Day 5
Air Raids in Leith
Memories of Leith:
Continuing our focus on Remembrance Day, we take a closer look at the Air Raids that took place in Leith during WWII with images, a news article and some collected recollections of the evening.
An article detailing the raids across Edinburgh including those in Leith from 1940-1942.
Having come through the First World War with only one attack by Zeppelin, which was aiming for Rosyth and the Forth Rail Bridge, but lost its way and instead followed the Water of Leith from the Harbour into Edinburgh dropping its bombs along the way, Leith was not so lucky in World War Two. While in comparison to some other locations, Leith as a whole was relatively unscathed. This was little comfort to those who lost loved ones, homes and livelihoods as a result of the attacks that did come. The bombings had a lasting impact on the families affected even where no loss of life occurred, with homes and businesses being destroyed.
Friends and Families of some of those lost in the air raids still remember them. Others recall the experience and damage nearby.
Photo of Largo Place destruction from the ‘mini blitz’ taken on April 8, 1941 © Hamish Stevenson. Thank you to Kenneth Williamson for help in photo clearances.
Peter Sellar was just getting ready to leave school when it was damaged by a bomb.
“A lad in my class at D.K was one of the injured in the raid, he received a wound from shrapnel in the back. I was ready to leave when the school was damaged and when we got a holiday I never did return to D.K was working right away in a rigging loft in the old dock called Charlie Foreman’s. They made all the halyards and hand lines plus other rigging for the ships in Robbs. We’d load it all on a large barrow and the senior Riggers would set it all up as we carried it all up to them.”
James Robb and Edith Rutherford remember his mum’s cousin, who was killed in a shelter by the same bombs that damaged the newly built Leith town hall complex, including Leith Theatre and Leith Library.
“My Mother’s cousin was killed in the Largo Place bombing. She went into the shelter but the bomb landed on it. Her gravestone in Seafield Cemetery describes her as having died as a result of enemy action. My Mother said hers was the last walking funeral in Leith RIP.”
“[This was] Jean Rutherford my late husband Charlie’s older sister. She was 15 years old.
Jean had gone down to clean the shelter out as the neighbours in the stair took it in turns to maintain it. When the bomb dropped on the other side of George street* the vibration caused the shelter to cave in, think she died instantly. Her dad and neighbours dug her out.
She is buried with her grandparents in Seafield cemetery. There were others killed on the site the bomb dropped, their names are in the book of civilians killed at Edinburgh Castle War Memorial.”
*George Street, Leith was one of those renamed after the amalgamation to prevent confusion with George Street Edinburgh - it is now part of North Fort Street
“Yes that name rings a bell now, she took mum to the brownies, it was the highlight of her week. Her uniform was too big for her when she started, and when she finished it was like a tunic top. Whenever she spoke about going, she remembered Jean. My mum was born in 1928, so that will give you an idea of what age she was when Jean passed . Mum was born in wilkie place, and couldn’t go to the shelter that night. They were members of St Thomas’ church , I expect there would be services in all the churches in Leith to remember those who died, there was one wee girl who carried Jeans memory from that day till her passing anyway. At mum’s service the minister spoke about mum being a brownie, and how, if ever a funeral procession came past her, even if she wasn’t in uniform, she’d stand at the pavement edge and do her brownie salute, a beautiful mark of respect. She would have done this for Jean if she’d had the opportunity, I hope she did. It’s so sad Jean passed away so young, it wasn’t fair, doing a good deed too. Such a tragic loss, her father must have been devastated. Such a sad story, an awful thing to happen to a lovely young girl. God rest her soul xx”
Jill McGlaughlin’s mother told her about the same event.
“My mum told me about a young girl of 14 who was killed when the land mine were dropped, Largo place, top of prince regent street, the library, and George street. My mum had been at the dentist that day and was feeling poorly, so my granny sent the boys to the shelter, and she and mum stood behind the open front door with the wall behind them. My mum was about 10, and said when the mines hit, in her head she saw a giant tearing up the pavements , she’d never heard noise like it, terrifying!! Lucky to have survived such a close call, they lived in Wilkie place!!”
Frank Ferri also witnessed the April 7th 1941 Bombing.
“On the night of April 7th 1941, my area (Ballantyne) was hit by a mini blitz. German aircraft heading for the shipyards of Clydebank on the west coast were intercepted by our RAF fighters and in an effort to get away as fast as they could the German bombers unloaded their bombs indiscriminately to hasten their exit. The bombs they released in our area were two land mines, suspended from parachutes, which silently fell from the sky, giving no warning until they reached ground level and exploded.
One bomb fell near Largo Place/ Keddie Gardens park, destroying the corner of a tenement and killing at least two people, at the same time badly damaging the Town Hall in Ferry Road (now Leith Library). Running parallel with Ballantyne and Largo Place is the Water of Leith and the then railway embankment. The second bomb fell in the deep embankment, thus forcing the blast in an upwards direction, had it fallen on more level ground, Ballantyne and other areas would have been levelled to the ground.
That night is indelibly imprinted in my mind. It would have been about nine o’clock, and I aged six or seven was sitting by the fireside reading my comic before going to bed. We were never early bedders, even as children, sleeping on many nights with our clothes on in anticipation of the air raid sirens going off.
My father heard an aircraft passing overhead. We were, to a degree, used to hearing the sounds of different aircraft engines and if the sirens went off, we knew it had been a German. So frequently did aircraft fly over our house, we learned to differentiate between the engine sounds of friend or foe.
On this occasion my father was right at guessing it was a German, but this time there was no siren warning, the bomb parachutes fell silently, and then there was this enormous blast, which lifted me right off my chair and flung me across the room into the lobby (hall).
The complete window had blown in, the plaster on the ceiling and walls fell off, with furniture, dust and glass strewn all over the place.
My father grabbed me, placed my two year old brother in an all enclosing gas mask that resembled a deep sea diver’s helmet and made for the door and balcony. Feeling the rubble of the balcony under his feet in the darkness, he shouted to my mother, ‘I think the balcony has gone, we may be trapped.’Meanwhile, he realised she had gone back into the house to retrieve her purse and had got trapped behind the living-room door that had been jammed by falling debris. He went back for her.The balcony as it turned out was safe and we gingerly made our way down the turreted staircase to the sound of exploding shells, shrapnel and tracer bullets and the sweeping bands of light from our ack ack gun searchlights scanning the skies.”