Grimsby During the Blitz

I can not remember if this is in the book of not.

All the kids were marched off to Waltham when bombing was going on and matched back again next morning.

Some days they had a train ride to  New Barton for a change and returned the following morning.

Source . Wife.

A couple of stories that my Dad told me:

My grandad had a furniture moving business - when families left the area during the blitz, he stored their furniture in a warehouse (and vacant houses) - he would draw a chalk lines around the furniture from different families.

My Dad was 13 in 1943 when someone came to the school and said they wanted help to pump petrol into US army vehicles in the Market Place so he left to do that and never went back to school.

My childhood home had cracks in most of the ceilings from the aftershocks of bombing raids on the docks and nearby railway lines. My brother still lives in the house and the cracks are still there.

Quoted from Connecticut Mariner

A couple of stories that my Dad told me:

My grandad had a furniture moving business - when families left the area during the blitz, he stored their furniture in a warehouse (and vacant houses) - he would draw a chalk lines around the furniture from different families.

My Dad was 13 in 1943 when someone came to the school and said they wanted help to pump petrol into US army vehicles in the Market Place so he left to do that and never went back to school.

Common factor here is that kids had to grow up fast in those days, take responsibility for themselves and others. The lads overseas were still teenagers or not much older, the girls at home were working from 14 onwards and expected to look after themselves. Not uncommon to see a young twenty something with a couple of young kids, or granny with them while the mother did war work.

My grandad took to poaching! in the war.  Fishing rod with a baccy tin fixed on the end, sulphur in the tin and when he found a Pidgeon roosting lit the sulphur and wafted the tin under the birds nose. Down it came.

He made his own poachers walking stick gun for small bore cartridges. I think he use to refill the shells aswell. This was a metal tube (barrel) attached to a chrome handle bent 180 degrees like a shepherds crook shape. Part of the handle was attached to the barrel and partly cut out so a cartridge could be inserted and located with a twist. The firing mechanism was a small pin under the bend in the handle which some way hit the cartridge.

The barrel was fixed inside a large cane with a rubber feral on the bottom. A walking stick to the gamekeeper.

I have a hard copy of a national newspaper article about the butterfly bombs that fell on Grimsby. They caused a lot of injuries and deaths as they were small and innocuous.  A woman was killed touching no one on her washing line.  This went on for weeks after the first initial bomb drop.  They were so many of them and they were small.

They also had a psychological impact on people. It was vital that the Germans could not know how effective and destructive the new butterfly bombs were.

There was a news blackout at the time.  Everything was Top Secret.  It worked. The Germans never knew.


My Dad lived at 1 Ellison Street, opposite the old Loftis’s toy shop and near to the Ground.  A butterfly bomb landed in front of their house and damaged the ba6 window.

I can send anyone a copy of the Grimsby butterfly bomb article.  Just need a PM and a library  open to get more copies printed.  (I only became aware of all this in the last 3 years).

Quoted from TownSNAFU5

I have a hard copy of a national newspaper article about the butterfly bombs that fell on Grimsby. They caused a lot of injuries and deaths as they were small and innocuous.  A woman was killed touching no one on her washing line.  This went on for weeks after the first initial bomb drop.  They were so many of them and they were small.

They also had a psychological impact on people. It was vital that the Germans could not know how effective and destructive the new butterfly bombs were.

There was a news blackout at the time.  Everything was Top Secret.  It worked. The Germans never knew.


My Dad lived at 1 Ellison Street, opposite the old Loftis’s toy shop and near to the Ground.  A butterfly bomb landed in front of their house and damaged the ba6 window.

I can send anyone a copy of the Grimsby butterfly bomb article.  Just need a PM and a library  open to get more copies printed.  (I only became aware of all this in the last 3 years).

I'm pretty sure my dad told me he'd lost an aunt to a butterfly bomb locally....

Something I learned the other day ( a post on Grimsby Memories on FB ) was that a bomb had been dropped on Springbank near the corner with Lombard Street

I lived there when I was younger yet had no idea that it had been hit.... you live and learn

It’s a shame there isn’t something for Grimsby like this site, which is an excellent resource.

http://bombsight.org/#15/51.5050/-0.0900