Friends,
Just like the warning labels on firefighter’s bunker
gear and helmets say, firefighting is an inherently dangerous occupation. An
average of 77 firefighters died in the line of duty each year since 2010. This
is down from an average of 151 per year in the 1970s. Still, the job puts
incredible demands on the men and women who answer the calls. Given the fact
that 9/11 and Pearl Harbor aside, the firefighters in the United States have
not regularly been called upon to put out fires in the midst of bombing raids.
It has happened on two days here, and one of those days, 9/11, saw over 300 of
FDNY’s bravest killed in action. This hit home to me because I was a
firefighter then. And having started out in life as a firefighter before I went
over to the dark side of the force (law enforcement), I feel a certain kinship
with the men and women who struggled to save lives and property during the
darkest days the world had ever seen.
During the 1930s, architects of air power worldwide
demonstrated the vulnerability of cities to aerial bombardment. The German
Condor Legion, fighting in the Spanish Civil War, brought this point home to
Europe when they pummeled the town of Guernica. Thanks to Pablo Picasso, who
from what I understand was a pretty screwed up dude, the world knows of this
because of his painting of the same name. As Europe marched closer and closer
to war, the British government tried to plan ahead. The London Fire Brigade was
an entirely full time department but many of the other parts of England relied
on a mixture of full time and on call firefighters, similar to our volunteer
firefighters in the United States. In 1937, Parliament authorized the
establishment of an Auxiliary Fire Service to be made up of men and women to
supplement the ranks of the paid fire crews in the event of a national
emergency. This proved to be a wise
decision as two years later, war did come. By the time it ended, over 270,000
men and 70,000 women served in either the National Fire Service or the
Auxiliary Fire Service.
Let us first consider the difficulties faced by the
men and women of Britain’s Fire Service and the people of London, Manchester,
Liverpool, etc, when the bombing began. First of all, fire stations are above
ground, of course, and that is where all of the fire apparatus (or appliances
as they call them across the pond) are stored. This means that they are just as
vulnerable as a civilian’s house or an industrial target. Second, hospitals are
also above ground. Imagine being injured and taken to a hospital only to be
killed by a second bomb while waiting in an emergency room. Sounds terrible and
it happened. Putting out fires is tough work, but imagine doing it while bombs
are falling all around you. The men and women of the Fire Service did it
routinely. They did not seek shelter from the shrapnel of exploding high
explosive rounds or the burning goo of an incendiary bomb. Rather they went out
into the fire lit night and did their jobs. And they died in scores.
For eight months, one week, and two days the German
Luftwaffe rained bombs on the people of London and also other cities in
England. It began on a Saturday afternoon, September 7th, around
5pm. Today it is sometimes called Black Saturday. This would start a period of
sustained bombings that would see London bombed for 57 consecutive nights at
its height. Over 400 civilians died that evening and over a thousand others
were wounded. Two firefighters and a female air raid warden were among those
killed and over a dozen firefighters injured. If you want to see a minute by
minute and bomb by bomb account, check out this link. The London docks were
hit causing a massive fire. The reporting Station Office is reported to have
said “Send all the pumps you’ve got! The whole bloody world’s on fire!” It is
amazing that the London Fire Brigade was able to keep such records in the midst
of such an attack. And they say that the Germans are good record keepers!
“Keep calm and carry on” was the slogan of the day.
(And you thought all the posters and t-shirts you see today are a new
creation!) The British people went about their jobs as best they could during
the day, as there was a war on, after all, and spent their nights huddled in
private bomb shelters or in the “tubes” of the city’s underground subway
system. By the end of October 13,000 civilians were dead. And there were more
to come. Perhaps the biggest raid of the war, with the most potential for
destruction, took place on the night of December 29th, 1940, a night
called the Second Great Fire of London. If the London Fire Brigade and the
Auxiliary Fire Service could not rise to the occasion, the city might be lost.
Given the fact that I am not a real historian, but rather a Half A$$ Historian,
I will now depart from the usual narrative and take a bit of dramatic license.
You will now enter a time machine and be inserted into the role of a member of
the London Fire Brigade.
You
are 36 hours into a 48 hour shift. The wartime demands have caused a different
shift schedule. You now work 48 hours on followed by 24 hours off. Then rinse
and repeat. Even your off time isn’t really off. After all, it isn’t like the
Jerries won’t come over whilst you are on a brief holiday. Bombs still fall on
your off period and sometimes you have no choice but to report back to work,
snatching what sleep you can in between alarms. Your station, in the East End
of London has escaped damage thus far, but manning the station in the midst of
an air raid is terrifying. You can hear bombs falling all around you and hear
the clang of shrapnel from the anti-aircraft shells bouncing off the roof.
