0:00:03 > 0:00:05In September 1940,
0:00:05 > 0:00:08death and destruction came to the streets of Britain
0:00:08 > 0:00:11on a scale never seen before or since.
0:00:14 > 0:00:15The noise was deafening.
0:00:15 > 0:00:19Bang, bang, tremendous explosions, one after another.
0:00:19 > 0:00:21They called it the Blitz.
0:00:23 > 0:00:26The whole city was aglow.
0:00:28 > 0:00:31In the space of little over eight months,
0:00:31 > 0:00:35more than 450,000 bombs rained down on British soil.
0:00:37 > 0:00:40But in the midst of the chaos and confusion,
0:00:40 > 0:00:43meticulous records were kept.
0:00:43 > 0:00:48This is a bomb map. Every single dot is where a bomb landed.
0:00:48 > 0:00:53Using this untapped archive, we'll identify individual bombs...
0:00:53 > 0:00:56That's the bomb that you're looking for.
0:00:56 > 0:00:57Oh, it is, yes.
0:00:57 > 0:01:01..with consequences which rippled out from the point of impact,
0:01:01 > 0:01:04through the lives of people and beyond,
0:01:04 > 0:01:06to help shape modern Britain.
0:01:08 > 0:01:12Of all the houses that plane was flying over...
0:01:12 > 0:01:14And one bomb.
0:01:15 > 0:01:17Why did it hit us?
0:01:19 > 0:01:23In this episode, a bomb falls on the East End of London
0:01:23 > 0:01:26on the very first night of the Blitz.
0:01:28 > 0:01:34Oh, my goodness me. At 05:55, at 8 Martindale Road.
0:01:36 > 0:01:38HE UX.
0:01:39 > 0:01:42This bomb changed lives.
0:01:42 > 0:01:44It's just wiped out, hasn't it?
0:01:44 > 0:01:46It's just wiped out.
0:01:46 > 0:01:51But it also exposed a social care system in crisis.
0:01:51 > 0:01:55There was just an utter lack of decency, of humanity,
0:01:55 > 0:01:57on the part of the authorities.
0:01:58 > 0:02:02What followed was a radical shift in attitudes towards the welfare
0:02:02 > 0:02:03of us all.
0:02:04 > 0:02:08Our plan is a service which will provide the best medical advice
0:02:08 > 0:02:11and treatment to every man, woman and child in this country.
0:02:13 > 0:02:15And it began with one bomb.
0:02:34 > 0:02:35The Blitz begins.
0:02:38 > 0:02:42A stone's throw from Martindale Road in Canning Town, East London,
0:02:42 > 0:02:4612-year-old Norman Pirie saw the first bombers appear.
0:02:49 > 0:02:51Brilliant blue sky.
0:02:53 > 0:02:57I was playing in the street with two or three friends.
0:02:57 > 0:03:01And we heard the noise of aircraft engines.
0:03:03 > 0:03:04And we all looked up.
0:03:04 > 0:03:08Hundreds of planes were coming down from the north,
0:03:08 > 0:03:11which I thought was odd.
0:03:11 > 0:03:14They must have swung round in a circle.
0:03:14 > 0:03:16And they were almost coming down above the road.
0:03:16 > 0:03:18And we stood there, open-mouthed.
0:03:20 > 0:03:22As they got towards us...
0:03:23 > 0:03:25..they started dropping the bombs.
0:03:26 > 0:03:30The capital had experienced light bombing raids before, but now,
0:03:30 > 0:03:34for the first time, the destructive force of the German Luftwaffe
0:03:34 > 0:03:37was unleashed on a massive scale,
0:03:37 > 0:03:41as wave after wave of bombers began to hammer the London docks
0:03:41 > 0:03:43and surrounding streets.
0:03:46 > 0:03:50It was a day that will go down in history as Black Saturday.
0:03:52 > 0:03:55As Stan Harris, at the time an 11-year-old
0:03:55 > 0:03:57Canning Town schoolboy, recalls.
0:03:59 > 0:04:01It was like an air display.
0:04:01 > 0:04:06Of course, then you heard the whistling and then the thundering
0:04:06 > 0:04:08and you realised that this was all...
0:04:09 > 0:04:11That this was real.
0:04:11 > 0:04:15That carried on right through the afternoon, the evening,
0:04:15 > 0:04:18all through the night, just continuous bombing.
0:04:19 > 0:04:25All this area and most of the East End was just one ball of flame.
0:04:27 > 0:04:32- NEWSREEL:- The skies lit up for up to 1,000 feet with this great glow.
0:04:32 > 0:04:34And it doesn't show any signs of diminishing.
0:04:34 > 0:04:37So the flames are leaping even higher.
0:04:39 > 0:04:42It's almost like the Day of Judgement.
0:04:46 > 0:04:49As the pounding of the docks continued,
0:04:49 > 0:04:51people sought shelter wherever they could.
0:04:53 > 0:04:57I'd gone under the table and the next minute, bang.
0:04:59 > 0:05:01The fireplace was blown out.
0:05:02 > 0:05:05Doors came off, roof had gone.
0:05:05 > 0:05:07Instead of looking up at the ceiling,
0:05:07 > 0:05:09you were looking up at the stars.
0:05:11 > 0:05:15During the raid that lasted for just over 12 hours,
0:05:15 > 0:05:19more than 600 tonnes of bombs fell on the London docks.
0:05:19 > 0:05:24At some point in that night of destruction, one bomb was released.
0:05:26 > 0:05:29It plummeted to earth at around 1,000 feet per second,
0:05:29 > 0:05:31heading towards a street in Canning Town.
0:05:33 > 0:05:3630 seconds later, it found its mark...
0:05:37 > 0:05:40..at number 8 Martindale Road.
0:05:43 > 0:05:45Of all the bombs that fell that night,
0:05:45 > 0:05:47this bomb would have consequences
0:05:47 > 0:05:49long after the all clear had sounded.
0:05:57 > 0:06:03Torn down and rebuilt after the war, Martindale Road was, in 1940,
0:06:03 > 0:06:06a typical Canning Town street in the county borough of West Ham.
0:06:08 > 0:06:10A terrace of two-up, two-downs.
0:06:10 > 0:06:13Cramped accommodation for the neighbourhood's dock
0:06:13 > 0:06:14and factory workers.
0:06:18 > 0:06:23In Martindale Road, five years before the bombers came,
0:06:23 > 0:06:25royal jubilee celebrations had been held.
0:06:29 > 0:06:31In this working-class neighbourhood,
0:06:31 > 0:06:35a close-knit community existed cheek by jowl
0:06:35 > 0:06:37with poverty and deprivation.
0:06:40 > 0:06:43Salt of the earth, salt of the earth.
0:06:46 > 0:06:50Unlike today, where families have spread their wings,
0:06:50 > 0:06:54they were always local, you know.
0:06:54 > 0:06:58Within, in most cases, sort of within yards of one another still.
0:06:58 > 0:07:01And remained so throughout their life.
0:07:05 > 0:07:08The Royal Docks were the commercial heart of Canning Town.
0:07:10 > 0:07:14Commodities and raw materials from the world over were unloaded here
0:07:14 > 0:07:17for processing at the Tate & Lyle sugar refinery,
0:07:17 > 0:07:22the Spillers grain mill, and half a dozen other major manufacturers.
0:07:25 > 0:07:29But on Black Saturday these docks, warehouses and factories
0:07:29 > 0:07:32would become the prime targets for German bombs.
0:07:34 > 0:07:36And alongside them, in the target area,
0:07:36 > 0:07:38were streets like Martindale Road.
0:07:43 > 0:07:46Six doors down from 8 Martindale Road, at number 20,
0:07:46 > 0:07:50lived Robert Belchamber, his wife, Mary-Ann, and their family.
0:07:52 > 0:07:54Seen here in the hop fields of Kent.
0:07:56 > 0:07:58For East End families like the Belchambers,
0:07:58 > 0:08:02September usually meant hop and fruit picking,
0:08:02 > 0:08:05and a few weeks of fresh air and freedom away from the smoke
0:08:05 > 0:08:07and grime of Canning Town.
