. 149 00:10:05,020 --> 00:10:08,940 And now, even as I speak, we're away from the docks, 150 00:10:08,940 --> 00:10:13,740 and we're into some fairly heavily populated areas. 151 00:10:13,740 --> 00:10:15,820 A lot of houses down there. 152 00:10:15,820 --> 00:10:17,860 They've got to get rid of their bombs. 153 00:10:17,860 --> 00:10:22,980 Demonstrates yet again the random nature of aerial war. 154 00:10:22,980 --> 00:10:25,220 Where would they drop? Who knows? 155 00:10:31,060 --> 00:10:34,300 Like many people in South Wales, my parents may have thought 156 00:10:34,300 --> 00:10:37,940 they'd escaped the worst horrors of the Blitz. 157 00:10:37,940 --> 00:10:42,740 By December 1940, the Nazi bombardment was four months old 158 00:10:42,740 --> 00:10:47,140 and the number of raids over other cities had started to wane. 159 00:10:47,140 --> 00:10:49,380 At Christmas, they stopped altogether. 160 00:10:49,380 --> 00:10:51,220 It was, indeed, a time for peace. 161 00:10:52,660 --> 00:10:57,140 But then came the New Year, a new wave of attacks and renewed terror. 162 00:10:59,820 --> 00:11:04,820 Thursday, January 2nd in 1941 was cold and clear with a full moon. 163 00:11:04,820 --> 00:11:08,500 A so-called "bomber's moon", providing near-perfect visibility. 164 00:11:10,980 --> 00:11:12,980 Sirens wailed 165 00:11:12,980 --> 00:11:17,940 as the advance bombers appeared in the skies above the Bristol Channel. 166 00:11:17,940 --> 00:11:20,940 The first bombs fell at 6.37pm. 167 00:11:22,220 --> 00:11:25,140 More followed for ten hours. 168 00:11:30,060 --> 00:11:34,460 If you were in Cardiff on January 2nd 1941, 169 00:11:34,460 --> 00:11:37,700 you'd probably remember what happened that dreadful night. 170 00:11:37,700 --> 00:11:40,020 If you were here in Grangetown, 171 00:11:40,020 --> 00:11:43,900 on the corner of Corporation Road and Stockland Street, 172 00:11:43,900 --> 00:11:47,900 those events would surely be seared into your memory. 173 00:11:47,900 --> 00:11:50,420 AIR-RAID SIREN WAILS 174 00:11:50,420 --> 00:11:54,300 This dockland neighbourhood was the first to be hit. 175 00:11:54,300 --> 00:11:56,900 Then, as now, it was densely populated 176 00:11:56,900 --> 00:11:59,780 with family homes and small businesses. 177 00:11:59,780 --> 00:12:03,220 On this corner, there used to stand the local bakery, Hollymans. 178 00:12:03,220 --> 00:12:07,380 It was destroyed in the worst single atrocity of the Cardiff Blitz. 179 00:12:08,660 --> 00:12:13,140 I used to go in there and I used to give him a hand kneading the bread. 180 00:12:13,140 --> 00:12:16,020 John Williams is now 89, but in 1941, 181 00:12:16,020 --> 00:12:19,660 he worked at Hollymans as a delivery boy. 182 00:12:19,660 --> 00:12:24,860 On January 2nd, he called by the bakery on his way home. 183 00:12:24,860 --> 00:12:28,140 I'd been out on my round, I'd come back and they said, 184 00:12:28,140 --> 00:12:31,020 "Oh, come in and have some soup before you go home." 185 00:12:31,020 --> 00:12:34,900 So, I went down the cellar with them and I had my soup. 186 00:12:34,900 --> 00:12:38,620 But this night, Bill Holliman said, 187 00:12:38,620 --> 00:12:43,660 "There's a lot of air activity coming across today," he said. 188 00:12:43,660 --> 00:12:45,620 "I think you'd better go home, 189 00:12:45,620 --> 00:12:49,540 "because I think your mother and father might be worried." 190 00:12:49,540 --> 00:12:53,220 You were 14 at the time? I was 14. So, I went home. 191 00:12:53,220 --> 00:12:55,740 'Tragically, many others didn't. 192 00:12:55,740 --> 00:12:59,580 'When the siren sounded, they took shelter in the bakery cellar. 193 00:12:59,580 --> 00:13:01,420 'It took a direct hit.' 194 00:13:01,420 --> 00:13:04,940 I went to work the next day, didn't know anything had happened. 195 00:13:04,940 --> 00:13:09,580 I turned the corner and it was all flat. 196 00:13:09,580 --> 00:13:14,860 They were bringing out bodies wrapped up in sacks and things like that. 197 00:13:14,860 --> 00:13:18,740 But it was never ascertained how many people were down there. 198 00:13:18,740 --> 00:13:22,780 But certainly more than 30. Well, they say there was about 30. 199 00:13:22,780 --> 00:13:26,980 Bill Hollyman, the man who owned the bakery, 200 00:13:26,980 --> 00:13:29,420 he was down in the cellar with everybody else. 201 00:13:29,420 --> 00:13:31,860 Yeah, him and his wife and his daughter 202 00:13:31,860 --> 00:13:35,380 and one of his uncles and his sister. 203 00:13:35,380 --> 00:13:38,780 And all the rest were people that had got called down there. 204 00:13:38,780 --> 00:13:41,500 Just neighbours who were looking for somewhere to shelter. 205 00:13:41,500 --> 00:13:43,620 Yeah, that's right. So, he was... 206 00:13:43,620 --> 00:13:46,500 He thought, obviously, he was doing people a favour 207 00:13:46,500 --> 00:13:50,220 by giving them shelter, and they all got killed. Yes. Yes. 208 00:13:50,220 --> 00:13:52,220 And what were you doing yourself 209 00:13:52,220 --> 00:13:54,620 when the bombs were falling that night? 210 00:13:54,620 --> 00:13:56,500 I was in an Anderson shelter 211 00:13:56,500 --> 00:14:00,180 with my mother and father and my sister and brother, 212 00:14:00,180 --> 00:14:05,540 in one of these Anderson shelters, in 6 Devon Street in Grangetown 213 00:14:05,540 --> 00:14:07,580 And you could hear the bombs falling? 214 00:14:07,580 --> 00:14:10,940 And we heard the bombs falling. And we had a little... 215 00:14:10,940 --> 00:14:14,900 We had a gramophone in there, we used to play records. Oh! 216 00:14:14,900 --> 00:14:17,180 God! Oh... 217 00:14:17,180 --> 00:14:19,860 Were you not scared? No. 218 00:14:19,860 --> 00:14:22,700 Well, I mean, we went to work the next day. 219 00:14:22,700 --> 00:14:24,340 Carry on with life, don't you? 220 00:14:24,340 --> 00:14:26,780 But they weren't so lucky here, were they? No, they weren't. 221 00:14:26,780 --> 00:14:28,420 MUSIC: Come Rain Or Come Shine 222 00:14:38,380 --> 00:14:41,140 This photo shows the gap amongst rows of houses 223 00:14:41,140 --> 00:14:43,180 where the bakery once stood. 224 00:14:48,540 --> 00:14:53,500 What strikes you so powerfully about a story like John's 225 00:14:53,500 --> 00:14:58,940 is the sheer random nature of aerial warfare. 226 00:15:00,460 --> 00:15:03,780 If John had gone down into the shelter that night, 227 00:15:03,780 --> 00:15:05,540 as he very well might have done, 228 00:15:05,540 --> 00:15:08,020 he would have been one of those 30-odd people 229 00:15:08,020 --> 00:15:11,500 who were blown to bits by that bomb. 230 00:15:11,500 --> 00:15:17,100 Instead, he was in another shelter, in another place, 231 00:15:17,100 --> 00:15:19,100 listening to music... 232 00:15:20,660 --> 00:15:23,900 ..and lived to tell us about it today. 233 00:15:44,500 --> 00:15:51,940 That first night of bombing claimed 165 lives and 430 casualties. 234 00:15:51,940 --> 00:15:55,500 It also created memories that can never be erased. 235 00:15:58,140 --> 00:16:00,700 Keith Flynn was a schoolboy at the time. 236 00:16:02,780 --> 00:16:04,460 Fear is a strange thing. 237 00:16:04,460 --> 00:16:07,740 Although we were in very dire circumstances, 238 00:16:07,740 --> 00:16:09,580 could have been killed any moment, 239 00:16:09,580 --> 00:16:14,020 and although bombs passed quite close and felt quite close, 240 00:16:14,020 --> 00:16:20,260 I don't think we ever showed any outward sign of distress in any way. 241 00:16:20,260 --> 00:16:24,900 No... Certainly, no crying or screaming. 