If today we were to stroll around the new Elephant Park development, built on the site of the old Heygate Estate, we might hear joyful children playing in the new water feature or in the playground in New Lion Way, writes Neil Crossfield…
If we were somehow transported back 80 years to June 6, 1942 and walked the same course, we also may have heard happy children and seen people relaxing in what was then called Gurney Street.
At the turn of the 20th century, Gurney Street and the streets around it had been in one of the most densely populated neighbourhoods in London.
Close to the Elephant and Castle, the area had been pounded during the Blitz and bomb-damaged houses stood all around. Though entry to these was officially prohibited, they became exciting playgrounds for local children, many of whom had returned from evacuation now that the worst of the bombing was over.
One of these damaged houses was 6 Gurney Street, which had been hit on the last night of the Blitz, May 10/11, 1941. Contemporary architectural drawings showed an approximation of the damage which would have been visible in June 1941. However, little beknown to the residents of Gurney Street, deep within the ruin lay an unexploded bomb which would later wreak havoc.
Saturday, June 6, 1942 was a fine, hot day. The Daily Herald printed a notice that the London blackout would not start till 10:57 pm and would lift at 5am the following morning.
Many residents were sitting on the steps of their blocks and groups of children were playing cricket with a tennis ball, using old floorboards as bats. Another child was riding up and down on a ‘fairy cycle (a popular children’s bike)’. John Garret, a 43-year-old air raid precaution (ARP) demolition worker, was planting tomatoes.
At around 9:30 pm, as crowds of cinema-goers were leaving the Trocadero Cinema, the ground shook as a large explosion ripped through Gurney Street. Eyewitnesses recalled seeing a huge plume of dust and smoke rising over the area and the explosion was heard up to five miles away. One young boy even remembered seeing a massive steel girder flying through the air. Once the dust began to settle, a scene of utter devastation was revealed. Eighteen people were killed and more than 130 were injured.
No air raid warning had sounded, nor had any enemy aircraft been reported, so it soon became apparent that this explosion was likely to have been caused by the detonation of unexploded ordnance.
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6 Gurney Street and the two houses either side had been completely obliterated and severe structural damage was caused to many other buildings in the neighbouring streets. Glass was shattered up to 670 feet away.
The Civil Defence Services, including firemen, heavy rescue squads and medical teams were mobilised to the scene promptly. Immediately treating the walking wounded and searching the ruins for those missing, they were soon joined by members of the public and family members who wanted to help, some scrabbling at the rubble with their bare hands.
Priests were seen among the collapsed buildings offering comfort to the injured and dying. The Rev. A.N. Turner of St. Matthews, Old Kent Road, told newspapers that it reminded him of a colliery explosion with families congregating at cordons set up by the home guard, and people desperate to hear any news of their missing loved ones.
A Canadian soldier called Samuel Schwartz had been in the area when he heard the bomb explode. He went to the scene and helped to bring bodies out. He continued to assist until Sunday evening but was later arrested, charged with being an absentee from his unit. Appearing at Old Street Police Court on June 10, the magistrate released him, sending him back with instructions of what to say to his officers. He was not the only soldier who had stopped to help. On June 13, the Daily Mirror printed a ‘thank you’ letter to an unknown Royal Engineer who had assisted on the evening despite having an injured foot.
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While the vast majority of rescuers and survivors conducted themselves in a professional, dignified and courageous manner, there were reports of looting from damaged houses, even while the rescue operation was still in progress. The South London Press carried a story on 12 June where a Mrs Fish said she would ‘string up the looters’ after spending the night trying to locate her family and rescue furniture from her bombed out house, only to find that £15 worth of clothing had been stolen from a pram.
Unfortunately the ‘Blitz Spirit’ did not spread to everyone as some criminals saw the war as an opportunity to rob and steal. Air Raid Wardens had previously recalled other instances in Walworth, where the bodies of those killed in air raids were robbed of rings and other jewellery.