0:08:08 > 0:08:10But on Black Saturday the Belchambers
0:08:10 > 0:08:12were still in Martindale Road.
0:08:14 > 0:08:18Sandra Belchamber is Robert and Mary-Ann's granddaughter.
0:08:18 > 0:08:22She's been researching her family history for more than 25 years.
0:08:24 > 0:08:29My grandfather Robert, when he came out of the Army,
0:08:29 > 0:08:31he started to work in the docks.
0:08:31 > 0:08:34And he was lucky enough, he got a union card,
0:08:34 > 0:08:36and so he had regular work.
0:08:37 > 0:08:41But, at some point, he had a disagreement,
0:08:41 > 0:08:44an argument with somebody there
0:08:44 > 0:08:48and, in frustration, he tore up his union card,
0:08:48 > 0:08:51probably to throw it at someone, to make a point.
0:08:51 > 0:08:53But then he became, then, one of the many
0:08:53 > 0:08:57that used to have to stand outside the gates in the morning
0:08:57 > 0:08:58and just get casual work.
0:08:58 > 0:09:02But it meant also that the security of having a wage,
0:09:02 > 0:09:04which wouldn't have been a lot, anyway,
0:09:04 > 0:09:08but it would have been regular, was suddenly stopped.
0:09:11 > 0:09:13Martindale Road knew all about hard times.
0:09:15 > 0:09:19Poverty, the pawnbroker and the Public Assistance Board
0:09:19 > 0:09:21were facts of everyday life.
0:09:23 > 0:09:28They had, in those days, a system called relief office.
0:09:28 > 0:09:31It was kind of like a social welfare thing.
0:09:31 > 0:09:34Where, if you were very poor, you could go to them,
0:09:34 > 0:09:38swallow your pride, and they would allow you a little money.
0:09:38 > 0:09:40I mean, they made you, really...
0:09:40 > 0:09:42It was almost like begging and pleading.
0:09:43 > 0:09:46Little scraps from the table, kind of thing.
0:09:46 > 0:09:50Now, my grandfather wouldn't have anything to do with this.
0:09:50 > 0:09:53"I'm not going to take charity from these people."
0:09:53 > 0:09:55But my grandmother went and she did it.
0:09:55 > 0:09:59And if that wasn't enough, she'd go to the pawn shop on Monday morning,
0:09:59 > 0:10:02pawn her wedding ring, pawn the clothes,
0:10:02 > 0:10:05you know, pawn anything that she could,
0:10:05 > 0:10:08to get enough money to feed the family for the week.
0:10:09 > 0:10:13It was a hand-to-mouth existence, really.
0:10:14 > 0:10:16Then the Blitz came to Martindale Road.
0:10:26 > 0:10:30Sandra wants to find out what that meant for her grandparents.
0:10:31 > 0:10:34If you lived in an area like that, then the bombs were dropping,
0:10:34 > 0:10:35and you had family,
0:10:35 > 0:10:38I mean, what decision do you make, where do you go?
0:10:38 > 0:10:41And when you've got small babies and children, I mean,
0:10:41 > 0:10:43it must have been terrible.
0:10:44 > 0:10:46I don't really know how they coped.
0:10:49 > 0:10:54"Bomb damage in West Ham during 1939 and 1945."
0:10:56 > 0:11:00Sandra is examining official records to find out more about the bomb
0:11:00 > 0:11:04that fell at 8 Martindale Road, just a few doors down
0:11:04 > 0:11:07from her grandparents' at number 20.
0:11:07 > 0:11:08Oh, my goodness me.
0:11:09 > 0:11:14On the 8th of September, 1940, at 05:55,
0:11:14 > 0:11:18five to six in the morning.
0:11:20 > 0:11:25At 8 Martindale Road, HE UX,
0:11:26 > 0:11:33which would have been a highly explosive, unexploded bomb.
0:11:44 > 0:11:46The all clear sounds.
0:11:46 > 0:11:49Just over an hour later, the unexploded bomb
0:11:49 > 0:11:51at number 8 was reported.
0:11:53 > 0:11:54It hadn't gone off,
0:11:54 > 0:11:58but its discovery was the start of a chain reaction
0:11:58 > 0:12:00that would change lives forever.
0:12:03 > 0:12:06- NEWSREEL:- Bombs, whether designed to go off on impact or not,
0:12:06 > 0:12:08will normally penetrate to a considerable depth.
0:12:08 > 0:12:12Therefore, all UXBs must be treated as potentially dangerous.
0:12:13 > 0:12:17As many as one in ten bombs that fell during the Blitz
0:12:17 > 0:12:19were classified as UXBs.
0:12:21 > 0:12:24The bomb that fell at number 8 might have been fitted
0:12:24 > 0:12:26with a time delay fuse or it could have been a dud.
0:12:28 > 0:12:32But the official policy in the first weeks of the Blitz was the same,
0:12:32 > 0:12:37immediate evacuation of all buildings within a 600-yard radius.
0:12:40 > 0:12:44And so, early on the Sunday morning after the Black Saturday raid,
0:12:44 > 0:12:48Martindale Road became the centre of a ring of chaos
0:12:48 > 0:12:51that rippled out through the neighbouring streets,
0:12:51 > 0:12:55as air raid wardens and police ordered residents to evacuate
0:12:55 > 0:12:56their homes.
0:12:58 > 0:13:01Everyone had to leave Martindale Road.
0:13:01 > 0:13:06And that's the same time that my grandparents,
0:13:06 > 0:13:11they were evacuated then, as well, because they lived
0:13:11 > 0:13:16at 20 Martindale Road. They left everything and just moved out.
0:13:24 > 0:13:29As the sun rises just 30 minutes after the reporting of the UXB
0:13:29 > 0:13:32at number 8, it feels like all of Canning Town is on the move.
0:13:34 > 0:13:38With the ruins of their homes still smouldering around them,
0:13:38 > 0:13:40some families head south,
0:13:40 > 0:13:42fleeing under the Thames by the Woolwich foot tunnel.
0:13:44 > 0:13:48Hundreds more tramp the ten miles north to Epping Forest,
0:13:48 > 0:13:51where they sheltered in improvised encampments.
0:13:53 > 0:13:55But many stayed closer to home.
0:13:57 > 0:14:01A few minutes' walk from Martindale Road, a rest centre,
0:14:01 > 0:14:04a front-line refuge for evacuees, had been set up
0:14:04 > 0:14:09at South Hallsville School, where today Hallsville Primary stands.
0:14:10 > 0:14:14The Belchambers from 20 Martindale Road were among hundreds
0:14:14 > 0:14:15told to go there.
0:14:16 > 0:14:21At the school to help them was air raid warden Alfred Day.
0:14:21 > 0:14:24Eva Coleman is his daughter.
0:14:24 > 0:14:26He was a welder by trade.
0:14:26 > 0:14:29He wanted to go into the Army but they wouldn't have him,
0:14:29 > 0:14:31because of his job.
0:14:31 > 0:14:34And he thought, he had to do something for the war effort,
0:14:34 > 0:14:39so he joined the ARP, and he got sent here by the commanding officer
0:14:39 > 0:14:41to say, go and help the people, check them in
0:14:41 > 0:14:46when they're coming into the school and halfway through the evening
0:14:46 > 0:14:49buses would come and take them off to the country.
0:14:51 > 0:14:53Many years later,
0:14:53 > 0:14:57Alfred Day wrote an account of what happened at the rest centre.
0:14:58 > 0:15:01The theory of the rest centre system is quite simple,
0:15:01 > 0:15:05people bombed out during a raid, especially during the night,
0:15:05 > 0:15:09are housed temporary in a school or either such suitable building.
0:15:09 > 0:15:11And as soon as possible,
0:15:11 > 0:15:14transport will be arranged from outside the area
0:15:14 > 0:15:19to move in and evacuate these people to a safer area.