242 00:16:24,900 --> 00:16:27,460 Next morning, when the noise had stopped, 243 00:16:27,460 --> 00:16:31,260 it was a brilliant, lovely, crystal clear morning. 244 00:16:31,260 --> 00:16:35,540 Turned the corner into Glamorgan Street, 245 00:16:35,540 --> 00:16:39,420 not knowing that a bomb had fallen there. 246 00:16:39,420 --> 00:16:42,020 And this lady was standing to my right. 247 00:16:42,020 --> 00:16:44,060 As I say, she was standing there. 248 00:16:44,060 --> 00:16:48,500 I remember it was a navy blue overcoat, over her nightclothes. 249 00:16:48,500 --> 00:16:52,580 I do remember her rather long, dark hair. 250 00:16:52,580 --> 00:16:55,500 And I noticed that she was staring at that rubble. 251 00:16:57,260 --> 00:17:00,700 Just staring. Not crying. Not making a sound. 252 00:17:02,300 --> 00:17:05,420 Until she suddenly said, "My mother's under that lot." 253 00:17:10,860 --> 00:17:14,580 And then my aunt and I walked up to Llandaff Cathedral. 254 00:17:14,580 --> 00:17:16,660 Because we... 255 00:17:16,660 --> 00:17:21,980 Simply because we were told that it had been destroyed. 256 00:17:21,980 --> 00:17:25,060 It hadn't been destroyed, but an awful mess. 257 00:17:27,340 --> 00:17:31,780 Whether it was an accident or a deliberate attempt to damage morale, 258 00:17:31,780 --> 00:17:34,980 the Luftwaffe did hit this famous city landmark, 259 00:17:34,980 --> 00:17:36,340 Llandaff Cathedral. 260 00:17:39,260 --> 00:17:42,180 A bomber dropped a parachute mine overhead 261 00:17:42,180 --> 00:17:45,180 and it floated down silently by the spire. 262 00:17:46,900 --> 00:17:49,540 The parachute got caught on that spire, 263 00:17:49,540 --> 00:17:52,740 caused some damage to the spire, just because the sheer weight of it. 264 00:17:52,740 --> 00:17:56,500 But then it dropped, and that's where it fell. 265 00:17:56,500 --> 00:17:58,820 And you see that stone down there. 266 00:17:58,820 --> 00:18:04,180 That is the point at which the land mine hit the ground and exploded. 267 00:18:32,540 --> 00:18:36,060 Dr John Kenyon is the cathedral archivist. 268 00:18:36,060 --> 00:18:39,020 The most damaged part is the south aisle 269 00:18:39,020 --> 00:18:41,580 and the south side of the nave roof, 270 00:18:41,580 --> 00:18:43,700 because all this collapsed 271 00:18:43,700 --> 00:18:47,420 and all the debris came down on part of the cathedral stalls. 272 00:18:50,900 --> 00:18:54,100 Most of the windows were blown out, so the glass all went. 273 00:18:54,100 --> 00:18:57,260 And, obviously, some of the tombs and other items in the cathedral 274 00:18:57,260 --> 00:19:01,380 were damaged simply by the falling debris - stonework and timberwork. 275 00:19:01,380 --> 00:19:04,700 So, it wasn't just the force of the blast. It was... 276 00:19:04,700 --> 00:19:08,260 It was what then came down as a result of the blast. 277 00:19:08,260 --> 00:19:10,940 And so the photographs show this debris 278 00:19:10,940 --> 00:19:13,020 occupying the whole of this area here. 279 00:19:16,420 --> 00:19:20,860 So, we're going up to the archives now, John? Yes, take care. 280 00:19:20,860 --> 00:19:24,420 This is a very old staircase. 281 00:19:24,420 --> 00:19:27,380 So, this is how you get to the office? Indeed. 282 00:19:28,900 --> 00:19:31,580 'Up in the rafters, I'm about to see a fragment 283 00:19:31,580 --> 00:19:35,260 'of what caused so much destruction.' 284 00:19:35,260 --> 00:19:39,980 And here's the evidence for it, with part of the cord 285 00:19:39,980 --> 00:19:42,820 and the parachute itself, which remains in the archives. 286 00:19:42,820 --> 00:19:46,980 I'm sure most of it was taken away elsewhere for souvenirs. 287 00:19:46,980 --> 00:19:49,940 Yes, I imagine there are little bits in lots of houses. 288 00:19:49,940 --> 00:19:52,700 But they were into the cathedral fairly quickly, 289 00:19:52,700 --> 00:19:55,540 trying to remove as much as they could that was salvageable. 290 00:19:55,540 --> 00:19:58,860 And, of course, Dean Jones, here... Very Reverend David Jones. 291 00:19:58,860 --> 00:20:00,860 According to one of the local recollections, 292 00:20:00,860 --> 00:20:02,660 the Dean couldn't find a hard hat, 293 00:20:02,660 --> 00:20:05,300 so he borrowed his wife's colander and came down. 294 00:20:05,300 --> 00:20:08,580 And according to... No great dignity involved in it! 295 00:20:08,580 --> 00:20:11,940 And, of course, stained glass smashed everywhere 296 00:20:11,940 --> 00:20:15,700 and some fragments have been collected. 297 00:20:15,700 --> 00:20:17,660 We don't know where this came from. 298 00:20:17,660 --> 00:20:20,860 You've got a nice squirrel's head there. Oh, right, so it is. 299 00:20:20,860 --> 00:20:22,380 I thought it was a rat. Yes, yes. 300 00:20:22,380 --> 00:20:25,340 No, I think a squirrel rather than a rat! 301 00:20:25,340 --> 00:20:27,700 But here is the Garden of Remembrance, 302 00:20:27,700 --> 00:20:29,180 which you were looking at. 303 00:20:29,180 --> 00:20:32,180 That's where the mine actually landed? This is the crater here. 304 00:20:32,180 --> 00:20:36,420 Yep. And, of course, where the land mine landed, there were burials 305 00:20:36,420 --> 00:20:39,700 and there were bones scattered over Llandaff, 306 00:20:39,700 --> 00:20:41,180 so they had to be gathered up... 307 00:20:41,180 --> 00:20:43,340 Really? They were blown up into the air? 308 00:20:43,340 --> 00:20:45,380 Along with all the memorials, as well, 309 00:20:45,380 --> 00:20:48,500 and so that caused a lot of damage to the houses with falling gravestones. 310 00:20:48,500 --> 00:20:51,940 Within weeks, the cathedral was holding services again, 311 00:20:51,940 --> 00:20:54,100 in part of the building, at least. 312 00:20:54,100 --> 00:20:58,180 Today, of course, it's fully repaired, although one scar remains. 313 00:20:58,180 --> 00:21:01,820 The force of the explosion created a crater 314 00:21:01,820 --> 00:21:03,980 and you can see how big the crater is. 315 00:21:03,980 --> 00:21:08,300 It's surrounded by those rosebushes that were planted since then 316 00:21:08,300 --> 00:21:09,940 to mark out where it fell. 317 00:21:09,940 --> 00:21:11,380 Here's the thing, though. 318 00:21:11,380 --> 00:21:17,180 Had it fallen another 20, 30 yards in any direction, 319 00:21:17,180 --> 00:21:23,340 the damage to the cathedral would have been utterly devastating. 320 00:21:23,340 --> 00:21:26,820 You could say there but for the grace of God. 321 00:21:41,460 --> 00:21:45,900 Near misses, tragedies, tales of incredible courage. 322 00:21:45,900 --> 00:21:50,060 The blitz and subsequent bombing raids created them all. 323 00:21:50,060 --> 00:21:52,580 And many of those stories and visual records 324 00:21:52,580 --> 00:21:55,740 are preserved here at the Glamorgan Archives in Cardiff. 325 00:21:57,780 --> 00:22:00,780 It also stores copies of newspapers from down the decades, 326 00:22:00,780 --> 00:22:02,140 including my own. 327 00:22:05,740 --> 00:22:10,780 I left school when I was 15 and went to work for the Penarth Times, 328 00:22:10,780 --> 00:22:15,580 a little newspaper in a seaside town five or six miles outside Cardiff. 