Along with the eighteen dead, 62 were seriously injured and 72 were slightly injured. Among the dead were six children under the age of ten. Their bodies were found close together by rescuers. Mr and Mrs John Garrett lost three of their five children: Charles aged 7, Ivy aged 6 and David aged 2. They had also been looking after another boy who was killed, Thomas Bishop aged 5. The family had been living at 65 Gurney Street since being bombed out of De Laune Street in 1941. John Garrett had to identify their bodies by means of pieces of clothing, rings and a scar. Early newspaper reports said that the youngest, David, had been found clutching a penny in his left hand.
An older son William, aged 13, had survived but had been buried under a kitchen table by debris. Another son, Tom aged 22, had returned to his army unit after seven days leave, just one hour before the explosion. Mrs Garrett was not initially told that her children had died, but was later seen being taken from the steps of her wrecked home weeping after hearing the sad news. Mr Garrett had told the Daily Mirror that his children had never been evacuated as his wife had said that ‘if we were bombed, we would all go together’.
Mary Ann Wright, aged twenty, had lived at 45 Larcom Street for two years while working at a local lemonade factory, possibly R. Whites. Her first wedding banns were due to be read the following morning, but she was killed while walking home to her lodgings.
Nine-year-old Sydney Edward Colwell had gone with his 7-year-old sister Sheila to buy ice creams from Roffo’s shop on the corner of Deacon Street and Ash Street. While Sheila was dawdling along Ash Street, Sydney rushed back to his nan’s house in the Palatinate Buildings. Sadly, he was walking along Gurney Street when the bomb exploded, crushing him under tons of falling masonry. His grandmother, Mrs C Donovan, was reported to have been seen wandering around the blast zone searching for her lost daughter and grandchildren. Sheila had survived, as did Sydney’s older brother Eugene and another sister Norma. Eugene later went on to write an account of the incident which can be viewed at the Southwark Local History Library in the Borough.
All the victims should be remembered but Frank Shaw Dawson stands out as a very interesting personality. Though totally inappropriate to modern sensibilities, in the language of the day, the South London Press described him as a ‘British African Negro’ who was a well-known and popular character in the Walworth area. He was said to have been a stoker in the merchant navy, a boxer in fairground booths, an East Lane tipster and a street vendor. The 1921 Census showed that he was lodging at 25 Dugdale Street, SE5, and is recorded as being 29 years and 7 months, single and that he was a British subject born in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
This would indicate that he was born in January 1892. His profession is stated as ‘pro music hall artist’. At the time of his death, Dawson was employed as a foundry labourer by Dewrance & Co. Engineers who had been based in Great Dover Street since the mid-1850s.
One of the many products made by Dewrance during the war were air pressure gauges fitted on the RAFs Lancaster and Wellington bombers. Like Dawson, many of those killed or injured would have been employed in vital war work in Southwark factories and workshops.
His funeral is one of the very few mentioned in the aftermath of the incident. As it was likely that he had no known relatives living in London it had been suggested that it would be left to the local council to bury Dawson. These ‘paupers’ burials’ would have been despised by many of the working classes, so friends and employers at Dewrance donated money from the firm’s Air Raid Distress Fund so that he could receive a proper burial.
The following Saturday, June 13, a procession left Simpson and Sons Funeral directors in East Lane, travelling past the Dewrance factory in Tabard Street before moving down Falmouth Road and past the scene of the tragedy in Gurney Street. It then proceeded to Nunhead Cemetery where Frank Shaw Dawson is still remembered on the Southwark Metropolitan Borough memorial along with the other victims of this tragedy.
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Many people had lucky escapes and were pulled out of the rubble after being trapped for hours. Using both heavy machinery and hand tools, rescuers would periodically call for total silence in the hope that any survivors could signal their location. At one somewhat bizarre point, work stopped while rescuers watched a wedding taking place at the nearby Crossway church. A new mobile sound location unit was used to try and locate any possible survivors trapped in the rubble. The Daily Mail had reported that rescuers were using a ‘magic eye to spot bombs’ prompting an angry note from the Ministry of Home Security asking whether anyone at the scene had talked to Daily Mail reporters. Later correspondence suggests that the newspaper had seen the listening device in operation and ‘either deliberately or through ignorance’ had ‘made a bit of a story about it.’