0:15:19 > 0:15:22The system should work but, like every other system,
0:15:22 > 0:15:25it depends on everyone concerned doing the right thing
0:15:25 > 0:15:27at the right time.
0:15:32 > 0:15:36Among those driven to the rest centre that Sunday morning
0:15:36 > 0:15:39by the UXB at number 8 were another Martindale Road family.
0:15:41 > 0:15:45Albert Gunn, his wife Til and their children,
0:15:45 > 0:15:47who lived in number 15.
0:15:49 > 0:15:52Judy Gregory is Albert Gunn's niece.
0:15:54 > 0:15:58I just think Albert was a character, he played in a band.
0:15:58 > 0:16:00I actually imagine parties might be a bit of fun.
0:16:02 > 0:16:05He'd worked for the sugar factory
0:16:05 > 0:16:08and then, when you get to 21, they laid you off
0:16:08 > 0:16:11because they then would have to pay you a man's wage.
0:16:11 > 0:16:15And Albert said he would never work for anybody again,
0:16:15 > 0:16:17so he actually didn't.
0:16:17 > 0:16:19He did general labouring jobs,
0:16:19 > 0:16:21he bought musical instruments that were broken
0:16:21 > 0:16:24and repaired them and obviously sold them on.
0:16:24 > 0:16:25He cut hair.
0:16:26 > 0:16:29The children used to come to the house and call out,
0:16:29 > 0:16:33"Albert, Mum's sick. Can you cut my hair and she'll pay you Friday?"
0:16:33 > 0:16:37But when you look at the children's hair, he did a good job of it.
0:16:38 > 0:16:41He could've been another Vidal Sassoon, we don't know, do we?
0:16:43 > 0:16:47They had five children in total.
0:16:47 > 0:16:49They had Joyce, who is their first-born child.
0:16:49 > 0:16:52Then they had Albert, but he died when he was three.
0:16:53 > 0:16:55Then they had Alice.
0:16:55 > 0:17:02Then along came Stevie in '37 and then, in 1940, Annie was born.
0:17:02 > 0:17:05We believe now it was on the 4th of September.
0:17:05 > 0:17:08So on the 7th of September, Black Saturday,
0:17:08 > 0:17:10she would have been three days old.
0:17:13 > 0:17:16Just around the corner from Albert, in Crown Street,
0:17:16 > 0:17:20lived Judy's father Henry Gunn and her mother Anne,
0:17:20 > 0:17:23married just six months earlier.
0:17:23 > 0:17:26Henry, who was away with the Army at the time,
0:17:26 > 0:17:28was particularly close to his older brother Albert.
0:17:30 > 0:17:33Dad loved him. Absolutely loved him.
0:17:33 > 0:17:35But it was always, "My brother Albert."
0:17:35 > 0:17:36He never just said, "Albert."
0:17:36 > 0:17:38It's always, "My brother Albert."
0:17:39 > 0:17:45Also at Crown Street, at number 23, was the matriarch of the Gunn clan,
0:17:45 > 0:17:46Granny Gunn.
0:17:47 > 0:17:51Granny Gunn married Thomas Gunn, who was in the Merchant Navy.
0:17:53 > 0:17:57They had ten children, but only five ever lived at one time.
0:17:59 > 0:18:02Granny Gunn said, "Grandfather was never there when she gave birth
0:18:02 > 0:18:04"to a child and never there when she buried one."
0:18:05 > 0:18:08With Thomas away at sea as usual, Granny Gunn
0:18:08 > 0:18:10lived with her daughter Emmie.
0:18:10 > 0:18:14Oh, Emmie was adored because you only had the boys there,
0:18:14 > 0:18:18so they had this one girl who is the youngest member of the family,
0:18:18 > 0:18:21they just doted on her, they idolised her.
0:18:23 > 0:18:26She's always got a happy face, you know, it's a smiley face,
0:18:26 > 0:18:29it's not a doom and gloom face.
0:18:37 > 0:18:40With the Gunns and their neighbours waiting at the school
0:18:40 > 0:18:43to be evacuated, all around them the devastating impact
0:18:43 > 0:18:46of the first night of the Blitz was plain to see.
0:18:47 > 0:18:54Destruction, death, terror, trauma, more than 400 fatalities in all.
0:18:57 > 0:19:01Into the chaos of Canning Town that morning stepped Richie Calder,
0:19:01 > 0:19:05a reporter for mass circulation left-wing newspaper
0:19:05 > 0:19:06The Daily Herald.
0:19:07 > 0:19:10For this campaigning journalist,
0:19:10 > 0:19:12this was more than just another news story.
0:19:12 > 0:19:14It was a cause.
0:19:14 > 0:19:18As his grandson, journalist Simon Calder, explains.
0:19:18 > 0:19:23What concerned Richie Calder was the fact that so little planning
0:19:23 > 0:19:30had been done for the inevitable human toll that the war would take.
0:19:30 > 0:19:34He had been very much involved with the Labour Party,
0:19:34 > 0:19:38urging the government before the war and indeed during the,
0:19:38 > 0:19:41kind of, first year before the Blitz started happening
0:19:41 > 0:19:46that they had to make preparations for the welfare of the people
0:19:46 > 0:19:50who would be badly hit by the inevitable bombardment.
0:19:50 > 0:19:54Nobody was expecting the Blitz in quite such intensity,
0:19:54 > 0:19:58but it was clear that there was going to be a human cost.
0:19:58 > 0:20:02And so, all that Richie had to do was put on his tin hat
0:20:02 > 0:20:05and hail a cab, and go to the heart of the story.
0:20:08 > 0:20:10Early Sunday afternoon,
0:20:10 > 0:20:13less than 12 hours after the unexploded bomb was discovered
0:20:13 > 0:20:18at Martindale Road, Richie Calder arrived at South Hallsville School.
0:20:21 > 0:20:24He described the scenes that confronted him in a book
0:20:24 > 0:20:28published the following year called The Lesson Of London.
0:20:29 > 0:20:31In the passages and classrooms,
0:20:31 > 0:20:34whole families were sitting in queues perched
0:20:34 > 0:20:38on their pitiful baggage waiting desperately for coaches
0:20:38 > 0:20:41to take them away from the terror of the bombs.
0:20:42 > 0:20:45I heard women, the mothers of young children,
0:20:45 > 0:20:49protesting with violence and with tears about the delay.
0:20:49 > 0:20:53Men were cursing the helpless local officials who knew only
0:20:53 > 0:20:56that the coaches were expected.
0:20:56 > 0:21:00The crowd clamoured for help for information, for reassurance,
0:21:00 > 0:21:03but the harassed officials knew no answer,
0:21:03 > 0:21:07other than the offer of a cup of tea.
0:21:10 > 0:21:15The scene he encountered was of utter horror.
0:21:15 > 0:21:19Very, very upset men and women who are trying to do their very best
0:21:19 > 0:21:22for their families, their children were terrified.
0:21:24 > 0:21:27All around them there was the evidence
0:21:27 > 0:21:31of what the Luftwaffe could do and it became clear
0:21:31 > 0:21:34that this was a place of great peril.
0:21:37 > 0:21:40I knew on that Sunday afternoon that, as sure as night
0:21:40 > 0:21:44would follow day, the bombers would come again with the darkness
0:21:44 > 0:21:47and that school would be bombed.
0:21:47 > 0:21:51It was not a premonition, it's a calculable certainty.
0:21:56 > 0:22:00As evening fell, Calder hurried back to Central London
0:22:00 > 0:22:02to raise the alarm.
0:22:02 > 0:22:05Three times he contacted the authorities in Whitehall
0:22:05 > 0:22:09warning them about the plight of the evacuees stranded at the school.
0:22:11 > 0:22:12But no-one responded.
0:22:17 > 0:22:20Back in Canning Town, the bombers have returned.
0:22:20 > 0:22:22As Richie Calder knew they would.
