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Bomb Strikes: Conventional Bombs |
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The more conventional bomb strikes on Whitstable may have come from planes offloading any remaining explosives after a raid on London or the Medway Towns. Evidence of this is supplied by Mollie Fallon in the quote below....
Such strikes may also have been made by damaged aircraft or those suffering mechanical problems. The aim here might be too lighten the load and make some use of their explosives while attempting to return to the safety of mainland Europe. On the other hand, some attacks on East Kent towns may have been the work of iindividual dive bombers that had been given license to roam the Kent countryside for possible random targets. Whatever, the thought processes involved, the attacks caused significant damage in various parts of Whitstable....
At the Boating Lake....
Mercifully, there were occasions when the strikes were inconvenient but inconsequential....
At the Horsebridge/Terrys Lane....
Other hits were more substantial....
The bomb landed on properties at junction of Horsebridge Road and Terry's Lane. The ticket office and houses were destroyed but the bus garage and Assembly Rooms survived despite significant damage. A small oblong ticket office was erected on the bomb site at the corner of the two roads after the war and this served customers throughout the 1950s. However, the northern side of Terry's Lane remained a rather ramshackle site for 55 years until the whole area was redeveloped in the year 2000....
High Street...
To date, we have learned of just one bomb in the main shopping streets. The device fell at the rear of a retail outlet at No. 5 High Street - not far from the Terry's Lane incident.
Regent Street...
In many ways, Regent Street was at the centre of much of the bombing. Mercifully, there was only one direct hit on the street. This is mentioned by Ian Johnson....
Warwick Road & Acton Roads
Two side roads leading from Regent Street suffered blasts. A bomb hit Nos 3 and 5 Warwick Road....
Warwick Road
... and another destroyed properties in Acton Road.
Above: Acton Road
Diamond Road...
A short distance away, a bomb damaged properties in Diamond Road close to the junction with Reservoir Road....
Clare Road...
The haphazard nature of the bombing meant that strikes hit some residential areas a considerable distance from the town centre and there were stories of both tragedy and incredible good fortune .....
Bearing in mind the densely populated nature of many of the roads, it is quite remarkable that casualties were not considerably greater.
Ham Shades Lane...
Bombs also hit the less populated outskirts of town. Two such explosions rocked the then "country surroundings" of Ham Shades Lane. The first was at Bartlett's corner where the bomb fell in what is now the entrance to Bridewell Park...
The second dropped further east as Bill Dancer explains....
As air raids became a part of normal life, some war-weary people became less concerned with a dash to the shelters and stayed in their homes. A favourite practice was to pop into the "cupboard under the stairs". I once asked my old dad about the wisdom of that practice. His answer was simple.... "If a bomb-hit house was left with anything standing, it was usually the staircase!".
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