329 00:22:15,580 --> 00:22:19,340 Now, this in front of me, and I'm careful about touching it, 330 00:22:19,340 --> 00:22:24,100 because it is the original, was the copy of the Penarth Times 331 00:22:24,100 --> 00:22:29,460 that was published a few hours before the Cardiff Blitz began. 332 00:22:29,460 --> 00:22:34,580 So, we had been at war already for a couple of years. 333 00:22:34,580 --> 00:22:38,980 Almost no coverage of the war on the front page of the newspaper, 334 00:22:38,980 --> 00:22:42,980 except in the gossip column, the Have You Heard column. 335 00:22:42,980 --> 00:22:46,460 And there are some wonderful little snippets about the war. 336 00:22:46,460 --> 00:22:51,740 One of them, to be proven very soon tragically wrong, says this. 337 00:22:51,740 --> 00:22:57,020 "One of the blessings this Christmas was that there were no air raids." 338 00:22:57,020 --> 00:22:59,940 Within hours, of course, of people reading that, 339 00:22:59,940 --> 00:23:01,700 the blitz was to begin. 340 00:23:03,100 --> 00:23:05,780 There are even jokes in the newspaper 341 00:23:05,780 --> 00:23:09,540 and one that I particularly like is this. 342 00:23:09,540 --> 00:23:13,620 The landlord says to the tenant, "I'm putting your rent up." 343 00:23:13,620 --> 00:23:15,460 The tenant asks why. 344 00:23:15,460 --> 00:23:17,420 The landlord said, 345 00:23:17,420 --> 00:23:22,540 "Because after last night's raid, your house is now detached." 346 00:23:24,380 --> 00:23:28,580 Managing to find humour when a house has been blown away. 347 00:23:28,580 --> 00:23:32,540 But, they had to have something to keep them going, didn't they? 348 00:23:35,980 --> 00:23:38,620 This is St Agnes Road in the Heath, 349 00:23:38,620 --> 00:23:42,620 and we can see an entire section of the street just taken out here. 350 00:23:42,620 --> 00:23:46,500 'The archivist Rhian Phillips has a collection of records 351 00:23:46,500 --> 00:23:50,980 'which give a window into everyday life during that time.' 352 00:23:50,980 --> 00:23:55,580 Rhian, these pictures are interesting material from that time. 353 00:23:55,580 --> 00:23:58,540 I like the air-raid wardens here. Yes. 354 00:23:58,540 --> 00:24:02,340 Because this gives us a nice idea 355 00:24:02,340 --> 00:24:06,900 of the mix of people who were volunteers, in some cases, 356 00:24:06,900 --> 00:24:09,340 in other cases dragooned to become... 357 00:24:09,340 --> 00:24:10,740 Just run me through that. 358 00:24:10,740 --> 00:24:13,700 It's interesting, because looking at the people who are in there, 359 00:24:13,700 --> 00:24:15,180 you realise all the young men 360 00:24:15,180 --> 00:24:17,540 would have been away serving with the forces. 361 00:24:17,540 --> 00:24:20,060 So, it's the older men who weren't in the Army 362 00:24:20,060 --> 00:24:23,780 and the women who were involved with the ARP system. Right. 363 00:24:23,780 --> 00:24:27,660 So, quite a mixture and a social mix and all the rest of it. Definitely. 364 00:24:27,660 --> 00:24:30,460 And here they are, all ready to go. Yes. 365 00:24:30,460 --> 00:24:33,740 Yes, with their gas masks on, ready for action, I think. 366 00:24:33,740 --> 00:24:35,820 Looking terribly sinister. Exactly. 367 00:24:35,820 --> 00:24:38,420 But how important it was that they had those. 368 00:24:38,420 --> 00:24:41,300 And now, the bomb damage. 369 00:24:41,300 --> 00:24:45,460 This one was my old employer, the Western Mail printing works. 370 00:24:45,460 --> 00:24:48,500 Yes, that was the printing works on Tudor Road and, of course, 371 00:24:48,500 --> 00:24:51,140 I mean, that would have been devastating for the Western Mail. 372 00:24:51,140 --> 00:24:54,820 Trying to get their newspaper out to the public, to the presses. 373 00:24:54,820 --> 00:24:59,420 And finding their works then destroyed, really, in this way, 374 00:24:59,420 --> 00:25:01,900 would have had an impact on their business, certainly. 375 00:25:01,900 --> 00:25:04,300 And our newspapers were very important. They were. 376 00:25:04,300 --> 00:25:06,780 At that time especially so, because it was the main means 377 00:25:06,780 --> 00:25:09,620 of people getting the news and finding out what was happening. 378 00:25:09,620 --> 00:25:11,980 Yes, no telly. No, exactly. Yes. Radio, of course. 379 00:25:11,980 --> 00:25:13,780 Yes, there was the wireless. 380 00:25:13,780 --> 00:25:16,940 We mustn't forget the Home Service was very important. Indeed. 381 00:25:16,940 --> 00:25:19,900 Now, this I find absolutely fascinating, 382 00:25:19,900 --> 00:25:22,580 and I know I mustn't pick it up and wave it around, 383 00:25:22,580 --> 00:25:24,420 because it might well fall apart. 384 00:25:24,420 --> 00:25:26,460 But tell me what it is. 385 00:25:26,460 --> 00:25:29,940 It's the log of a primary school, a particular primary school. 386 00:25:29,940 --> 00:25:32,900 Yes, it's the logbook for the Splott Road primary school. 387 00:25:32,900 --> 00:25:36,380 Which is where I went! It was, yes. At the age of four, or nearly five. 388 00:25:36,380 --> 00:25:39,580 Yes. And so this was a diary that the head teacher kept. 389 00:25:39,580 --> 00:25:42,700 We see here an alert at 11.30. All clear, 12. 390 00:25:42,700 --> 00:25:45,420 Alert, 3.10. All clear, 3.30. 391 00:25:45,420 --> 00:25:48,220 This would have been hugely disruptive for the school day 392 00:25:48,220 --> 00:25:51,340 and we see, as well, a note here that attendance was very low. 393 00:25:51,340 --> 00:25:53,460 Only 87 of the children present 394 00:25:53,460 --> 00:25:55,700 owing to the raids the previous night. 395 00:25:55,700 --> 00:25:58,380 So, if the children had been up all night in the shelters 396 00:25:58,380 --> 00:26:00,020 with the bombing going on, 397 00:26:00,020 --> 00:26:02,700 they weren't coming to school the next day due to exhaustion. 398 00:26:02,700 --> 00:26:04,420 But it's as though they're saying... 399 00:26:04,420 --> 00:26:06,180 Because it's all terribly formal 400 00:26:06,180 --> 00:26:08,780 and records must be kept under all circumstances. 401 00:26:08,780 --> 00:26:11,060 It's as if they're saying "Tut, tut, tut". Exactly. 402 00:26:11,060 --> 00:26:12,860 "Children weren't coming to school". 403 00:26:12,860 --> 00:26:15,460 There is that sort of attitude coming in there a little. 404 00:26:15,460 --> 00:26:16,820 Extraordinary, isn't it? 405 00:26:16,820 --> 00:26:19,220 You think, my God, they're lucky to be alive. Yes. 406 00:26:19,220 --> 00:26:22,580 Here's something else that interests me - this map. 407 00:26:22,580 --> 00:26:26,660 A bombing map. This was a bit after the Blitz. This was in...? 408 00:26:26,660 --> 00:26:30,100 This is 1943. May '43, this is. Right. 409 00:26:30,100 --> 00:26:33,740 And it shows us what their target was, 410 00:26:33,740 --> 00:26:36,180 which, obviously, was the docks, as we've been hearing. 411 00:26:36,180 --> 00:26:40,020 Yes. That's what they were really after. 412 00:26:40,020 --> 00:26:43,380 But this is the Splott area. Yes. 413 00:26:43,380 --> 00:26:45,740 Where, of course, I lived. 414 00:26:45,740 --> 00:26:50,020 And this is Pearl Street. Yeah. And there's a bomb... 415 00:26:50,020 --> 00:26:53,700 It looks as if it is just... Right at the end of the street. 416 00:26:53,700 --> 00:26:56,660 Right at the end of the street, which is where I lived. 417 00:26:56,660 --> 00:27:00,620 That's quite chilling, actually, looking and seeing how close... Yes. 418 00:27:00,620 --> 00:27:02,980 Even though I knew about the bombsites, 419 00:27:02,980 --> 00:27:05,820 looking at that map and seeing... 