0:22:27 > 0:22:30- NEWSREEL:- Morning went roughly a quarter of an hour ago
0:22:30 > 0:22:33and the raiders flew straightaway over the city,
0:22:33 > 0:22:36over Woolwich Way, the Thames Estuary, where they went last night,
0:22:36 > 0:22:39where they've started another large fire.
0:22:39 > 0:22:42You could smell... The smell of dust was everywhere.
0:22:44 > 0:22:49Tobacco dust. They hit a lot of the warehouses and the ships and sugar,
0:22:50 > 0:22:55molasses, I suppose, was spilt on the water and it was on fire,
0:22:55 > 0:22:57catching fire and that was the smell.
0:22:58 > 0:23:01And you could almost taste the dust in the air.
0:23:05 > 0:23:09As the long night wore on and the bombs continue to fall,
0:23:09 > 0:23:12more and more families sought refuge at the rest centre
0:23:12 > 0:23:16where Eva Coleman's father, Alfred Day, and his colleagues
0:23:16 > 0:23:18were struggling to cope.
0:23:19 > 0:23:22The raiders kept up their relentless attack
0:23:22 > 0:23:25and with each bomb that fell, a few more were added
0:23:25 > 0:23:27to our swelling numbers.
0:23:27 > 0:23:30By the time we crammed everybody into the shelters,
0:23:30 > 0:23:33we were literally speaking, bursting at the seams.'
0:23:37 > 0:23:43By the time the all clear finally sounded at 5:35am on Monday morning,
0:23:43 > 0:23:45conditions in the school were becoming desperate.
0:23:47 > 0:23:51A propaganda film made later on in the war shows rest centres
0:23:51 > 0:23:53as they were supposed to be.
0:23:54 > 0:23:57- NEWSREEL:- They're welcomed and made comfortable,
0:23:57 > 0:23:59but they can't stay too long as room must be found
0:23:59 > 0:24:01for those made homeless by the next raid.
0:24:03 > 0:24:05But after two nights of intensive bombing,
0:24:05 > 0:24:08South Hallsville School was nothing like this.
0:24:09 > 0:24:12Underequipped and unprotected to start with,
0:24:12 > 0:24:16it had become overcrowded and squalid, as well as dangerous.
0:24:20 > 0:24:23But still no rescue buses appeared to take people away
0:24:23 > 0:24:25from the danger zone.
0:24:25 > 0:24:30People kept coming, coming, coming, the electricity went,
0:24:30 > 0:24:33the water went, there was nobody, no buses.
0:24:35 > 0:24:38It's been 24 hours since Sandra's grandparents,
0:24:38 > 0:24:43Robert and Mary-Ann Belchamber, left Martindale Road.
0:24:43 > 0:24:45As conditions in the school worsened,
0:24:45 > 0:24:47their anxiety reached breaking point.
0:24:49 > 0:24:52They were told, because it was so full, that they would
0:24:52 > 0:24:55have to be separated, they'd have to put the men and boys
0:24:55 > 0:24:59in one corridor and the women and girls in another.
0:24:59 > 0:25:03And my grandfather went back to Mary-Ann and said to her,
0:25:03 > 0:25:07"Look, I don't like it. I think we should leave."
0:25:07 > 0:25:13And so the three children and Robert and Mary-Ann left the school
0:25:13 > 0:25:17and made their way out and decided that they would try
0:25:17 > 0:25:22to get down to Kent, where they went every year to do the fruit picking.
0:25:24 > 0:25:28Between the Belchambers and the safety of the huts in Kent
0:25:28 > 0:25:32lay a city in flames and a transport system in chaos.
0:25:34 > 0:25:36But just a few weeks before,
0:25:36 > 0:25:38Robert had got lucky on the football pools
0:25:38 > 0:25:41and had bought a second-hand car out of his winnings,
0:25:42 > 0:25:44even though he couldn't drive.
0:25:45 > 0:25:49But his son-in-law could, just about.
0:25:50 > 0:25:55Although he had never driven a car before, only a motorbike,
0:25:55 > 0:25:57he agreed to take them down.
0:25:57 > 0:26:00So they got all in the car and drove down to Kent
0:26:00 > 0:26:05through the Blackwall Tunnel, but everything was done in second gear,
0:26:05 > 0:26:08because that's the only gear that he could use.
0:26:08 > 0:26:10When they reached Blackwall Tunnel,
0:26:10 > 0:26:14they were stopped by armed guards and they had to explain
0:26:14 > 0:26:17why they were going, and after a lot of talking,
0:26:17 > 0:26:20and a lot of persuasion, they were eventually allowed
0:26:20 > 0:26:26to go through the tunnel, and they came down to Kent, in second gear!
0:26:28 > 0:26:31Anne Gunn, Judy Gregory's mother,
0:26:31 > 0:26:33had not joined her in-laws at the school.
0:26:35 > 0:26:37With her husband Henry away with the Army,
0:26:37 > 0:26:40she had gone back to her parents when the bombing started
0:26:40 > 0:26:43and had then decided to leave Canning Town altogether.
0:26:45 > 0:26:48But not before she'd said her goodbyes.
0:26:48 > 0:26:53Mum said they moved them into a corridor by the headmaster's study
0:26:53 > 0:26:56and Til was laying on the camp bed with the baby,
0:26:56 > 0:26:59and the children were sat on a form alongside.
0:27:00 > 0:27:02They were moved there because they were told it was safe.
0:27:02 > 0:27:07In fact, I think Til said that to Mum, "We'll be safe here, Anne".
0:27:15 > 0:27:19The air raid sirens sound their doleful warning once again.
0:27:20 > 0:27:23Just over 36 hours since the unexploded bomb
0:27:23 > 0:27:27was reported in Martindale Road, Canning Town was under attack
0:27:27 > 0:27:29for a third consecutive night.
0:27:32 > 0:27:36Judy Gregory has come to the record office for the Canning Town area to
0:27:36 > 0:27:43meet local historian Paul Rusiewski and to find out what happened next.
0:27:43 > 0:27:47These are group situation reports
0:27:47 > 0:27:50from the ARP authorities
0:27:50 > 0:27:55on the spot at the time that the German air raids were happening.
0:27:55 > 0:27:59So this is an example here from West Ham.
0:27:59 > 0:28:03So somebody's doing this, or this is happening 24 hours a day,
0:28:03 > 0:28:05- someone is sitting? - That's right, yes.
0:28:05 > 0:28:08Writing these messages and having to dispatch them?
0:28:08 > 0:28:15Oh, yes, yes. And they're being sent to the local headquarters
0:28:15 > 0:28:18by ARP men on the spot where the bombs are falling.
0:28:19 > 0:28:24These terse, fragmentary dispatches offer a minute-by-minute account
0:28:24 > 0:28:28of incidents as they were called in from the front line of the Blitz.
0:28:30 > 0:28:31Oh, this is us, my good...
0:28:31 > 0:28:32Oh.
0:28:46 > 0:28:47- WHISPERS:- Pull yourself together.
0:28:49 > 0:28:55At 4:09am, a report was received concerning South Hallsville School.
0:29:01 > 0:29:03- You all right?- Yeah.
0:29:04 > 0:29:06It's, it's...
0:29:09 > 0:29:14Major occurrence, 03:49, West Ham and South Hallsville School.
0:29:15 > 0:29:20Badly damaged. 600 refugees accommodated here.
0:29:21 > 0:29:24Stated to be in panic and casualties unknown.
0:29:31 > 0:29:33Dreadful.
0:29:33 > 0:29:34Absolutely dreadful.
0:29:36 > 0:29:37Out in the playground,
0:29:37 > 0:29:41I was just about to make a run for it when I heard something whistling
0:29:41 > 0:29:44through the air. I threw myself down flat.
0:29:44 > 0:29:48There was a terrific crunch and as I lifted my eye,
0:29:48 > 0:29:51I saw one half of the school disappear
0:29:51 > 0:29:53in a cloud of smoke and dust.
0:30:07 > 0:30:09Verbal report from controller,
0:30:09 > 0:30:13who states major occurrences at Hallsville School
0:30:13 > 0:30:17resulted in about 200 casualties, mainly children.
