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Survivors remember the Bristol Blitz
On November 24 1940, the city of Bristol was left shattered as bombings killed over 200 people.
This was the beginning of what is now known as the Bristol Blitz, a series of Nazi bombing campaigns that left over one thousand people dead and over one thousand injured by the time it was all over in April 1941.
Decades later there are still remnants of the war, lurking around parts of the city – from the hidden air raid shelter under St Nick’s Market to a pillbox on top of the former A Bond tobacco warehouse
is needed now More than ever
Duncan Mckellar has been running tours of the St Nick’s air raid shelter for many years.
He hopes that one day the air raid shelter will be transformed into a fully fledged war museum, as there are so many people in the city with artefacts from the Second World War “who don’t really know what to do with their stuff”.
With dozens of photographs, posters, and accounts from survivors available there are infinite possibilities for what a future museum could look like.
The walls of air raid shelter under St Nick’s market are covered by war time advertisements and posters – photo: Karen Johnson
Bristol24/7 tracked down survivors of the Bristol Blitz, to hear their accounts of the war days.
Born in 1935, Julie Nicholson’s grandmother owned the Hole in the Wall pub that still stands just off Queen Square. In 1940, five-year-old Julie and her family were curled up in the pub’s cellar as the air raid warnings went off and bombs began to fall.
Julie recalled: “All I could hear was the whistling of the bombs falling continuously and the bangs as they exploded all around us.”
Debris filled city streets during the Bristol Blitz- photo: Bristol Archives
When the bombs finally stopped and Julie and her family were able to exit the pub, all they saw was utter destruction: “What a sight met us – devastation everywhere.
“The warehouse towards Princes Street along the docks was burning.
“All you could smell was the burning of thousands of tons of tea, sugar… stored in the warehouses like roasting peanuts – I can still recall that smell.”
Julie is now in her late 80s but still has vivid recollections of the war.
While the war was devastating, the years afterwards also had their challenges.
Melissa Feltham’s father, David Price, once lived in the outskirts of Bristol. As a young child with bad asthma, his family decided to send him to an open air school.
Bristol’s first open air school was in Knowle – illustration: Loxton V/ Bristol Archives
In an article about open air schools in Bristol and Gloucester for the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, Jeannie Duckworth explains that open air schools were initially set up in the early 20th century to prevent the spread of disease.
She writes: “In the crowded conditions of the classrooms it was feared that cross-infection would be prevalent, particularly from children suffering from tuberculosis, and if a child was too weak or, as it was termed, ‘delicate’ to attend school, it was thought that it would probably not survive to adulthood anyway.
“On April 21 1913 the (Bristol Civic) League suggested the foundation of an open air school for the education and treatment of tubercular and ailing children. Open sheds would serve as classrooms, restrooms and dinner rooms in bad weather. In good weather, children would work, play and rest in the open air.”
St Mary Le Port is now being redeveloped into a hotel – photo: Bristol Archives
Bristol’s first open air school opened on October 20 1913 in Knowle
Melissa Feltham’s father was sent to an open air boarding school in Minehead in the years following the Second World War. The school was “run by Bristol City Council as a special open air school originally for tuberculosis but then also for children with asthma and other breathing conditions”.
Melissa added: “The children had a good diet and were given warm clothes and a thick rug. The school only closed for a few days at Christmas. The classrooms had sliding doors that stayed open all year. They sat wrapped in blankets. After lunch, they sat and rested in deck chairs.
“Later open air classes were added to Victoria Park School and Eastville Park. Dad did most of his schooling outside or with doors and windows open. They also had deck chairs and hammocks to rest in.”
Another testimony about life in Bristol during and after the Blitz can be found in the memoir of Richard Williams, who passed away in 2019 and was born and raised at the bottom of Park Hill in Shirehampton.
In his memoir, he wrote: “Our family’s first sign of the war was having the railings around the front garden removed for the metal content for the war effort.
“The next was part of our back garden being dug up and an Anderson air raid shelter installed, wood benches on three sides and wood steps down from the door. The outside was soon improved with large stones built up on the side next to the garden path.”
Castle Park was once the beating heart of Bristol – photo: ricksphotos101 / Flickr
During the war, there were several food shortages in the UK and basic utilities were rationed. Richard recalled his family having a book with coupons for each person that could be renewed for food and clothing.
In his memoir he explained that: “With the food rationing, if Mum heard that the butcher had offal on sale, she would grab her wicker shopping basket, and be gone to join the queue.
“If she was lucky and he had not sold out, she would come home with whatever was available, and be pleased with the amount he was able to sell her.
“Waiting for a haircut one day, the barber asked me to go to the newsagents and collect his evening paper: ‘Just ask for Mr Churchill’s paper, he will know.’
“Not understanding a thing about it, I must have used a very flat voice that said: ‘Can I have Mr Churchill’s paper please?’, and was very surprised to find that our Prime Minister read the Bristol Evening Post.
“A long time after I discovered that Churchill was also the barber’s name.”
Bridge Street was just one of the roads in what is now Castle Park that was left shattered by the bombings – photo: Bristol Archives
As the war intensified, Richard moved to Rangeworthy, a village in South Gloucester where his grandparents lived.
But for many, like Julie Nicholson who was five when the Blitz began, the war was not about escaping but about protecting what they had.
She recalled: “The night raids tailed off and the daylight raids started dropping incendiary bombs.
“My main hobby, like many other children was collecting the shrapnel found in all the streets. My father returned from work one lunchtime and found my mother and me upstairs on the roof with me opening bottles of beer and my mother pouring the contents on the bombs to put them out.
“He decided enough was enough, my grandmother sold the pub, and we moved back to Clifton and I started to go to school again. Although the Blitz had stopped, daylight raids continued.”
Main photo: Historic England
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