420 00:27:05,820 --> 00:27:11,700 If that bomb had been delayed by a fraction of a second... 421 00:27:11,700 --> 00:27:14,180 I wouldn't be here talking to you now. 422 00:27:14,180 --> 00:27:17,020 Exactly. Yeah, it's scary. Mm. 423 00:27:23,900 --> 00:27:27,580 The bombing permeated every part of life. 424 00:27:27,580 --> 00:27:31,940 Cardiff would endure sporadic bombing and many air-raid warnings, 425 00:27:31,940 --> 00:27:34,100 the horrors of each of these raids 426 00:27:34,100 --> 00:27:36,980 lasting long after the bombers had gone. 427 00:27:36,980 --> 00:27:40,860 For Keith Flynn, the dread of another Blitz was always there. 428 00:27:40,860 --> 00:27:44,020 Probably every night a siren would go, pretty well. 429 00:27:45,660 --> 00:27:49,100 When you'd had a good dose of it and you know what to expect, 430 00:27:49,100 --> 00:27:50,460 that was the worst part. 431 00:27:51,700 --> 00:27:54,420 At about six o'clock every evening... 432 00:27:54,420 --> 00:27:58,660 It was dark in those days. ..I'd go out into the back garden. 433 00:27:58,660 --> 00:28:02,140 And I had my favourite place where I'd stand and look, 434 00:28:02,140 --> 00:28:04,940 to look at the weather. 435 00:28:04,940 --> 00:28:08,940 Was there a moon? Or were clouds coming up? 436 00:28:08,940 --> 00:28:11,100 Or was there going to be rain? 437 00:28:11,100 --> 00:28:14,900 If there was a moon, there was going to be an air raid. 438 00:28:14,900 --> 00:28:17,140 Your life was governed by this sort of thing. 439 00:28:21,340 --> 00:28:24,740 The presence of war and the constant threat of attack was everywhere. 440 00:28:26,980 --> 00:28:28,780 Cardiff Castle. 441 00:28:28,780 --> 00:28:30,580 For centuries, millennia, 442 00:28:30,580 --> 00:28:34,740 a magnificent symbol of defence and defiance. 443 00:28:34,740 --> 00:28:40,580 But during those dark days of 1941, it became something else as well. 444 00:28:40,580 --> 00:28:42,060 A refuge. 445 00:28:47,340 --> 00:28:49,700 Existing spaces within the castle walls 446 00:28:49,700 --> 00:28:52,060 were turned into air-raid shelters. 447 00:28:52,060 --> 00:28:54,860 Four large holes were made in the walls 448 00:28:54,860 --> 00:28:58,140 and ramps were built to allow quick access. 449 00:28:58,140 --> 00:28:59,540 When the siren sounded, 450 00:28:59,540 --> 00:29:02,700 hundreds of people who lived and worked in the city 451 00:29:02,700 --> 00:29:05,060 would rush here looking for safety. 452 00:29:05,060 --> 00:29:06,980 AIR-RAID SIREN WAILS 453 00:29:36,580 --> 00:29:41,260 This really is the grandaddy of all air-raid shelters. 454 00:29:41,260 --> 00:29:43,460 This tunnel... 455 00:29:43,460 --> 00:29:45,100 Just paced it out. 456 00:29:45,100 --> 00:29:47,980 ..is about 200 yards, a bit more than 200 yards, 457 00:29:47,980 --> 00:29:50,100 from one end to the other. 458 00:29:50,100 --> 00:29:54,420 And you can see the benches where people sat. 459 00:29:54,420 --> 00:29:57,260 Not... Not desperately comfortable. 460 00:29:57,260 --> 00:29:59,900 I have to say, I wouldn't want to be sitting here for too long. 461 00:29:59,900 --> 00:30:02,140 You certainly have to sit upright. 462 00:30:02,140 --> 00:30:05,820 And...some comforts. 463 00:30:05,820 --> 00:30:08,620 There's a kitchen. So, if you needed a cup of tea... 464 00:30:13,140 --> 00:30:15,820 Various tins of this, that and the other. 465 00:30:18,580 --> 00:30:21,740 This plan from the time shows how the castle walls 466 00:30:21,740 --> 00:30:24,380 were divided into eight separate sections. 467 00:30:24,380 --> 00:30:27,980 If one took a direct hit, blast barriers made of brick 468 00:30:27,980 --> 00:30:31,060 would protect those in other parts of the castle walls. 469 00:30:45,420 --> 00:30:50,500 And they could fit as many as 1,800 people in here. 470 00:30:50,500 --> 00:30:51,900 1,800 people. 471 00:30:53,980 --> 00:30:56,860 And if the air raid was a really long one 472 00:30:56,860 --> 00:31:00,660 and people needed them - bunk beds. 473 00:31:05,380 --> 00:31:08,180 They could spend a reasonably restful night, 474 00:31:08,180 --> 00:31:11,380 although whether you could get any rest at all 475 00:31:11,380 --> 00:31:14,020 when you're hearing the bombs drop 476 00:31:14,020 --> 00:31:20,140 and waiting for that precious sound of the all-clear, I rather doubt. 477 00:31:22,180 --> 00:31:23,620 EXPLOSIONS 478 00:31:24,900 --> 00:31:28,100 MUSIC: Stardust 479 00:31:43,140 --> 00:31:47,460 Thankfully, the castle shelters were never tested by a direct hit. 480 00:31:52,100 --> 00:31:54,700 Other shelters had been built across the city 481 00:31:54,700 --> 00:31:57,460 in cellars, gardens and streets. 482 00:31:57,460 --> 00:32:00,460 After 75 years, there are few people now 483 00:32:00,460 --> 00:32:04,300 who can tell us what it was like to spend nights in a shelter. 484 00:32:05,660 --> 00:32:07,700 And I went over into this shelter, 485 00:32:07,700 --> 00:32:13,180 where there were about half a dozen people sheltering, 486 00:32:13,180 --> 00:32:15,300 frightened... 487 00:32:15,300 --> 00:32:19,100 in the darkness, because there was no light in there. 488 00:32:19,100 --> 00:32:22,820 The great Welsh entertainer Wyn Calvin, 90 now, 489 00:32:22,820 --> 00:32:25,540 was an Army Cadet during the war. 490 00:32:25,540 --> 00:32:32,860 But I did recognise two of the people who were there, 491 00:32:32,860 --> 00:32:38,540 that I knew were very keen members of the church nearby. 492 00:32:40,020 --> 00:32:45,700 And I thought, "Oh, maybe I'm in good company here." 493 00:32:45,700 --> 00:32:47,860 Because by now, 494 00:32:47,860 --> 00:32:52,460 the screaming sound of a bomb falling, 495 00:32:52,460 --> 00:32:57,340 followed very swiftly by the explosion of the bomb, 496 00:32:57,340 --> 00:32:58,860 and with it all, 497 00:32:58,860 --> 00:33:01,820 the sound of anti-aircraft fire, 498 00:33:01,820 --> 00:33:05,220 made a cacophony of sound that was... 499 00:33:07,140 --> 00:33:10,900 ..frightening and memorable. 500 00:33:12,380 --> 00:33:16,900 Although the sort of memory that one would prefer to forget. 501 00:33:16,900 --> 00:33:19,180 EXPLOSIONS 502 00:33:20,380 --> 00:33:24,460 I was thinking, "Perhaps we should pray. What do we do?" 503 00:33:24,460 --> 00:33:27,700 And the only prayer that I could think of was, 504 00:33:27,700 --> 00:33:30,340 "For what we are now about to receive, 505 00:33:30,340 --> 00:33:32,900 "May the Lord make us truly thankful." 506 00:33:34,420 --> 00:33:36,220 I didn't laugh about it then. 507 00:33:45,780 --> 00:33:48,900 As the Blitz continued and the number of targets increased, 508 00:33:48,900 --> 00:33:51,980 prayers were being said throughout the whole of Wales. 509 00:34:04,460 --> 00:34:08,260 The port of Pembroke in the west had already suffered badly. 510 00:34:08,260 --> 00:34:11,980 In August 1940, a direct hit on one oil tank 511 00:34:11,980 --> 00:34:15,940 sparked the biggest blaze in Britain since the Great Fire of London. 512 00:34:17,060 --> 00:34:19,460 EXPLOSIONS 513 00:34:21,340 --> 00:34:26,620 It burned for nearly three weeks, destroyed 33 million gallons of oil 514 00:34:26,620 --> 00:34:28,820 and threatened to engulf the town. 515 00:34:32,940 --> 00:34:37,380 It took more than 600 firefighters to put it out. 516 00:34:37,380 --> 00:34:39,700 Five of them from Cardiff were killed. 