0:30:19 > 0:30:23Imperative that other refugees are evacuated without delay.
0:30:24 > 0:30:30Arrangements for this going forward, otherwise situation still obscure.
0:30:38 > 0:30:42We walked down and we could see the dust and the commotion
0:30:42 > 0:30:46round the area of the school and there was broken beams
0:30:46 > 0:30:48and bricks all over the place.
0:30:48 > 0:30:52The rubble, if you could call it that,
0:30:52 > 0:30:56looked about 20 feet high, to me, as a child.
0:30:57 > 0:30:59You couldn't discern anything,
0:30:59 > 0:31:03it was just a pile of bricks and dirt and dust.
0:31:03 > 0:31:08And just saw this, these rescue people, policemen and wardens,
0:31:08 > 0:31:09whatever they were,
0:31:11 > 0:31:15we saw them bringing objects out and laying them on the ground
0:31:15 > 0:31:17and covering them over with sacking.
0:31:18 > 0:31:22We didn't know at the time they were bodies, or bits of bodies.
0:31:27 > 0:31:32It was about 7am, daylight was beginning to break through.
0:31:32 > 0:31:36Already a message had been sent to control, cancel the buses,
0:31:36 > 0:31:38send us morgue vans and ambulances.
0:31:44 > 0:31:48It was rumoured later that buses had been sent,
0:31:48 > 0:31:51but they'd gone to Camden Town rather than Canning Town.
0:31:55 > 0:31:58There was anger later on, people were saying,
0:31:58 > 0:32:03"Well, why didn't the transport come in time?"
0:32:03 > 0:32:07And the consensus, I think, was that they hadn't bothered.
0:32:07 > 0:32:12The authorities don't care about us down here, the East End, you know,
0:32:12 > 0:32:14they're not worth thinking about.
0:32:14 > 0:32:16You just can't imagine...
0:32:16 > 0:32:21- No.- ..what chaos... - No.- ..was going on there.
0:32:21 > 0:32:27- Because they didn't know how many people were in that school.- No, no.
0:32:27 > 0:32:29They didn't really know how to get them out.
0:32:29 > 0:32:34It was an incident that nobody had any experience of dealing with.
0:32:34 > 0:32:37Oh, no. And my understanding was that they were digging at the site,
0:32:37 > 0:32:42getting bodies and bits of bodies out, for well over a week.
0:32:42 > 0:32:43Really?
0:32:49 > 0:32:52A small group of us were standing on the edge of the crater,
0:32:52 > 0:32:56near to me with the counsellor in charge of shelters.
0:32:56 > 0:32:59As we stood there surveying the scene, he lifted his head
0:32:59 > 0:33:04to the sky, and with tears streaming down his face, he cried,
0:33:04 > 0:33:07"My God, my God, this should never have happened!"
0:33:11 > 0:33:15Casualties from the school were taken to a temporary mortuary
0:33:15 > 0:33:18a few miles away at the Romford Road Baths.
0:33:18 > 0:33:22A place Stan Harris would come to know well
0:33:22 > 0:33:27when he joined the family firm of undertakers,
0:33:27 > 0:33:30T Cribb & Sons in 1942, aged just 14.
0:33:30 > 0:33:34It was strange, of course, and you had a ramp going down,
0:33:34 > 0:33:37and you had all these trays lined up.
0:33:37 > 0:33:39Maybe a family, maybe the odd one or two,
0:33:39 > 0:33:41but sometimes three or four families,
0:33:43 > 0:33:47depending on the raid, and how much damage and how many casualties.
0:33:49 > 0:33:53As you picked them up, that's how they were brought out of the debris,
0:33:53 > 0:33:57and invariably it was left to me, any young children and babies,
0:33:57 > 0:34:04to prepare them and make them as presentable, if you possibly could.
0:34:04 > 0:34:08Again, these stories that, in the end, they didn't bother
0:34:08 > 0:34:10to get any more out.
0:34:10 > 0:34:16They put quicklime down all over the place and there's still people
0:34:16 > 0:34:17down there now, you know.
0:34:19 > 0:34:23That's a point that's been raised many, many, many times,
0:34:23 > 0:34:27and to be perfectly honest, I don't think anybody will ever know.
0:34:29 > 0:34:30It's possible...
0:34:31 > 0:34:32It's possible.
0:34:37 > 0:34:41From the official death toll given at the time of 73,
0:34:41 > 0:34:4744 of the victims from 17 different families came from Martindale Road.
0:34:49 > 0:34:52Anne Gunn, Judy Gregory's mother,
0:34:52 > 0:34:55discovered the Gunn family's fate when she returned to Canning Town
0:34:55 > 0:34:57a few weeks later.
0:34:58 > 0:35:02She decided to come home, because I think things had quietened down
0:35:02 > 0:35:08a little bit then, and she asked a man sitting on his windowsill,
0:35:08 > 0:35:11did he know where Mrs Gunn and the family were.
0:35:11 > 0:35:13And he said, "Oh, they've gone, love."
0:35:13 > 0:35:16She said, "Yes, I know they've gone, do you know where they've gone?"
0:35:16 > 0:35:18Then he told her they'd all been killed.
0:35:20 > 0:35:23And that was when Mum sent the telegram to get Dad home.
0:35:25 > 0:35:28The incident in the family was always "the school",
0:35:29 > 0:35:31never South Hallsville or Agate Street,
0:35:31 > 0:35:35it was just "the school", and don't ask any questions.
0:35:38 > 0:35:40We couldn't ask Dad any questions.
0:35:43 > 0:35:45I look at these pictures...
0:35:48 > 0:35:52Til, Joyce, Alice, Stephen, Annie,
0:35:53 > 0:35:56Albert, Granny Gunn and Emmie.
0:35:58 > 0:36:01A huge part of my family went,
0:36:01 > 0:36:05and so our lives were very different after that, I think,
0:36:05 > 0:36:09because these children wouldn't have been that much older than us.
0:36:09 > 0:36:11What would our relationship have been with them?
0:36:16 > 0:36:18It's just wiped out, isn't it?
0:36:18 > 0:36:19It's just wiped out.
0:36:27 > 0:36:29But this is one family.
0:36:29 > 0:36:32If you multiply this across the whole of the country,
0:36:34 > 0:36:37it's just awful, isn't it?
0:36:37 > 0:36:40It's just, you can't sort of picture it, somehow.
0:36:43 > 0:36:45And Martindale Road, in particular,
0:36:45 > 0:36:49because although there were Albert and Til's family,
0:36:49 > 0:36:53there were other families who lost five, six people in that street too.
0:36:57 > 0:37:00All for the sake of a bomb that didn't explode, really.
0:37:05 > 0:37:10Tuesday morning, 48 hours after the unexploded bomb was reported
0:37:10 > 0:37:14in Martindale Road, reporter Ritchie Calder returned
0:37:14 > 0:37:17to South Hallsville School to witness the aftermath
0:37:17 > 0:37:20of a catastrophe he had seen coming.
0:37:20 > 0:37:22The next morning I saw the crater,
0:37:22 > 0:37:25I saw the rescue men descending perilously into it,
0:37:25 > 0:37:28listening for the sounds of the living.
0:37:28 > 0:37:31Saw the tombs of whole families.
0:37:31 > 0:37:36I spoke to men, fathers of families, who had been cursing on the Sunday.
0:37:36 > 0:37:41They were speechless and numbed by the horror of it all now.
0:37:41 > 0:37:43With the disclosure of that tragedy,
0:37:43 > 0:37:48which I insisted at the time, and still do insist, was the result of
0:37:48 > 0:37:50official blundering, the storm broke.
0:37:55 > 0:37:58Next day, the Daily Herald carried on its front page
0:37:58 > 0:38:01Calder's angry account of the South Hallsville disaster.
0:38:04 > 0:38:07But for Calder, the failures at the school were part
0:38:07 > 0:38:11of a far greater failure by the authorities,
0:38:11 > 0:38:14exposed in the first 72 hours of the Blitz.