The search continued until late on Monday, June 8, when Mrs Gudgeon, believed to be missing, telephoned relatives to inform them that she had been away visiting relatives at the time the blast occurred.
Anger was directed towards the Civil Defence Services for their failure to identify the danger, which the later official enquiry recorded as being a 1000kg G type parachute mine. The bomb had pierced the wall of 6 Gurney Street but had not exploded. However, air raid wardens at the time believed that a 50kg high explosive bomb had exploded and caused the damage observed on the building. Sometime after, the building had been demolished and the debris had been backfilled into the crater, unwittingly covering up the mine.
The reason why it exploded after thirteen months was unclear but quite possibly could have been caused by vibration from heavy machinery which had been used in the surrounding area to clear bomb damage. An official enquiry was held at Southwark Town Hall and the Civil Defence Forces were exonerated from all blame and praised for their heroic rescue attempts. However, after this event, further guidance was issued to all Air Raid Wardens about the need to carefully assess their bomb damage reports to minimise the risk of such an event happening again.
There are now probably few people alive who witnessed the incident, but its legacy would cast a shadow over the lives of those families affected for many years. All losses in war are regrettable but considering many of the people killed and injured had survived the worse days of the Blitz, to die in such a tragic manner, on a beautiful summer’s evening was a cruel twist of fate.
List of those killed at Gurney Street on June 6, 1942
- CHARLES MICHAEL GARRETT – aged 7
- DAVID GARRETT aged 2
- IVY ROSINA GARRETT aged 6
Charles, David and Ivy are all registered as living at 56A De Laune Street. Sons and daughter of John Edward and Jane Elizabeth Garrett. They died at 65 Gurney Street. The family had been living at 65 Gurney Street since being bombed out of De Laune Street in 1941.
- THOMAS EDWARD BISHOP – aged 5.
Thomas is also registered as living at 56A De Laune Street. He was the son of Private Thomas Edward Bishop of the Pioneer Corps. Little Thomas died at 65 Gurney Street, he was being looked after by the Garrett family, when the bomb exploded.
- EDWARD BRYAN CARTER – aged 4.
Edward lived at number 16 Gurney Street and die at Gurney Street.
- SYDNEY RAYMOND COLWELL – aged 9.
Sydney was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Herbert John Colwell, of 66 Brocket House, Union Road, Wandsworth and died at Gurney Street.
- FRANK SHAW DAWSON – aged 43.
Died at number 8 Gurney Street.
- ELLEN MOYCE – aged just 23 months.
The little baby also died at 8 Gurney Street.
- WILLIAM ALBERT LAWRENCE – aged 14.
William died at Gurney Street.
- HERBERT STANLEY LONGMAN – aged 63.
Herbert died at 14 Gurney Street.
- FLORENCE MAY OLIVER – aged 12.
Florence lived at 18 Gurney Street. She was injured at Gurney Street and unfortunately died same day having been taken to Lambeth Hospital.
- JOSEPH SOPP – aged 19.
Joseph died at Gurney Street.
- CAROLINE LOUISA SUMMERFIELD – aged 54.
Caroline died at 12 Gurney Street.
- MARY FRANCES WHITEHEAD – aged 65.
Mary also died at 12 Gurney Street alongside Caroline Summerfield.
- WALTER ERNEST USHER – aged 4.
Little Walter died at 65 Gurney Street.
- THOMAS VERITY – aged 70.
Thomas died at 47 Gurney Street.
- WILLIAM JOHN WELLS – aged 64.
Husband of Mary Wells, William died at 59 Gurney Street.
- MARY ANN WRIGHT – aged 20.
Daughter of William Wright, of 45 Larcom Street. Died at Gurney Street.