517 00:34:41,380 --> 00:34:43,820 North Wales didn't escape, either. 518 00:34:43,820 --> 00:34:46,940 Bangor, Llandudno and Holyhead were all hit, 519 00:34:46,940 --> 00:34:50,020 primarily because they were on the Luftwaffe's flight path 520 00:34:50,020 --> 00:34:51,780 to the Liverpool docks. 521 00:34:53,260 --> 00:34:57,820 On 24th October 1941, three people in Bangor lost their lives 522 00:34:57,820 --> 00:35:01,140 as a result of parachute land mines. 523 00:35:01,140 --> 00:35:04,060 Ironically, many vital national services, 524 00:35:04,060 --> 00:35:07,860 including the Inland Revenue and the BBC light entertainment department, 525 00:35:07,860 --> 00:35:11,900 had relocated to this area to escape heavy bombing in London. 526 00:35:13,620 --> 00:35:18,420 Bangor became a hive of entertainment industry, 527 00:35:18,420 --> 00:35:22,260 and so many of these great names of variety, 528 00:35:22,260 --> 00:35:26,940 in those days, of entertainment, were there in Bangor. 529 00:35:26,940 --> 00:35:28,900 Some of it... 530 00:35:28,900 --> 00:35:32,220 Some of them stationed there for several years. 531 00:35:32,220 --> 00:35:34,500 'It's That Man Again.' 532 00:35:34,500 --> 00:35:38,460 Among the biggest names was Tommy Handley, who used the Bangor studio 533 00:35:38,460 --> 00:35:41,980 to record his hugely popular wireless programme 534 00:35:41,980 --> 00:35:43,660 It's That Man Again. 535 00:35:43,660 --> 00:35:46,100 '..his infantile indefatigability...' 536 00:35:46,100 --> 00:35:50,700 One evening, while that was being broadcast live, 537 00:35:50,700 --> 00:35:53,940 a plane that had been, they think, 538 00:35:53,940 --> 00:35:58,580 damaged by anti-aircraft fire over Liverpool 539 00:35:58,580 --> 00:36:03,940 was leaping back from whence it had come. 540 00:36:03,940 --> 00:36:07,780 And wanting to get rid of its... 541 00:36:07,780 --> 00:36:10,900 the bomb that it had left onboard, 542 00:36:10,900 --> 00:36:13,020 just let it go 543 00:36:13,020 --> 00:36:15,260 and it fell on Bangor. 544 00:36:15,260 --> 00:36:18,660 It was heard over the air, 545 00:36:18,660 --> 00:36:22,900 but nobody knew what the sound of this in the distance was. 546 00:36:22,900 --> 00:36:28,500 A bomb blast can just be heard in the background of this recording. 547 00:36:28,500 --> 00:36:31,420 '# It ain't what you do... #' 548 00:36:31,420 --> 00:36:33,060 FAINT EXPLOSION 549 00:36:33,060 --> 00:36:34,700 '# It's the way that you do it... #' 550 00:36:34,700 --> 00:36:38,260 But with true Blitz spirit, the show went on. 551 00:36:38,260 --> 00:36:42,700 That was the bombing of Bangor. 552 00:36:47,300 --> 00:36:49,580 North Wales was spared the worst. 553 00:36:49,580 --> 00:36:53,140 The bombing never reached the intensity of the Cardiff Blitz. 554 00:36:53,140 --> 00:36:55,980 Back in the capital, the people continued to call 555 00:36:55,980 --> 00:36:58,740 on their own reserves of courage and resilience. 556 00:36:58,740 --> 00:37:01,180 But they also relied on others. 557 00:37:01,180 --> 00:37:03,740 The war brought out a spirit of selflessness, 558 00:37:03,740 --> 00:37:07,460 typified by one young woman - Edith Shute. 559 00:37:07,460 --> 00:37:09,860 She was 23 when the Cardiff Blitz started. 560 00:37:09,860 --> 00:37:13,180 She had a driving licence and basic first-aid training, 561 00:37:13,180 --> 00:37:16,180 so she volunteered for the ambulance service. 562 00:37:16,180 --> 00:37:18,300 She is now 98. 563 00:37:18,300 --> 00:37:22,740 I drove the ambulance twice or three times, I think, 564 00:37:22,740 --> 00:37:24,900 before I went out on duty. 565 00:37:27,900 --> 00:37:30,860 So, you just did it. Oh, we just did it. 566 00:37:30,860 --> 00:37:33,380 I think a lot of other people did the same. 567 00:37:35,340 --> 00:37:39,020 You did see some terrible things, didn't you? Yes. 568 00:37:39,020 --> 00:37:44,900 On one occasion, we were called out to Violet Row in Whitchurch 569 00:37:44,900 --> 00:37:50,060 and we had to stand by while they dug people out. 570 00:37:50,060 --> 00:37:53,540 Because the bomb had flattened their house? Yes. 571 00:37:53,540 --> 00:37:56,540 And we were... 572 00:37:56,540 --> 00:38:01,340 They loaded up this patient and... 573 00:38:03,260 --> 00:38:09,540 ..we were instructed to go to Whitchurch Hospital. 574 00:38:09,540 --> 00:38:12,420 So, we went into this hospital 575 00:38:12,420 --> 00:38:18,220 and the man came out and said, "Why have you brought this woman here?" 576 00:38:19,700 --> 00:38:23,060 And I cottoned on to what it was all about 577 00:38:23,060 --> 00:38:26,020 and said, "Who am I to say she was dead?" 578 00:38:26,020 --> 00:38:28,860 Because he thought you should have taken her straight to the morgue. 579 00:38:28,860 --> 00:38:30,620 He was a doctor. 580 00:38:30,620 --> 00:38:34,500 I said, "I'm not qualified to," you know, 581 00:38:34,500 --> 00:38:39,340 "to express a person's life or death." 582 00:38:39,340 --> 00:38:41,940 When there were a lot of raids, 583 00:38:41,940 --> 00:38:45,180 you were taking more people to the morgue... 584 00:38:45,180 --> 00:38:49,940 Oh, I went more to the morgue than hospital. 585 00:38:49,940 --> 00:38:53,100 Because it was mostly bodies that were being brought out? 586 00:38:53,100 --> 00:38:54,940 Yes, that's right. 587 00:38:54,940 --> 00:39:00,340 There was one occasion when a bomb had fallen near a bridge 588 00:39:00,340 --> 00:39:03,700 and quite a few people were very badly hurt. 589 00:39:03,700 --> 00:39:05,620 Do you remember that? 590 00:39:05,620 --> 00:39:08,900 A piece of the bridge came down, 591 00:39:08,900 --> 00:39:13,660 bringing three men with it who were trying to repair it. 592 00:39:13,660 --> 00:39:20,260 We were trying to tie one man's legs together 593 00:39:20,260 --> 00:39:23,020 to stop them moving around. 594 00:39:23,020 --> 00:39:29,540 And a lady doctor who lived in that area, she came along and said, 595 00:39:29,540 --> 00:39:32,340 "I wouldn't bother, if I were you, love. 596 00:39:32,340 --> 00:39:35,180 "You'll be lucky if he lasts very long. 597 00:39:35,180 --> 00:39:38,140 "Get him to hospital as quickly as you can." 598 00:39:38,140 --> 00:39:43,740 And one man's blood was running like a river in the gutter. 599 00:39:43,740 --> 00:39:48,180 And then we had to drive to St David's Hospital. 600 00:39:48,180 --> 00:39:51,780 And the one man breathed his last 601 00:39:51,780 --> 00:39:56,060 as we were entering the precincts of the hospital. 602 00:39:56,060 --> 00:40:02,060 Because nothing had prepared you for this. No. No. 603 00:40:02,060 --> 00:40:04,060 Nothing had prepared us for it. 604 00:40:04,060 --> 00:40:06,380 And no training, or proper training, or anything. 605 00:40:06,380 --> 00:40:09,060 No, no. No proper training. So you just had to...? 606 00:40:09,060 --> 00:40:10,740 You had to learn on the spot. 607 00:40:11,940 --> 00:40:16,420 You see, to people listening to you today, they would just say, 608 00:40:16,420 --> 00:40:19,660 "Well, that must have been terrifying, awful." 609 00:40:21,740 --> 00:40:23,700 Well... 610 00:40:23,700 --> 00:40:26,780 If you had somebody in trouble beside you, 611 00:40:26,780 --> 00:40:29,460 you have to do what you can to help. 612 00:40:32,220 --> 00:40:36,060 There were more than a dozen heavy bombing raids on Cardiff in total. 