0:38:19 > 0:38:22An all-out aerial assault on Britain had long been expected.
0:38:25 > 0:38:30Before war began, plans were laid to deal with this new form of warfare,
0:38:30 > 0:38:33with elaborate systems to cope with poison gas,
0:38:33 > 0:38:37mass hysteria and death on a catastrophic scale.
0:38:38 > 0:38:40- NEWSREEL:- This hand rattle means death.
0:38:42 > 0:38:43Put on your gas mask.
0:38:46 > 0:38:50But the authorities had prepared for the wrong war.
0:38:50 > 0:38:52When the real bombs began to fall,
0:38:52 > 0:38:55there was no poison gas or mass hysteria,
0:38:55 > 0:38:57and casualties were in the thousands,
0:38:57 > 0:38:59rather than the hundreds of thousands.
0:39:01 > 0:39:04What the bombing did create was an acute social crisis
0:39:04 > 0:39:09for bombed out families and families made homeless by evacuation,
0:39:09 > 0:39:12struggling to put their lives back together again.
0:39:16 > 0:39:20In the immediate aftermath of the South Hallsville tragedy,
0:39:20 > 0:39:23Ritchie Calder went on the war path on their behalf.
0:39:25 > 0:39:30Ritchie pieced together, from talking to survivors,
0:39:30 > 0:39:34the story of the appalling odyssey they had to make,
0:39:34 > 0:39:36calling in at various offices.
0:39:36 > 0:39:39You had to find some kind of roof over your head,
0:39:39 > 0:39:43you had to find some clothes, some food, a little bit of cash,
0:39:43 > 0:39:46new ration cards, an identity card.
0:39:48 > 0:39:53And Ritchie actually paced out that journey and he reckoned it
0:39:53 > 0:39:55was 8.5 miles.
0:39:55 > 0:39:57And when they reached journey's end,
0:39:57 > 0:39:59it was like the bad old days all over again.
0:40:01 > 0:40:06When they went to the official bodies, the Public Assistance Board,
0:40:06 > 0:40:09in order to say, "I've lost everything,"
0:40:09 > 0:40:13there was just an utter lack of decency, of humanity,
0:40:13 > 0:40:15on the part of the authorities.
0:40:15 > 0:40:21These people, who'd lost their homes, weren't seen as destitute
0:40:21 > 0:40:23and desperately in need of support,
0:40:23 > 0:40:26they were sometimes seen as scroungers.
0:40:29 > 0:40:33In this moment of national emergency, Calder argued,
0:40:33 > 0:40:36people were being let down by an antiquated system,
0:40:36 > 0:40:40prejudiced against the poor and which failed to reflect
0:40:40 > 0:40:42the new realities of the Blitz.
0:40:44 > 0:40:47To understand how this could happen,
0:40:47 > 0:40:50you have to understand the mindset of the bureaucrats
0:40:50 > 0:40:52who designed the system in the first place.
0:40:54 > 0:40:56This is Gideon Calder,
0:40:56 > 0:40:58he's another of Ritchie Calder's grandsons
0:40:58 > 0:41:01and an expert in the field of social policy.
0:41:04 > 0:41:07In the National Archives, he's examining the file
0:41:07 > 0:41:12of official correspondence dating from the summer of 1939,
0:41:12 > 0:41:14a full year before the Blitz began.
0:41:16 > 0:41:21Under discussion are rest centres like South Hallsville School and the
0:41:21 > 0:41:23question of who pays to equip them.
0:41:25 > 0:41:27The understanding was that there were two different types
0:41:27 > 0:41:33of homeless person created by a likely, say, bomb attack.
0:41:33 > 0:41:35The first sort of person would be somebody who was,
0:41:35 > 0:41:38who remained in the place of their residence,
0:41:38 > 0:41:42so they were called a "native" to that local authority.
0:41:42 > 0:41:44The other kind of person would have shifted
0:41:44 > 0:41:47from their home local authority to somebody else's,
0:41:47 > 0:41:51and they would be called an "immigrant", or a "refugee".
0:41:51 > 0:41:54So those classed as a native would be the responsibility
0:41:54 > 0:41:58of their local authority, but those who'd been classed as an immigrant
0:41:58 > 0:42:01would be the responsibility of central government.
0:42:03 > 0:42:08But this classification created a bureaucratic stand-off
0:42:08 > 0:42:10on issues great and small.
0:42:10 > 0:42:15For example, there was a reluctance on all sides to pay for blankets
0:42:15 > 0:42:18in rest centres, because, in the confusion of a raid,
0:42:18 > 0:42:22how could anyone tell if they were being used by natives or immigrants?
0:42:23 > 0:42:27This is a Mr Chatfield responding to Mr McGregor,
0:42:27 > 0:42:29who we meet a lot in these documents.
0:42:29 > 0:42:31I find it impossible, personally,
0:42:31 > 0:42:34to stand out against the view that some provision of blankets
0:42:34 > 0:42:36should be made.
0:42:36 > 0:42:38Rough shelter is all very well,
0:42:38 > 0:42:42and while mattresses and all other elaborations such as are suggested
0:42:42 > 0:42:45in many quarters should no doubt be refused,
0:42:45 > 0:42:48it would be a sure way to riot and revolution if scared,
0:42:48 > 0:42:52exhausted and hungry people were not provided with some assistance
0:42:52 > 0:42:54towards keeping them warm during the night.
0:42:55 > 0:43:00In the corner there's a marginal note, it says,
0:43:00 > 0:43:02The Treasury do not agree.
0:43:04 > 0:43:07The story here isn't really just about blankets,
0:43:07 > 0:43:10it's about the whole nature of the way in which these things
0:43:10 > 0:43:15are being tackled. And if you are going to design a way
0:43:15 > 0:43:19of equipping the nation, at local level, for the challenges
0:43:19 > 0:43:24that were going to face it, this is almost exactly what you wouldn't do.
0:43:25 > 0:43:28Think about how little we are aware of these lines on the map,
0:43:28 > 0:43:31which are the boundaries between local authorities
0:43:31 > 0:43:33and how little they would be in your head
0:43:33 > 0:43:35were you in an emergency situation.
0:43:36 > 0:43:39In human terms, it's a mess,
0:43:39 > 0:43:42and it's a mess which we only really see that starkly
0:43:42 > 0:43:46when the bombs are falling and people are plunged into crisis.
0:43:50 > 0:43:52After the Black Saturday raid,
0:43:52 > 0:43:56London was blitzed for 57 consecutive nights.
0:43:59 > 0:44:02Calder followed in the wake of the destruction
0:44:02 > 0:44:06as it spread from the Docklands to be heart of the City and beyond,
0:44:07 > 0:44:10reporting on the plight of the homeless and destitute.
0:44:12 > 0:44:14During his nightly forays,
0:44:14 > 0:44:17he met people forced to take matters into their own hands,
0:44:17 > 0:44:21improvising shelters and surviving as best they could.
0:44:24 > 0:44:27What he kept seeing, as he was reporting,
0:44:27 > 0:44:32was that hope actually lay with the everyday responses
0:44:32 > 0:44:35of neighbourhoods, who tended to come up
0:44:35 > 0:44:37with quite practical solutions.
0:44:38 > 0:44:42You might think at some times that this is slightly romanticised.
0:44:42 > 0:44:45The Blitz must've been straightforwardly rubbish
0:44:45 > 0:44:48for many people. And I'm sure that they weren't all generous and kind
0:44:48 > 0:44:51permanently through every moment of the situation.
0:44:51 > 0:44:53But I think you have to believe him.
0:44:53 > 0:44:57And what he mostly finds is people who repeatedly are doing
0:44:57 > 0:44:59what they think is the best thing to do,
0:44:59 > 0:45:02despite the fact nobody's ordered them to do it.
0:45:04 > 0:45:07Calder didn't have far to look for examples of self-help.
