Tag Archives: second world war

Superb TV programme: The Bombs that changed Britain

By Paul Walter | Wed 29th November 2017 - 3:00 pm

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The devastation of South Hallsville School in East Ham, London after a bomb hit it in 1940.

The BBC is to be congratulated on a superb history series currently going out on BBC2 – Blitz: The bombs that changed Britain.

We often think of the wartime blitz and see film footage of mounds of rubble and people trying to find loved ones.

But this TV series goes one step further and very specifically outlines the terrible impact of one bomb (in each of four episodes).

In the first programme, now on BBC iPlayer for the next 28 days, they follow the story of an unexploded bomb which fell on Number 5 Martindale Road, Canning Town in London. Because it was unexploded, the whole area had to be evacuated. This led to 600 people being crammed into nearby South Hallsville School. The idea was that people would be quickly moved from the school out of danger. But due to bureaucratic incompetence and official indifference to the plight of the mainly poor people there, the numbers mushroomed over several nights. Then the inevitable happened and the school was bombed, with horrific and widespread devastation.

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Paddy Ashdown talks about his new book “A brilliant little operation”

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 23rd August 2012 - 12:57 pm

I had to stifle a giggle as Paddy Ashdown strode on to the stage at the Edinburgh Book Festival and said:

What are you lot doing here at ten in the morning?

There was a certain irony at this coming from the man who notoriously held meetings at the crack of dawn when he was party leader.

The morning after his “why the world will never be the same again” talk, he was back to tell us about his new book, “A brilliant little operation”, about the founding raid of the Special Boat Service, the special forces unit where he would later serve. …