Just a few items from the areas in and around Torbay.

There are too many for us to list all here but we have added a few links and items below.

Text and images © Adrian Chan-Wyles 2011.

On Wednesday 15 July 1940, I happened to be present at the bombing of the London City (mentioned by Bruce Peeke in his article). A friend and I were on the beach, at the beginning of the breakwater when we saw a twin-engine plane diving at us. We plunged under a stone staircase. All this happened in five seconds. We heard an explosion, and creeping from under the stairs we sae black smoke rising from the London City and could see she was sinking. To give a reference to the time, this happened at midday because we normally had our dinner at 12.o'clock and I lived at 25 King Street and had to be home for dinner. That was our first bomb after our escape and the bombardment we passed through in Dieppe.

A month later, we went to live in Overgang Street. The London City was refloated in 1941 and a few days later bombed. But the bombs passed through her after deck, and out through the stern without damaging her seriously. In 1942, the Belgian School had a classroom in the cloakroom of the Town Hall. We were having a French lesson when we heard bombs falling. Our teacher was so afraid that he left us so we ran to the harbour to see what happened and there was the London City sinking with a gap in her side where the engine room was.

On Monday 19 May 1940 while I was again attending the Belgian School (this time in a room in the Sunday School of the Baptist Church). we heard explosions and smelt gas. Everyone left the school and I had to scramble over the brick-strewn Middle Street.  One bomb fell near the gas tank which began to leak.; another fell on the off-licence  in Fore Street, killing the parents of a National School friend of mine. When I lived in Overgang Street, the planes flew at the height of our cellar window when they flew in, following the line of the New Road.  They attacked the shipyard with poor results.

Only one time bomb fell on Brixham. During the night, we were awakened by the siren and we went to shelter in an old shed built into the rocks on the street. A German bomber passed by and later on the all-clear sounded and we went home. An explosion was heard in the morning and a row of houses on the other side of the harbour to where we lived was damaged. I remember too being woken up in the night by the explosion in Furzeham.

Once, I was with my father and other fishermen on the Overgang Steps (where the Customs and Harbour Master's offices were). It was in the afternoon when suddenly  four yellow-nosed Heinkels came into view, dropping bombs on the ships lying at anchor. Everyone went behind the wall; when we peered over it we saw a sinking fishing boat nearby. Another vessel, which had been moored alongside a fishing smack, was now without masts and the mast of the other smack was sticking out of the water. Luckily, my father's ship was far from where the bombs dropped. As it was high water, some boats in the inner harbour started their engines and put themselves on each side of the sinking N45. Passing steel wires under the damaged vessel, they brought her into the inner harbour. They then brought in the fishing boat without its mast.On board was the owner, who, with his son, had been working on the engine at the very moment the bomb exploded on the smack which had been alongside. The boat without masts never sailed again. It was docked in the inner harbour in front of the inner pier, and later, during another aeroplane attack, a bomb fell in front opening all the planks. I remember a friend of ours who lived in the New Road in front of the paint works. He was afraid and moved to the Parkham Road to be safer, and later on, a bomb fell in front of the house where he lived but in the lower part near Bolton Street, without causing any damage. 

Three times, German planes gunned my father while he was fishing, but the last time was the worst. My father's ship was the O.280 Pierre, War Number 128 - previously it had been the old Brixham smack BM1 Superb. He saw the German planes passing and entering the River Dart. A moment later, they were back and unfortunately he was in their path. When he saw the planes coming he rushed below deck; there was the sound of cannon fire and the motor started running on one cylinder and water was flooding the ship. Coming up on deck. he found half of the mast shot away and a hole in the hull just on the waterline. My father had, by way of precaution, made a sort of shelter  on the fore deck by placing iron ballast ingots. These ingots slipped to the starboard side, causing the ship to list, so the hole on the port side came above the water level. They were then able to plug  this hole with a wooden tap they used to close the screw shaft when in repair. On another Belgian ship, the skipper had, that same day, run for cover from the  helm and lost his leg - he died later in hospital. Two ships were lost through mines and the third by an explosion in  their net; they managed to get to shore but their boat then sank. 

Hoping this was some contribution to the history of Brixham

Pierre Logghe

Retired deepsea fishery Captain

June 16 2012

The Palace Hotel at War...

With the outbreak of hostilities in 1939, many hotels found themselves commandeered for military use. With its excellent communications and equable climate, Torquay was an obvious place for the War Ministry to look for a building suitable for conversion to a military hospital. The Palace was selected as a hospital for RAF Officers. 

On the 25th October 1942, a German bomber scored a direct hit on the East Wing, severing it almost completely from the rest of the building. Tragically, the hotel was full at the time with 203 patients. The result was that 64 people were killed, including nurses, with one person missing. The hospital was evacuated and a care and maintenance party installed while a decision was made regarding the building's future. However, on the 8th January 1943 there was another raid resulting in a direct hit and so the Palace was abandoned for the remainder of the war.

Most of the major hotels in Torquay were eventually taken over for military use. The RAF came first, arriving in Babbacombe in June 1940 to set up a Training establishment, followed by another at Torre Abbey in September 1941. Several hotels were commandeered for accommodation purposes and the Training establishments extended to the Grand Hotel and Castle Chambers. The Palace Hotel was to  become important as an RAF Hospital and, of course, the whole harbour area was later to provided a rehearsal ground for the D-Day Landings. Looking at areas eventually bombed by the German Luftwaffe, it is fairly clear that they had reliable intelligence and were not  trying to scare the local population with random bombing. They struck at the Babbacombe area more than once, targeted the area surrounding Torre Abbey and finally, directly attacked the Palace Hotel twice notwithstanding the red cross painted on its roof.

The list below is not a complete list of all of Torquay's air raids but does include those in which loss of life was high. It is believed that, in all, 168 civilians were killed (although the list below contains  only 134 names*) with 158 others being seriously injured and that 137 houses were completely destroyed; the number of war-damaged properties is not known but was high.

In WW2 Brixham railway station staff were issued with gas masks and steel helmets. Many staff members became involved in civil defence and Home Guard duties. Security around the station intensified during the 'invasion' crisis following the Dunkirk evacuation in May/June 1940. Staff were issued with 'pink slips' ID cards that had to be shown when challenged by Home Guardsman and Police. Gas masks and ID had to carried at all times.

Home Guard staff included Sgt Percy Wadham, Corp Dick Stancombe and Privates George Baker and Rod Saunders. Fire Watchers included station master Cecil Williams and Charlie Ashton. 

The railway supplied engine spares for the Royal Navy and ammunition, torpedoes, explosives and depth charges. Deliveries were made to Brixham from the naval store at Keyham, Plymouth. 

Camouflage paint was produced by the Brixham Paint Company and 40 gallon drums were dispatched by rail to airfields across the country. 

The D-Day rehearsal, codenamed Exercise Tiger, was a disaster on a grand scale with the loss of life greater than the actual invasion of Normandy just months later. But the true story was to remain a secret for decades to come.

These are a few of many links you can find online .

Also the book by Ken Small is a very good read on the subject . 

http://www.exercisetigermemorial.co.uk/south-hams-mass-evacuation-1943

https://www.americanheritage.com/content/what-happened-devon

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-27185893

https://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/world-war-two/world-war-two-in-western-europe/d-day-index/operation-tiger/

https://www.bythedart.co.uk/the-evacuation-of-the-south-hams/

http://www.exercisetigerslapton.org/evacuation/