Bombs over Glasgow in WW2

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Postby JayKay » Wed Sep 21, 2005 3:15 pm

. She was watching from Germiston and looking over towards Petershill road/Springburn area. Can't remember for sure if she said exactly where the aircraft came down - could have been Springburn/Bishopbriggs - like I said vague memories. I would be curious to know if anyone can put anything concrete behind this

Possibly further to this I heard that South Crosshill Road in Bishopbriggs suffered bomb damage and a bumber of houses were destroyed. It was apparently caused by a damaged aircraft shedding its load of bombs. IIRC the street consists of several old houses, interspersed with newer 50s/60s housing.

Apparently the new houses were built on where the houses were hit, the older homes are the ones that missed. The new houses follow a straight line, and there in the park at the end of Kenmure Drive close to Bishopbriggs Golf Course there is the site of what was (apparently) a very large crater, turned into a wooded area of the park, where according local legend the plane finally crashed.

Obviously much of this is based on local legend. However according to my late aunt who lived in the area at the time, a german bomb did come through the roof of Bishopbriggs library, which was the school in Bishopbriggs at the time.
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BOMBS OVER GLASGOW

Postby Socceroo » Wed Sep 21, 2005 3:38 pm

I will produce a list of known / probable bomb sites in Glasgow from this topic and will post it.

The Clydebank records detail the near exact location and weight of bombs dropped on the burgh and any loss of life.

This information for Glasgow must be available somewhere. No doubt it was classified / sensitive until after the war so that it did not have an effect on morale.

I don't know therefore if the newspapers of the day would give too much information.
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Postby Tamandee » Wed Sep 21, 2005 5:18 pm

The_Clincher wrote:I've heard accounts of Kilmun St in Maryhill being decimated during WW2 with the sky being "black" with Luftwaffe planes.

Maybe some on here will be able to give you more info....i will gather anecdotal evidence in due course and post my findings on here. :)


Hi, I don't remember this personally (too young) but St Mary's primary school in Maryhill was bombed. It apparently had at least two levels above ground floor which (by the time I went there) was down to just one. (My memory is a bit hazy, it was a long time ago!). I think that's the reason they built the annexe to the school which was on the site of the new Maryhill Police Station, opposite the Barracks gates. Hope this helps. :)
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Postby Socceroo » Wed Sep 21, 2005 5:56 pm

Thanks, that's another one for the list.

I seem to recall that Gordon R. Urquhart's excellent book - Along Great Western Road gives a bit of detail on the Bombing of Kelvinside / Kelvindale including the damage to the big church (name escapes me) around the corner from Cleveden Crescent.

The list grows.
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Postby Schiehallion » Wed Sep 21, 2005 10:13 pm

Another two places that were bombed were the Glasgow Eye Dispensary in Charlotte St and Maryhill RC Chapel on Maryhill Rd.
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Postby Blueboy » Thu Sep 22, 2005 11:54 am

Some tenements on Deanston drive in Shawlands were re-built following bomb damage. You can still see the shrapnel marks on adjacent buildings. Apparently Queens Park's unusual shape made it look like a munitions depot or something in reconnaissance photos.
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Re: BOMBS OVER GLASGOW

Postby The Doctor » Thu Sep 22, 2005 12:30 pm

AlanM wrote:
I suppose the starting point for researching this would be to look at newspapers of the time, Mitchell Library here we come

Alan


Period newspapers will tell you nothing. Locations weren't published at the time for security reasons.
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Postby Socceroo » Thu Sep 22, 2005 3:13 pm

I am aware that there was quite a lot of bombing activity over the Queens Park area, but the only reference i have got is the destruction of the Greek Thompson Queens Park church.

I have been told that there was a lot of Ack Ack sites and Barrage Balloons in the area but this was more to deter the Luftwaffe coming in over Renfrewshire on their way to the Clydeside and Dixon Blazes etc.

I am also told that local legend however, at the time, gave the view that the authorities had something secret in the area which they really wanted to protect.

But i think the main reason there were so many defences was primarily due to Weirs of Cathcart, Dixon Blazes and the many railway sidings etc that would require protection / deterrent. Reason enough.
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Re: BOMBS OVER GLASGOW

Postby Schiehallion » Thu Sep 22, 2005 7:58 pm

SOCCEROO wrote:But i think the main reason there were so many defences was primarily due to Weirs of Cathcart, Dixon Blazes and the many railway sidings etc that would require protection / deterrent. Reason enough.


Weirs was a big target for them. They had even made biplanes during WW1.
The factory is outlined in black on this Luftwaffe aerial survey.

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Postby Socceroo » Thu Sep 22, 2005 8:22 pm

Thanks for that. I have seen quite a few Luftwaffe target maps of various areas of Glasgow, but i do not remember seeing that one.

I have been going through tonight about 30 or so Glasgow history books that i have to see what is available on Luftwaffe activity over Glasgow.

There seems to be a lot of contradiction on casualty figures with some saying that Glasgow over the period of the war suffered more casualties than Clydebank did in March 1941, and some other sources saying the overall casualty figures for the period 1939 - 1945 were much less than those suffered by Clydebank during the two raids of March 1941.

I have now from various books, websites, and from this forum got about 20+ bomb site locations in the city.

Already i can see from plotting the pattern of sites that multiple bomb sites may be from a single aircraft run.
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Postby johnnyanglia » Fri Sep 23, 2005 8:16 pm

I have also read about the Deanston Drive bombing. It was either in Bob Crampsey's book about growing up during the war in the Southside or Rudolf McKenna's book "They belonged to Glasgow". If memory serves me correct two tenements were felled by a direct hit on Deanston Drive and 22 or 24 people were killed. This put paid to the popular(and very bizarre)fallacy that Hitler's Aunt lived in Shawlands and had(up till then)been spared attention by bombers.
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Postby Socceroo » Fri Sep 23, 2005 9:14 pm

Thanks for the info i'll look it up in a bit more detail. Regarding Deanston Drive does anyone know if there is a gap site with a more modern building taking the place of the tenements.

I am putting together a map of the various bombsites and i'll probably take some photographs too of gap sites, buildings with shrapnel scars etc.
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Postby johnnyanglia » Fri Sep 23, 2005 9:51 pm

I believe the gap site on Deanston Drive is where the children's nursery now stands.
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Postby crusty_bint » Fri Sep 23, 2005 9:54 pm

There are indeed gaps in the tenement lines on Deanston Drive (Just bought a flat on that street!), they have been filled with those three-storey Corporation flats, the type with the inbuilt veranda constructed of concrete/foamslag blocks with the wee teeny smooth pebbles set into them. Know the type?

If you have the arial atlas of Glasgow have a look on page 82, ref BN36, on the westerly edge you'll see the break in the tenement blocks. If you don't have the arial atlas I recommend you get one: they're indespensible!!

I'll try get you a fotie over the next couple of days.
Last edited by crusty_bint on Wed Oct 19, 2005 10:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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BOMBS OVER GLASGOW

Postby Socceroo » Fri Sep 23, 2005 9:59 pm

I know where the Nursery is i have walked past it many times on my way to the pub.

I did not know that it was a bomb site with so much loss of life. You learn something new about this City every day.
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