613 00:40:36,060 --> 00:40:39,820 By the end, countless buildings and many lives were in ruins. 614 00:40:41,580 --> 00:40:45,900 But the Luftwaffe wasn't finished with South Wales. 615 00:40:45,900 --> 00:40:50,580 They'd already selected another target 40 miles to the west. 616 00:40:50,580 --> 00:40:53,100 They'd launched a few attacks. 617 00:40:53,100 --> 00:40:57,980 Now, they were to return with unexpected ferocity 618 00:40:57,980 --> 00:41:00,460 and with devastating results. 619 00:41:01,620 --> 00:41:04,100 AIR-RAID SIREN WAILS 620 00:41:04,100 --> 00:41:07,660 Like Cardiff, prewar Swansea was a crucial port 621 00:41:07,660 --> 00:41:10,700 and a centre for military-based industries. 622 00:41:10,700 --> 00:41:14,820 So, it was inevitable the city would appear on the Nazis' hit list. 623 00:41:15,980 --> 00:41:22,420 This image, which is, I think, quite the most chilling graphic 624 00:41:22,420 --> 00:41:26,060 you can possibly look at of Swansea, 625 00:41:26,060 --> 00:41:32,580 shows just how dense the dock facilities were 626 00:41:32,580 --> 00:41:36,500 and how close by the housing was. 627 00:41:36,500 --> 00:41:39,300 And literally, if you were... 628 00:41:39,300 --> 00:41:41,740 If you press a button a second late, two seconds late, 629 00:41:41,740 --> 00:41:46,180 your bombs will, without any doubt, have gone into the town. 630 00:41:46,180 --> 00:41:50,780 And, indeed, the early attacks in February 1941 631 00:41:50,780 --> 00:41:55,500 effectively destroyed the... sort of the city centre. 632 00:41:55,500 --> 00:41:57,340 They missed the docks. 633 00:41:57,340 --> 00:42:00,820 They really did miss the docks. That is extraordinary, isn't it? 634 00:42:00,820 --> 00:42:04,420 And they flattened the city centre. 635 00:42:04,420 --> 00:42:07,340 What was not happening during these raids, of course, 636 00:42:07,340 --> 00:42:11,900 was great squadrons of massed bombers coming in. 637 00:42:11,900 --> 00:42:14,260 It was very different from that. 638 00:42:14,260 --> 00:42:18,500 But you believe, in a sense, even more frightening. 639 00:42:18,500 --> 00:42:21,660 If you are looking at two or three hours 640 00:42:21,660 --> 00:42:25,020 and 50 or 60 aircraft, maybe 100 aircraft, 641 00:42:25,020 --> 00:42:29,460 they're coming in at the rate of sort one every minute, minute and a half. 642 00:42:30,780 --> 00:42:37,580 You know, there you are, you can hear the engines rising, it's coming in. 643 00:42:37,580 --> 00:42:40,340 Then you would probably hear bombs. 644 00:42:40,340 --> 00:42:44,140 And then you'd think there's another one coming, and another one coming. 645 00:42:44,140 --> 00:42:47,340 Psychological effect. Another one coming, and another, and another. 646 00:42:47,340 --> 00:42:50,980 And that must have had a really perturbing effect. 647 00:42:50,980 --> 00:42:52,820 The psychological effect. 648 00:42:52,820 --> 00:42:55,140 "Is the next one going to drop on me?" Absolutely. 649 00:43:03,900 --> 00:43:05,420 Viewed from the air, 650 00:43:05,420 --> 00:43:08,420 you can see why this place was a sitting duck for the Luftwaffe. 651 00:43:10,260 --> 00:43:14,060 Even without any modern navigational aids, 652 00:43:14,060 --> 00:43:16,340 the Germans would have had absolutely no trouble 653 00:43:16,340 --> 00:43:20,140 finding Swansea even at night, because, of course, 654 00:43:20,140 --> 00:43:24,500 you just come up the Channel, you stick to the coast, and there it is. 655 00:43:24,500 --> 00:43:28,140 And you've got the hills behind to tell you where the port is, 656 00:43:28,140 --> 00:43:31,180 even if you can't see the actual dock buildings. 657 00:43:31,180 --> 00:43:34,140 So, an easy target to find. 658 00:43:34,140 --> 00:43:37,660 And, as we now know, tragically, 659 00:43:37,660 --> 00:43:44,620 a very easy target to cause massive, massive damage to. 660 00:43:44,620 --> 00:43:47,300 Swansea was so badly hit. 661 00:43:56,780 --> 00:43:59,700 All of the focus... 662 00:43:59,700 --> 00:44:05,060 is it just that area enclosed by that outer breakwater there. 663 00:44:05,060 --> 00:44:09,700 Yeah, that's it. Yes, we can see it in one sweep. Absolutely. 664 00:44:09,700 --> 00:44:13,780 That's the entire old centre, isn't it, which was completely flattened. 665 00:44:13,780 --> 00:44:18,100 Yes, exactly. What we're looking at now... 666 00:44:18,100 --> 00:44:22,780 In Feb '41, there were three attacks in so many days 667 00:44:22,780 --> 00:44:25,100 and they destroyed the city centre. 668 00:44:28,220 --> 00:44:32,140 Shudder to think what those few days must have been like, eh? Ohh. 669 00:44:32,140 --> 00:44:33,380 Horrifying. 670 00:44:36,580 --> 00:44:42,260 Just to give you an idea of the concentrated nature of the bombing, 671 00:44:42,260 --> 00:44:46,980 40 acres of Swansea town centre was flattened. 672 00:44:46,980 --> 00:44:52,260 That is the most concentrated bit of bombing of the war. 673 00:44:59,180 --> 00:45:01,820 Between 19th and 21st February, 674 00:45:01,820 --> 00:45:06,580 bombs fell for a total of 13 hours and 48 minutes. 675 00:45:06,580 --> 00:45:08,820 They set whole districts ablaze. 676 00:45:10,940 --> 00:45:12,940 This is the only known photograph 677 00:45:12,940 --> 00:45:15,740 taken during the three nights' blitz. 678 00:45:15,740 --> 00:45:20,220 The attacks killed 230 people and injured more than 400. 679 00:45:21,420 --> 00:45:26,260 857 properties were destroyed, 11,000 damaged, 680 00:45:26,260 --> 00:45:28,860 and 7,000 people were made homeless. 681 00:45:33,420 --> 00:45:37,540 Elaine Kidwell was the youngest warden in Britain. She was 17. 682 00:45:38,980 --> 00:45:43,700 What they said to me was, "18?" "I'm in my 18th year," I said. 683 00:45:43,700 --> 00:45:45,180 So, I didn't lie. 684 00:45:46,460 --> 00:45:52,380 So, let's just go back to the Swansea Blitz, and it was so bad. 685 00:45:52,380 --> 00:45:53,820 It was, yes. 686 00:45:53,820 --> 00:45:56,340 Just describe what it was like on those nights 687 00:45:56,340 --> 00:45:58,860 when they were bombing and bombing and bombing. 688 00:45:58,860 --> 00:46:02,500 Well, we'd come running out and we'd be blowing our whistles and yelling. 689 00:46:02,500 --> 00:46:04,260 And the shelters were open. 690 00:46:04,260 --> 00:46:07,500 Stand and say, "Come on, come on, get in there." 691 00:46:07,500 --> 00:46:10,620 And they were machine-gunning the balloons down, 692 00:46:10,620 --> 00:46:13,020 because they were over the docks, you see. 693 00:46:13,020 --> 00:46:16,060 And I remember running along Quay Parade for my life, 694 00:46:16,060 --> 00:46:18,660 because the bullets were coming behind me, you know. 695 00:46:18,660 --> 00:46:22,660 And then I dived into a doorway and they went past, you know. 696 00:46:22,660 --> 00:46:27,500 Then I heard a whistle going, blowing frantically. 697 00:46:27,500 --> 00:46:31,780 I rushed down the steps and over to... 698 00:46:31,780 --> 00:46:33,900 where the whistling was coming from. 699 00:46:33,900 --> 00:46:36,620 And when I got there - it was in Quay Parade - 700 00:46:36,620 --> 00:46:39,900 there was a warden leaning over a body on the ground. 701 00:46:39,900 --> 00:46:42,500 So, I went up and he said, "This is for you." 702 00:46:42,500 --> 00:46:44,780 He said, "You'd know what to do." "Where is it?" 703 00:46:44,780 --> 00:46:47,300 He said, "I don't know. He's bleeding from somewhere." 