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Aug 29, 2023 · Did your street make it unscathed through the second world war? The Layers of London website provides an interactive bomb damage map of London. The map is colour-coded to show area of light...
During the Second World War, St Marylebone and Paddington suffered extensive bomb damage. The two rail heads at Paddington and Marylebone Stations and Church Street, caught in the flight path between them, were prime bombing targets This bombing map was made in 1946, immediately after the Second World War and formed the basis on which the ...
- What Was The Bomb Census?
- How Was The Bomb Census Information gathered?
- How to Search For Bomb Census Records and Air Raid Damage Files
- Searching For Casualties by Name
- National Fire Service and Air Raid Precautions
- Other Records of Air Raid Attacks and Damage
- Records in Other Archives and Online Sources
- Further Reading
In September 1940 the government started to collect and collate information relating to damage sustained during bombing raids. This was known as the ‘Bomb Census’. Initially, only information relating to London, Birmingham and Liverpool was collated but by September 1941 the Bomb Census had been extended to cover the rest of the UK. Its purpose was...
Information was gathered locally by police, air raid wardens and military personnel. They noted where, when and what types of bombs had fallen during an air raid and passed this on to the Ministry of Home Security Bomb Census Organisation where regional technical officers plotted the positions of the bombs onto maps. These bomb plots along with the...
A search for documents at The National Archives begins in our online catalogue. The catalogue contains short descriptions of the records and a document reference for each – you will need the document reference before you can see the records. The records themselves are not viewable online so to see them you will have to either visit us in Kew or ord...
Try searching on the Commonwealth War Graves Commissionwebsite to trace a record by name of someone killed by a bomb. Try variations of a name if your first search does not yield results. For example, Bert may be listed as Albert, Bill as William, and so on. Otherwise, try consulting the eight volumes of Civilian War Dead 1939-1945, published by th...
For the first two years of the war, fires were dealt with by locally run Auxiliary Fire Services, staffed by men who were unable to serve in the armed forces. In 1941 these were replaced with the National Fire Service (NFS). Personnel records for the NFS and ARP have not survived but you can search our cataloguefor surviving policy files and other ...
See the following record types, produced by branches of central government, for a broader picture of the effects of and responses to air raids.
Some county, metropolitan and other local archives hold records created locally, relating to the area, such as incident maps and registers or ARP wardens’ logs. There are also some useful online sources relating to Second World War bombing.
Visit The National Archives’ shop for a range of publications about bombing in the Second World War. Alternatively, search The National Archives’ library catalogueto see what is available to consult at Kew, including the following publications: Basil Collier, Official History of the Second World War: The defence of the United Kingdom (HMSO 1957) Pe...
The Bomb Sight web map and mobile app reveals WW2 bomb census maps between 7/10/1940 and 06/06/1941, previously available only by viewing them in the Reading Room of The National Archives.
The United Kingdom took part in World War II from 3 September 1939 until 15 August 1945. At the beginning of the war in 1939, London was the largest city in the world, with 8.2 million inhabitants. It was the capital not just for the United Kingdom, but for the entire British Empire. London was central to the British war effort.
'Paddington Station escaped the worst of the London Blitz until attacked by incendiary bombs in January 1941, but the worst single incident was early on 17 April 1941 when a land mine exploded in the departure roadway. The main buildings were badly damaged and the boardroom and some offices demolished.
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