| 1937 |
Civil Defence Services for the Merseyside Area established. |
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| August 1939 |
Evacuation preparations in Merseyside begin; children issued with gas masks and name tags. |
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September 1939 |
3rd: Britain enters the Second World War; 95,000 children are evacuated from Merseyside. |
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August 1940 |
9th: First bombs dropped on Merseyside at Prenton, Birkenhead. Liverpool’s first casualty of the 'Blitz'.
10th: First bombs dropped on Wallasey.
17th: First bombs dropped on Liverpool. Liverpool Overhead railway damaged.
19th: Walton Gaol bombed killing 22 prisoners. |
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September 1940 |
5th: Liverpool's Anglican Cathedral damaged by bomb blast.
6th: Children’s Convalescent Home bombed, Birkenhead.
26th: Heavy raid on docks and warehouses. Argyle Theatre, Birkenhead, seriously damaged. |
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October 1940 |
23rd: Merseyside suffers 200th air raid. |
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November 1940 |
28th: Heaviest air raids to date; 200 people killed in total as the first land mines dropped on Merseyside. 164 people killed when a shelter underneath the Junior Technical School, Durning Road, collapsed. |
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December 1940 |
3rd: 180 people killed in attack on a packed air raid shelter
12th: Merseyside suffers its 300th air raid.
20th: Start of the ‘The ‘Christmas Raids’ with 365 people killed over three nights. 42 people killed in a bomb attack on two air raid shelters; another 42 people killed when railway arches being used as unofficial shelters are hit; 1399 children evacuated out of Liverpool.
21st: 74 people killed in a direct hit on a large air raid shelter.
22nd: End of the ‘Christmas Raids’. |
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January 1941 |
Bad flying weather results in just three air raids in the whole month. |
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February 1941 |
7th: ‘Western Approaches Command Headquarters transferred to Liverpool from Plymouth.
Only two raids are carried out on Merseyside in February. |
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March 1941 |
12-13th: Heavy bombing resumes. Wallasey suffers its heaviest raids as 174 people are killed.
16th: Baby girl found alive under debris in Wallasey, after being trapped for three and a half days. |
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April 1941 |
25th: Winston Churchill visits Liverpool to see the city and port.
The Luftwaffe (German air force) limited the raids on Merseyside to just three this month, conserving their forces for the upcoming ‘May Blitz’. |
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May 1941 |
1st: Beginning of the ‘The ‘May Blitz’ 1741 people were killed and 114 people seriously injured by the end of the week.
3rd: Worst night of the ‘May Blitz’, including the explosion of the cargo ship Malakand in Huskisson Dock.
7th: Final night of the ‘May Blitz’;
13th: 550 ‘Unknown Warriors of the Battle of Britain’ are buried in a common grave at Anfield Cemetery. |
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June 1941 |
1st: Heavy raids on Liverpool docks; East Gladstone Dock is badly damaged. |
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July 1941 |
24th: Light air raid on Merseyside. |
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November 1941 |
1st: A light air raid is the final attack on Merseyside in 1941. |
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January 1942 |
10th: Merseyside’s final bombing raid of the Second World War sees houses in Upper Stanhope Street demolished. |