704 00:46:47,300 --> 00:46:51,420 Anyway, it was black, you see, you couldn't tell. And I said... 705 00:46:51,420 --> 00:46:53,700 The man, he was unconscious, thank goodness. 706 00:46:53,700 --> 00:46:56,540 Anyway, I felt around and then where his leg was, there was nothing. 707 00:46:56,540 --> 00:46:59,180 "Oh, God, blood. The leg's gone." 708 00:46:59,180 --> 00:47:04,220 So, put a tourniquet on him now and put everything right. 709 00:47:04,220 --> 00:47:08,660 In any case, this ambulance came along, which was really a van. 710 00:47:08,660 --> 00:47:13,220 And he said to me, "All right?" I said, "Yes." I said, "I'm fine." 711 00:47:13,220 --> 00:47:17,140 "Right," he said. "Listen now," he said. "You saved his life. 712 00:47:17,140 --> 00:47:20,660 "All right, he hasn't got a leg, but he's going to live." 713 00:47:20,660 --> 00:47:24,980 Anyway, he came to see me some years later and he said, 714 00:47:24,980 --> 00:47:27,700 "How in hell did you get through the Blitz? 715 00:47:27,700 --> 00:47:29,700 "Cos you were always out in it." 716 00:47:29,700 --> 00:47:32,340 I said, "I rather would have been out than been in," 717 00:47:32,340 --> 00:47:34,340 cos your imagination can... when you're in 718 00:47:34,340 --> 00:47:36,580 and you hear the banging and the banging. 719 00:47:36,580 --> 00:47:39,500 When you're out, you can see what's happening, you know. 720 00:47:39,500 --> 00:47:43,700 So, there we were. But the damage was so bad. 721 00:47:43,700 --> 00:47:48,300 I remember I went up the top of one street where... 722 00:47:48,300 --> 00:47:53,260 there were three men now of a bomb squad, taking a bomb apart. 723 00:47:53,260 --> 00:47:57,100 And I got up just before the explosion 724 00:47:57,100 --> 00:47:59,740 and, of course, it was terrible. 725 00:47:59,740 --> 00:48:02,620 The three had been blown to bits. 726 00:48:02,620 --> 00:48:06,940 There were bits of bodies everywhere, all blood... 727 00:48:06,940 --> 00:48:12,740 And that spot I can still go up and I avert my...like that. 728 00:48:12,740 --> 00:48:15,940 I know the exact spot where those three were killed, and I knew them. 729 00:48:19,020 --> 00:48:21,900 She was just a girl and she was seeing things 730 00:48:21,900 --> 00:48:24,980 most of us would hope never to have to see. 731 00:48:27,460 --> 00:48:29,940 There was one thing I haven't forgotten, 732 00:48:29,940 --> 00:48:33,780 but I'm coming to terms even though it's a long time ago. 733 00:48:33,780 --> 00:48:35,620 I was coming off duty 734 00:48:35,620 --> 00:48:40,860 and they were bringing the dead from where there was a lot of casualties. 735 00:48:40,860 --> 00:48:46,260 And in the back of this car, now I can see... The hood was down. 736 00:48:46,260 --> 00:48:52,260 And I could see two little babies in a white box like that. 737 00:48:52,260 --> 00:48:54,380 And one was lying... 738 00:48:54,380 --> 00:48:58,580 The little girl lying like this, and the little boy was a bit older, 739 00:48:58,580 --> 00:49:01,420 had his arm on her, but he was dead, too. 740 00:49:02,900 --> 00:49:05,340 And I still can't get over it. 741 00:49:05,340 --> 00:49:09,220 But I'm not grieving and I'm glad that they both went together. 742 00:49:09,220 --> 00:49:10,500 You know what I mean? 743 00:49:10,500 --> 00:49:14,860 But the waste of it, you know. It was so wicked. 744 00:49:14,860 --> 00:49:17,580 Yeah. And they were still bombing us. 745 00:49:17,580 --> 00:49:21,580 That night, I remember going up and seeing 746 00:49:21,580 --> 00:49:25,700 that from Swansea Castle down to... 747 00:49:25,700 --> 00:49:27,740 Oh. 748 00:49:27,740 --> 00:49:31,580 ..the bottom of St Helens Road was burning. 749 00:49:31,580 --> 00:49:33,580 And it burned... The whole swathe of it? 750 00:49:33,580 --> 00:49:35,420 Yeah. And it burned from... 751 00:49:37,020 --> 00:49:39,860 ..that side to that side, the same. 752 00:49:39,860 --> 00:49:41,820 Everything was in flames. 753 00:49:41,820 --> 00:49:43,900 And people were running for the beach. 754 00:49:43,900 --> 00:49:46,180 Because if the worst came to the worst, 755 00:49:46,180 --> 00:49:48,220 they could get into the water, see? 756 00:49:48,220 --> 00:49:53,060 The heat must have been tremendous. Terrible. It sounds like a hell. 757 00:49:53,060 --> 00:49:55,420 It was hell. There was no other word for it. 758 00:50:10,300 --> 00:50:13,100 'Morning is breaking over Wales at war.' 759 00:50:13,100 --> 00:50:15,220 Dylan Thomas was a Swansea man. 760 00:50:15,220 --> 00:50:17,820 His writing showed how haunted he was 761 00:50:17,820 --> 00:50:20,140 by the destruction of his hometown. 762 00:50:20,140 --> 00:50:23,980 Thomas had been declared medically unfit for military service, 763 00:50:23,980 --> 00:50:26,260 so he spent much of the war writing scripts 764 00:50:26,260 --> 00:50:29,620 for the Ministry of Information propaganda films. 765 00:50:29,620 --> 00:50:31,700 'In the furnaces of Llanelli...' 766 00:50:31,700 --> 00:50:33,100 Those who studied his life 767 00:50:33,100 --> 00:50:37,540 believe he was actually in Swansea at the height of the attacks. 768 00:50:37,540 --> 00:50:40,420 There's testimony from a very close friend of his 769 00:50:40,420 --> 00:50:42,180 who saw Dylan and his wife, Caitlin, 770 00:50:42,180 --> 00:50:44,260 walking through the streets of bombed Swansea 771 00:50:44,260 --> 00:50:46,580 after the Blitz in that February. 772 00:50:46,580 --> 00:50:48,340 And Dylan turned to his friend 773 00:50:48,340 --> 00:50:50,740 and said, "Our Swansea has died." 774 00:50:50,740 --> 00:50:54,660 So, parts of the town that he knew and loved and was so familiar with, 775 00:50:54,660 --> 00:50:59,060 had written about in his short stories, were just flattened. 776 00:50:59,060 --> 00:51:01,740 In a sense, what one would love to see 777 00:51:01,740 --> 00:51:04,740 is his chronicling of the terrible events 778 00:51:04,740 --> 00:51:07,820 of early 1941 here in Swansea. 779 00:51:07,820 --> 00:51:11,260 But he didn't do that, did he? He wrote later. That's right. 780 00:51:11,260 --> 00:51:17,300 It took him six years to absorb those traumatic events of Swansea, 781 00:51:17,300 --> 00:51:20,140 the destruction of the Swansea he knew and loved. 782 00:51:20,140 --> 00:51:26,060 Return Journey was the great play that he wrote in 1947. 783 00:51:26,060 --> 00:51:28,940 Yes, that's right. This is the original script. 784 00:51:28,940 --> 00:51:31,820 This is the actual broadcast script that he'd have read from. Yes. 785 00:51:31,820 --> 00:51:34,340 He was very keen to get every detail right in this script, 786 00:51:34,340 --> 00:51:36,500 to the extent that he checked the order 787 00:51:36,500 --> 00:51:38,540 of all the shops that had been bombed, 788 00:51:38,540 --> 00:51:40,540 to make sure he had them in the correct order 789 00:51:40,540 --> 00:51:42,740 when he was writing about them in this piece. 790 00:51:42,740 --> 00:51:46,500 'WHSmith, Boots Cash Chemists, Leslie's Stores, Upson's Shoes, 791 00:51:46,500 --> 00:51:49,860 'Prince of Wales, Tucker's Fish, Stead And Simpson, 792 00:51:49,860 --> 00:51:53,180 'all the shops bombed and vanished.' 