Outside a helmet is a must. You risk death otherwise. When the alarm comes in,
you jump on the engine, just like in peacetime, and head out the door. But this
time your driver has to dodge shell craters and debris. All hope for a quiet
night is shattered when the air raid sirens begin to wail around 6pm. A quick
check of the equipment, and then it is time to wait for the Central Office to
call with an assignment. Women man a control board in the candlelight waiting
to receive reports of fires and send you out towards an uncertain fate.
Tonight
the East End gets a pasting, as does the center of the city. You race from one
burning block to another trying desperately to stem the tide of the bombs which
just don’t seem to stop. Around 2am, you respond to a report of a direct hit on
an air raid shelter. These calls are the worst. Bombs can kill people in many
different ways. One of the most unusual is “blast lung” where the victim’s lungs
are destroyed by the pressure caused by high explosives. You think of them as
the lucky ones. They look as though they are asleep. You want to shake them and
tell them to wake up and move along. Normally, high explosives blow people
apart. You don’t deal with bodies so much as pieces of bodies. Arms, legs,
heads, brains, stomachs, hopes, and dreams, all shattered by an unseen enemy.
And then there is the constant smell of roasted flesh which never seems to
leave your nose. Even on your off days, you wake up and smell it. There are a
few victims trapped. Despite the roar of nearby flames, the drone of German
aircraft, and the constant bark of anti-aircraft guns, you press your ear into
the rubble hoping to hear a sound. You tap on a piece of pipe and listen again.
Someone faintly taps back. A fury of digging ensues and soon you uncover a
young woman. Her leg is pinned beneath a heavy beam. You and several of your mates
lift in while another pulls her out. Part of her shattered leg remains behind.
The ambulance crew frantically searches for a tourniquet but when they manage
to produce one, she is already dead. And the screams. Dear God, the screams. The screams of the trapped, the screams of the dying, the screams of those who have survived but lost their entire family. You'll never get them out of your head. No matter how long you live.
The
crew fighting a blaze one street over is caught in the open when a bomb
explodes. Three of them are killed and five more seriously injured. They are
whisked away to hospital where another will die a few hours later. And the
fires keep coming. The city is facing a fire storm with fires merging together
and creating a tornado of fire that threatens to destroy the center of the
city. As you spray water on a burning building, a wall collapses nearby, adding
another firefighter to the list of the fourteen who will die tonight. Another
250 will be injured, some severely. But you and your mates hold on. Against all
odds, you manage to gain the upper hand. As the sun rises, partially obscured
by the smoke which still wafts over the city, the dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral is
still standing. Despite Jerry’s best efforts, it is still there as a symbol of
the city’s determination in the face of everything that can be thrown at it.
That, Dear Readers, is a glimpse into one night
faced by the men and women of the London Fire Brigade and Auxiliary Fire
Service. And that is just one night, one out of many. During the course of the
Blitz, two fire stations would receive direct hits. Two firemen died in the
first and six in the second. The deadliest raid during the Blitz took place
near its conclusion, on May 10th, 1941, when over 1300 Londoners
died in a single night. And again, the members of the Fire Brigade answered the
call. By the war’s end, over 1,000 men of the Britain’s Fire Service died in
the line of duty, with 1/3rd of them being from London. In addition, 24 women of the Auxiliary Fire Service also gave their lives. 6,000 were
seriously injured and many more slightly injured. Their sacrifices are
commemorated with the National Fire Memorial near Hyde Park, pictured below. I
will close with a quote from a member of the LFB who penned these words.
And
many learned the nastier ways of dying
Or
limped back maimed and shattered from the strife
While
all endured unpleasantness and danger
Continually—and
learned to love life
And in an era here in the United States, when paid
and volunteer firefighters get into heated internet exchanges about what makes
a “real” firefighter, allow me to share this anecdote. The paid firefighters
were issued one type of boots and the auxiliary another. One Station Officer
during the Blitz walked past the tarp covered bodies of 14 firefighters. All he
could see of them was the boots sticking out. 6 wore the boots of the London
Fire Brigade. 8 wore the boots of the Auxiliary Fire Service. “Well,” he said “they are all equal now.”
My name is Lee Hutch and I am a Half A$$ Historian
who salutes the men and women of the British Fire Service, who stood alone as
their country stood alone, during the dark days of The Blitz. Greater love hath
no man (or woman).
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