0:45:09 > 0:45:12When the authorities banned the use of the city's Underground stations
0:45:12 > 0:45:16as shelters, Londoners ignored them,
0:45:16 > 0:45:20forcing gates open or simply buying a ticket and refusing to budge.
0:45:24 > 0:45:27Before long, the authorities quietly gave up
0:45:27 > 0:45:30and made the Tube shelters official.
0:45:32 > 0:45:35In Spitalfields, a working-class neighbourhood
0:45:35 > 0:45:37just a few miles from Martindale Road,
0:45:37 > 0:45:42Calder came across another example, Mickey Davis.
0:45:42 > 0:45:45A local optician, who set up a committee to improve conditions
0:45:45 > 0:45:49in the improvised bomb shelters that had sprung up in the area,
0:45:49 > 0:45:53including one in the crypt of Christ Church, Spitalfields.
0:45:55 > 0:45:58Gideon Calder has come to Christ Church
0:45:58 > 0:46:02to meet Mickey Davis's nephew, Mike Brooke.
0:46:02 > 0:46:05He was known as Mickey The Midget.
0:46:05 > 0:46:07Which is not PC nowadays.
0:46:07 > 0:46:09But back then,
0:46:09 > 0:46:12he was something like four-and-a-half feet tall.
0:46:12 > 0:46:13He was very short.
0:46:13 > 0:46:15Mickey, as marshal of the Spitalfields shelter
0:46:15 > 0:46:17across the road in the wool exchange,
0:46:17 > 0:46:19also looked after this shelter.
0:46:19 > 0:46:22So, I think, between the two shelters,
0:46:22 > 0:46:25he would have been able to house 2,000-3,000 people.
0:46:31 > 0:46:34These people look like they're having a tough time.
0:46:34 > 0:46:37Well, although you were safe in the shelter,
0:46:37 > 0:46:41it was not a healthy environment.
0:46:44 > 0:46:46The impression that I get is that one of the main effects
0:46:46 > 0:46:49that Mickey's work had was to transform shelters
0:46:49 > 0:46:54from places which were pretty grim and with barely adequate sanitation
0:46:54 > 0:46:58and with generally, you know, very poor sleeping arrangements
0:46:58 > 0:47:01and so on into places which were at least humane
0:47:01 > 0:47:03in terms of a place to spend the night.
0:47:03 > 0:47:07He was one of life's natural organisers.
0:47:07 > 0:47:12For example, he persuaded Marks & Spencer to give him money
0:47:12 > 0:47:14to set up a canteen.
0:47:14 > 0:47:18And from the canteen, he used the profits of that to buy milk
0:47:18 > 0:47:21to give out free milk to the children who were in the area.
0:47:21 > 0:47:25A very poor area, East End of London in Spitalfields.
0:47:25 > 0:47:28And he got some sort of social service going.
0:47:30 > 0:47:34But the thing that really caught Calder's eye in Mickey's shelter
0:47:34 > 0:47:37was a medical post run by a volunteer doctor.
0:47:39 > 0:47:43He managed, almost without knowing it, to instil ideas of hygiene,
0:47:43 > 0:47:45of self-protection against disease,
0:47:45 > 0:47:47of positive health against sickness,
0:47:47 > 0:47:51and the idea almost unknown amongst the poor, that the doctor
0:47:51 > 0:47:55is not just someone you go to when you are desperately sick.
0:47:55 > 0:47:59That that voluntary medical post had all the hints of what we might do,
0:47:59 > 0:48:02to create a health service instead of a sickness service.
0:48:06 > 0:48:09My grandfather says in the Lesson Of London that Black Saturday
0:48:09 > 0:48:13will become as significant in the history of Britain
0:48:13 > 0:48:16as the fall of the Bastille in France.
0:48:16 > 0:48:20What he means by that is that what we discover at those moments
0:48:20 > 0:48:26is both the scale of what we face but we're also pointed towards
0:48:26 > 0:48:28the necessity of certain solutions,
0:48:28 > 0:48:31not just during the war, but also afterwards.
0:48:31 > 0:48:33He repeatedly says what we're talking about here...
0:48:33 > 0:48:35He's writing in 1941.
0:48:35 > 0:48:38Repeatedly says what we're talking about here is not just a response
0:48:38 > 0:48:41to the immediate kind of catastrophe of the Blitz.
0:48:41 > 0:48:45It's a response to the rebuilding of the country, which will inevitably
0:48:45 > 0:48:47have to take place after all this is over.
0:48:50 > 0:48:54Calder's message, carried from the bombed-out streets of Canning Town
0:48:54 > 0:48:57to the heart of the establishment, was the first draft
0:48:57 > 0:49:00of a new national consensus that would emerge from the ruins
0:49:00 > 0:49:01of Blitzed Britain.
0:49:03 > 0:49:06Just over three weeks since the unexploded bomb fell
0:49:06 > 0:49:10on Martindale Road, more than 5,000 Londoners had been killed
0:49:10 > 0:49:13and around 7,000 seriously injured.
0:49:14 > 0:49:18Around 120,000 houses had been destroyed or badly damaged.
0:49:19 > 0:49:22And in London's rest centres,
0:49:22 > 0:49:2525,000 homeless people were still stranded,
0:49:25 > 0:49:29sometimes in desperate conditions, but with nowhere else to go.
0:49:31 > 0:49:35Goaded by critics in the press like Calder and by political pressure
0:49:35 > 0:49:39behind the scenes, on the 26th of September,
0:49:39 > 0:49:41the government appointed a special commissioner
0:49:41 > 0:49:43for the homeless in London.
0:49:43 > 0:49:46His name was Henry Willink,
0:49:46 > 0:49:49Conservative MP for Croydon North.
0:49:49 > 0:49:51Isn't that so how you remember him?
0:49:51 > 0:49:57Absolutely, and that photograph has always sat in my family's house
0:49:57 > 0:49:58somewhere. So...
0:49:58 > 0:50:03Juliette Hancock and Penny Linnett are Henry Willink's granddaughters.
0:50:03 > 0:50:05It's incredibly familiar, isn't it?
0:50:05 > 0:50:06It's very, very familiar.
0:50:06 > 0:50:08- The pipe...- Yeah.
0:50:08 > 0:50:12- The glasses.- The glasses, the thoughtfulness...
0:50:12 > 0:50:13- Yeah.- The paper!
0:50:15 > 0:50:18By the time Juliette and Penny got to know him,
0:50:18 > 0:50:21Henry Willink was Sir Henry
0:50:21 > 0:50:22and had swapped politics
0:50:22 > 0:50:25for the Mastership of Magdalene College, Cambridge.
0:50:27 > 0:50:30But in the 1960s, he presented his grandchildren
0:50:30 > 0:50:34with a privately printed memoir so that they'd know something
0:50:34 > 0:50:35about his earlier life.
0:50:35 > 0:50:36Oh!
0:50:38 > 0:50:42It was a very privileged background he'd had.
0:50:42 > 0:50:45But nonetheless, being a young officer at the age of 22
0:50:45 > 0:50:49at the Somme, extraordinarily formative.
0:50:49 > 0:50:52And the sense of duty that he had.
0:50:52 > 0:50:55And I think, yeah, that probably all came together with what he was doing
0:50:55 > 0:50:57in the Second World War.
0:50:57 > 0:51:02The idea that he'd been responsible for men at the Front and it was
0:51:02 > 0:51:06important for them to know that their families back at home
0:51:06 > 0:51:08were being looked after.
0:51:08 > 0:51:11I think he would have felt passionately that life
0:51:11 > 0:51:13should be made as easy as possible for these people.
0:51:15 > 0:51:18Not everyone was impressed.
0:51:18 > 0:51:20In the pages of the Daily Herald,
0:51:20 > 0:51:23Ritchie Calder greeted Henry Willink's appointment
0:51:23 > 0:51:24with scepticism.
0:51:26 > 0:51:29My grandfather wasn't convinced that he has the back-up, really,
0:51:29 > 0:51:31to genuinely tackle the problems.