793 00:51:53,180 --> 00:51:55,980 But he even wrote to a former grammar school master of his 794 00:51:55,980 --> 00:51:59,220 to get the names of those former boys who had died in the war 795 00:51:59,220 --> 00:52:00,740 who were on the roll of honour 796 00:52:00,740 --> 00:52:03,020 so he could include their names in this broadcast. 797 00:52:03,020 --> 00:52:04,340 BELL TOLLS 798 00:52:04,340 --> 00:52:05,980 'Evans KJ. 799 00:52:05,980 --> 00:52:07,420 'Haynes GC. 800 00:52:07,420 --> 00:52:09,580 'Roberts IL. 801 00:52:09,580 --> 00:52:11,380 'Moxham J. 802 00:52:11,380 --> 00:52:14,180 'Thomas H. Baines W.' 803 00:52:14,180 --> 00:52:17,900 And it's not an attempt to put a gloss on what happened 804 00:52:17,900 --> 00:52:19,340 in any sense at all. 805 00:52:19,340 --> 00:52:21,980 It's not lyrical in that sense, is it? 806 00:52:21,980 --> 00:52:25,300 In fact, it's brutally truthful. Yes. But there is... 807 00:52:25,300 --> 00:52:28,500 Well, there's a beauty in it. Yes, and it's an elegy. 808 00:52:28,500 --> 00:52:30,500 It's a very beautiful elegy, I think, 809 00:52:30,500 --> 00:52:34,780 to a lost Swansea, a lost childhood, which resonated with so many people. 810 00:52:56,300 --> 00:53:00,100 It's a very, very long time since Dylan Thomas wrote that play. 811 00:53:00,100 --> 00:53:01,900 He was in his thirties then. 812 00:53:01,900 --> 00:53:06,060 And, obviously, nothing that he describes is as it was then. 813 00:53:06,060 --> 00:53:10,420 This is the new Swansea. None of the old remains. 814 00:53:10,420 --> 00:53:12,540 But his words remain, 815 00:53:12,540 --> 00:53:16,820 and they are as colourful and evocative today 816 00:53:16,820 --> 00:53:19,220 as they were when he wrote them. 817 00:53:19,220 --> 00:53:21,420 Let's give you another flavour of it. 818 00:53:23,260 --> 00:53:25,860 "Boys romped, calling high and clear, 819 00:53:25,860 --> 00:53:28,380 "on top of a levelled chemist's and a shoe-shop, 820 00:53:28,380 --> 00:53:29,700 "and a little girl..." 821 00:53:29,700 --> 00:53:31,100 "..wearing a man's cap, 822 00:53:31,100 --> 00:53:33,860 "threw a snowball in a chill deserted garden 823 00:53:33,860 --> 00:53:37,340 "that had once been the Jug and Bottle of the Prince of Wales." 824 00:53:37,340 --> 00:53:39,340 "..for where the squat and tall shops 825 00:53:39,340 --> 00:53:41,380 "had shielded the town from the sea 826 00:53:41,380 --> 00:53:45,580 "lay their blitzed flat graves marbled with snow 827 00:53:45,580 --> 00:53:47,900 "and headstoned with fences." 828 00:53:47,900 --> 00:53:52,420 "David Evans, Gregory Confectioners, Bovega, Burton's, Lloyds Bank, 829 00:53:52,420 --> 00:53:54,060 "and nothing." 830 00:53:58,060 --> 00:54:02,140 One of the pubs reduced to dust and rubble was the King's Head. 831 00:54:02,140 --> 00:54:04,780 It had been home to Marion Garnett's family. 832 00:54:04,780 --> 00:54:07,220 She was just a baby at the time. 833 00:54:07,220 --> 00:54:10,380 On the third night of the blitz, 834 00:54:10,380 --> 00:54:14,020 my mother was standing opposite our pub 835 00:54:14,020 --> 00:54:20,260 and a man came down and said to her, "You'd better move from there, 836 00:54:20,260 --> 00:54:24,660 "because that pub will be up in flames." 837 00:54:24,660 --> 00:54:29,300 With the centre of Swansea burning, they had to flee for their lives. 838 00:54:29,300 --> 00:54:33,180 My mother told me that she walked over bodies 839 00:54:33,180 --> 00:54:36,380 and then we all went down to the air-raid shelter. 840 00:54:38,180 --> 00:54:41,180 The family survived, but the pub was gone. 841 00:54:41,180 --> 00:54:44,260 All they had left were the clothes they wore. 842 00:54:44,260 --> 00:54:47,100 My mother was in quite a bad emotional state 843 00:54:47,100 --> 00:54:49,860 because, of course, she had lost everything. 844 00:54:49,860 --> 00:54:51,860 But she had a glimmer of hope, 845 00:54:51,860 --> 00:54:54,620 knowing my father would be coming home 846 00:54:54,620 --> 00:54:58,060 and then, perhaps, life would start as normal again. 847 00:54:59,700 --> 00:55:01,020 But it never did. 848 00:55:01,020 --> 00:55:04,020 Marion's father had been serving in Africa. 849 00:55:04,020 --> 00:55:05,660 The year after the blitz, 850 00:55:05,660 --> 00:55:09,380 the family received the worst possible news. 851 00:55:09,380 --> 00:55:14,220 My mother and I had been to the Post Office to collect her Army pay. 852 00:55:14,220 --> 00:55:19,340 And we came back, and Nana - I can see it now in my mind's eye - 853 00:55:19,340 --> 00:55:22,460 was waving a telegram. 854 00:55:22,460 --> 00:55:25,260 And my mother took it. 855 00:55:25,260 --> 00:55:32,260 She opened it and she sat down on a big armchair near the fire... 856 00:55:34,140 --> 00:55:37,100 ..and started to cry. 857 00:55:38,460 --> 00:55:43,060 And that scene is, really, my first memory, 858 00:55:43,060 --> 00:55:46,460 and it's something that will always be with me. 859 00:55:46,460 --> 00:55:49,180 The sadness was so intense. 860 00:55:49,180 --> 00:55:53,780 Not only my mother had lost her house and home. 861 00:55:53,780 --> 00:55:56,700 Now she'd lost her husband and my father. 862 00:56:02,180 --> 00:56:05,580 Her family devastated, a town destroyed. 863 00:56:05,580 --> 00:56:08,180 In Swansea, many lives were changed for ever. 864 00:56:12,340 --> 00:56:15,540 But what the bombs and the flames never killed 865 00:56:15,540 --> 00:56:17,620 was the spirit of the locals. 866 00:56:17,620 --> 00:56:21,660 It survived and the place itself was rebuilt. 867 00:56:21,660 --> 00:56:23,940 The centre is now full of tall buildings, 868 00:56:23,940 --> 00:56:26,620 unrecognisable from what it was before the war. 869 00:56:28,140 --> 00:56:30,780 Despite all the careful preparation and planning, 870 00:56:30,780 --> 00:56:35,420 Hitler's blitzkrieg, lightning war, failed to break Britain. 871 00:56:38,700 --> 00:56:43,380 I know now just how close his pilots came to dropping a bomb on my home. 872 00:56:43,380 --> 00:56:46,660 And yet it, like the people and the nation, 873 00:56:46,660 --> 00:56:48,580 stood firm against the onslaught. 874 00:56:55,220 --> 00:56:57,220 Back on the ground in Splott, 875 00:56:57,220 --> 00:57:01,980 the bombsites that were once my forbidden playgrounds are long gone. 876 00:57:01,980 --> 00:57:05,580 In their place, family homes for the next generation. 877 00:57:07,540 --> 00:57:10,660 Childhood produces a million false memories 878 00:57:10,660 --> 00:57:13,700 and, of course, I was a baby when the bombs were actually falling. 879 00:57:13,700 --> 00:57:16,860 So, it's been fascinating to talk to people who were older 880 00:57:16,860 --> 00:57:19,060 and who really do remember what it was like 881 00:57:19,060 --> 00:57:20,780 when the bombs were dropping. 882 00:57:20,780 --> 00:57:25,260 What I remember, and this is a real memory, is playing on the bombsites. 883 00:57:25,260 --> 00:57:29,700 They were all around here, the bombs dropped on these streets, 884 00:57:29,700 --> 00:57:35,180 and so there'd be that gap, and the house would be utterly destroyed. 885 00:57:35,180 --> 00:57:38,300 And now, well, the streets are back to normal, 886 00:57:38,300 --> 00:57:41,540 houses are painted a little more brightly than they were then. 887 00:57:41,540 --> 00:57:43,740 And things have changed. 888 00:57:43,740 --> 00:57:45,940 Everything has changed. 889 00:57:45,940 --> 00:57:51,460 Our memories, though, for those who really can remember, are vivid.