RAIDS ON LONDON

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21207, 2 September 1940, Page 7

RAIDS ON LONDON

SIX ALARMS IN DAY

CASUALTIES AND FIRES PLANES SHOT DOWN (United Press Assn. —Elec. Tel. Copyright) LONDON, Sept. 1 “ Here they are again,” commented thousands of Londoners going to work when the sirens broke through the roar of traffic on Saturday morning. The alarm resulted from the appearance of a dozen German bombers with an escort of 20 Messerschmitts over the south-east of England. A stronger force of bombers and 30 more lighters soon followed. Half an hour after crossing the coast raiders were seen returning to the Channel, widely scattered, with British fighters darting in and out of the enemy’s broken formations. Meanwhile, London’s trains and buses carried on. Thirteen of the raiders are reported to have been shot down in a series of encounters over the south-east of England, extending from the point where the British fighters first made contact with the enemy in the English Channel. London had six alarms during the day, two of them after sunset. Before the third warning was sounded a raider diving from the clouds dropped bombs in a London area crowded with shoppers. Women and children rushed for shelter and fire brigades and air raid squads quickly turned out. Mass Raids Resumed It was only a few hours after the last enemy night-bomber had gone home that the German Air Force early on Saturday morning resumed its daylight mass raids on south-east of England, says a British official wireless message. Throughout the morning Spitfire and Hurricane pilots raced up into the sky to engage the enemy. Time and again they broke up bomber formations and then harried the German pilots striving to reach thdir target. Anti-aircraft batteries also put up a terrific protective barrage. The first raid took place shortly after seven o’clock, when formations totalling about 100 German bombers and fighter escorts passed the coast between the North Foreland and Dungeness, hoping to bomb Kent and Surrey aerodromes. Hardly had the raiders been driven off when a second flight of about 50 aircraft passed the coast. An hour later several more enemy formations attacked shipping in the Thames Estuary. Large numbers of enemy aeroplanes made further attacks on the south-east of England in the evening, crossing the Kent coast in successive waves at short intervals. Machines operating singly or in small formations bombed industrial districts in the north-west and northeast. In one north-west city incendiary bombs started a large number of fires, but all except two of them were put out and these two are now under control. The extent of the damage caused was slight and casualties were small in number. Some casualties were reported in the London area. Women and Child Killed Agency reports tell of extensive raids on Saturday night on the Midlands and the north-east. In one small Midlands town two women and a child are reported to have been killed by a high explosive bomb, and on a north-east town more than 50 high-explosive bombs were dropped. Most of them fell in the outskirts, but two bombs were dropped in the centre of the town, making huge craters and breaking a gas main. London had a short air raid warning about 10 o’clock on Sunday morning. No machines were seen over London itself. Large enemy forces of bombers and fighter escorts, however, appeared over the Thames, but a heavy anti-aircraft barrage and action by British fighters broke them up. Some bombs were dropped and they did a certain amount of damage. Barrage Balloons Shot Down Messerschmitts shot down some barrage balloons over the southeast of England on Saturday. The crew guarding one balloon brought down a raider with their rifles. During the raid on the balloons, the sky was filled with bursting shells, and shrapnel and spent incendiary bullets spattered the streets like hail.

The raiders found the reception too hot, and retire.d after shooting down “Dockyard Dolly,” “Undulating Ursula” and Dopey Joe,” which are Royal Air Force pet names for balloons.