0:51:31 > 0:51:32That he's a government placed man.
0:51:32 > 0:51:35He's a Tory guy with no particular history
0:51:35 > 0:51:37of dealing with these kinds of problems.
0:51:38 > 0:51:40What happens over time, though, is that I think
0:51:40 > 0:51:42he begrudgingly begins to recognise that, actually,
0:51:42 > 0:51:44Willink is making a fist of it.
0:51:44 > 0:51:47In that, actually, there's a real value in what's happening here.
0:51:50 > 0:51:54In his memoir, Willink described how he set about the task.
0:51:55 > 0:51:59It was after discussion with the London County Council's Rest Centre
0:51:59 > 0:52:02Officer that, without any authority to do so,
0:52:02 > 0:52:07I authorised the spending of £300,000 as quickly as possible
0:52:07 > 0:52:11for the making of blast walls in 200 rest centres.
0:52:11 > 0:52:16This seemed to me essential in order to reduce the risk of large numbers
0:52:16 > 0:52:20of casualties arising from the explosion of one bomb.
0:52:22 > 0:52:26All he had was influence and persuasion.
0:52:26 > 0:52:31And I think the fact that he did what he did in the first 30 days,
0:52:31 > 0:52:33let alone in the 12 months that followed,
0:52:33 > 0:52:35was absolutely extraordinary.
0:52:37 > 0:52:42Finding ways to do things, cutting through red tape.
0:52:44 > 0:52:48On the 2nd of October, the Prime Minister sent for me.
0:52:48 > 0:52:51I remember most clearly his a general directive,
0:52:51 > 0:52:53which still seems to me admirable.
0:52:53 > 0:52:56These unfortunate people must be treated
0:52:56 > 0:53:02with kindness and generosity. But with firmness, when necessary.
0:53:05 > 0:53:08Willink took Churchill at his word.
0:53:08 > 0:53:13Outside East Ham Townhall in the borough neighbouring Canning Town,
0:53:13 > 0:53:16he can be seen promoting one-stop information centres
0:53:16 > 0:53:20designed to end the exhausting odysseys for bombed-out families
0:53:20 > 0:53:22that Calder had documented.
0:53:25 > 0:53:28He also cleared out the rest centres by speeding up billeting
0:53:28 > 0:53:33of the homeless, recruiting a 30-strong team of social workers
0:53:33 > 0:53:36to badger local authorities to do more for them.
0:53:38 > 0:53:41The culmination of his work can be found
0:53:41 > 0:53:45in a modest government pamphlet first produced in November, 1941
0:53:45 > 0:53:48and entitled The Care Of The Homeless.
0:53:50 > 0:53:53It marks the distance travelled since the bomb fell
0:53:53 > 0:53:59on Martindale Road, a journey from an uneven, grudging, chaotic system
0:53:59 > 0:54:04to a more humane system based on the concept of universal welfare.
0:54:05 > 0:54:08I'm mesmerised because I've never seen this before.
0:54:08 > 0:54:09No, I hadn't seen it before either.
0:54:09 > 0:54:11And it's just the most extraordinary read.
0:54:11 > 0:54:13The detail, isn't it?
0:54:13 > 0:54:16Absolutely. They were actually, by this stage,
0:54:16 > 0:54:19not only looking at good, practical administration,
0:54:19 > 0:54:21but caring for people as human beings.
0:54:21 > 0:54:23- Absolutely.- And everyone being different.
0:54:23 > 0:54:26So, it's got to that kind a small detail.
0:54:26 > 0:54:30- Yeah.- Covering literally everything from, you know,
0:54:30 > 0:54:33what sort of food there needed to be in the centres.
0:54:33 > 0:54:36How many blankets there needed to be.
0:54:36 > 0:54:39In the giving of help on the multifarious problems
0:54:39 > 0:54:43that beset the homeless, many agencies are involved.
0:54:43 > 0:54:45And close planning is therefore required
0:54:45 > 0:54:46to reduce as much as possible
0:54:46 > 0:54:49what might be a harassing search for information and help.
0:54:49 > 0:54:51So, he just pulled it all together, didn't he?
0:54:51 > 0:54:53Pulling it all together.
0:54:56 > 0:55:00The official bomb map for West Ham records the location
0:55:00 > 0:55:05of more than 3,000 bombs that fell on the borough
0:55:05 > 0:55:07between 1939 and 1945.
0:55:10 > 0:55:13But the reverberations of the unexploded bomb
0:55:13 > 0:55:17that fell on 8 Martindale Road were felt far beyond West Ham.
0:55:18 > 0:55:21From the disaster itself, Hallsville School,
0:55:21 > 0:55:25through the campaign in journalism of Ritchie Calder to the reforms of
0:55:25 > 0:55:27Henry Willink.
0:55:30 > 0:55:32- NEWSREEL:- Mr Henry Willink, Minister of Health
0:55:32 > 0:55:33for England and Wales,
0:55:33 > 0:55:36talks about the government's National Health Scheme.
0:55:36 > 0:55:39I've been asked to tell you just a little about this new plan
0:55:39 > 0:55:40for better health.
0:55:40 > 0:55:43Henry Willink went on to serve as Minister of Health
0:55:43 > 0:55:46in Winston Churchill's wartime coalition government.
0:55:48 > 0:55:51In 1944, he published a White Paper containing
0:55:51 > 0:55:56this country's first proposals for a National Health Service,
0:55:56 > 0:56:01a response to the Beveridge Report which had called for the creation
0:56:01 > 0:56:02of a welfare state.
0:56:04 > 0:56:08Our plan is a service which will provide the best medical advice
0:56:08 > 0:56:10and treatment to everyone.
0:56:10 > 0:56:12Every man, woman and child in this country.
0:56:13 > 0:56:16Whatever your income, if you want to use the service,
0:56:16 > 0:56:18there'll be no charge for treatment.
0:56:21 > 0:56:25Sandra Belchamber's grandparents, Robert and Mary-Ann,
0:56:25 > 0:56:28never returned to Martindale Road.
0:56:28 > 0:56:33These Canning Town refugees made a new life for their family in Kent.
0:56:36 > 0:56:40Today, golfers tee off where the hop pickers huts once stood.
0:56:44 > 0:56:48Judy Gregory's mum and dad did return to Canning Town.
0:56:48 > 0:56:51And Judy grew up in the same street where Uncle Albert
0:56:51 > 0:56:53and his family once lived.
0:56:55 > 0:56:57She didn't attend the school closest to her home.
0:56:58 > 0:57:01But it was many years before she understood the reason why.
0:57:05 > 0:57:10Today, Hallsville Primary is a beacon of excellence
0:57:10 > 0:57:11in Canning Town.
0:57:11 > 0:57:15Its children play on the site where South Hallsville School once stood.
0:57:19 > 0:57:23There is no record of what happened to the unexploded bomb
0:57:23 > 0:57:24at 8 Martindale Road.
0:57:24 > 0:57:28But like hundreds of others, it was probably dug up,
0:57:28 > 0:57:32taken to Hackney Marshes, and safely detonated there.
0:57:38 > 0:57:41A bomb drops on a suburban street in Hull.
0:57:42 > 0:57:44The three children were killed instantly.
0:57:44 > 0:57:47The trauma that followed was captured
0:57:47 > 0:57:49in a unique government survey.
0:57:49 > 0:57:52He heard moaning and set about digging for his children.
0:57:52 > 0:57:55He felt in a mental frenzy.
0:57:56 > 0:58:01A survey used to help seal the fate of countless German civilians.
0:58:02 > 0:58:03I find that horrifying.
0:58:03 > 0:58:05I'm sorry, I don't know if I should say that.
0:58:05 > 0:58:06But I find that horrifying.
0:58:08 > 0:58:11How were the lives of Germans affected by air raids
0:58:11 > 0:58:14when the Allies retaliated?
0:58:14 > 0:58:20To explore this and more, go to bbc.co.uk/blitz
0:58:20 > 0:58:22and follow the links to The Open University.