aged 19 months. She's remembered on her grandparents' headstone in St John's churchyard, Dewsbury Moor, West Yorkshire, but where was she was killed? It's not clear if she's actually buried there, or just remembered.
Civilian CARTER, BERYL Died 06/11/1944 Civilian War Dead Aged 19 months; of 77 Biscot Road. Daughter of 2nd Lieut. and Mrs. Stanley Carter. Died at 77 Biscot Road. Civilian THOMPSON, ANNIE ELIZABETH Died 06/11/1944 Aged 69 Civilian War Dead of 77 Biscot Road. Widow of James Thompson. Died at 77 Biscot Road.
Biscot Road Luton,Bedfordshire. At 9:50 AM on Monday November 6th 1944, a single V2 rocket detonated in the Commer Car Factory canteen block in Biscot Road, killing 19 people, injuring 196 and damaging 1,524 houses. As common with all V2 rockets, there was no air-raid warning since the radar technology of the day was unable to detect these rockets as they followed a ballistic trajectory via space, and were travelling faster than the speed of sound at impact. The explosion caused a crater 30 ft wide and 12 ft deep. Numbers 77 – 83 & 58 – 68 Biscot Road were destroyed, and houses up to 1.5 miles away were damaged. Brick dust from the pulverised houses drifted and settled in Wardown Park. If the rocket had landed 5 minutes later, the canteen would have been filled with people taking their 10 AM break. https://www.lutonculture.com/uploads/documents/1333365604_Bombsitetrailmapsandtext.pdf 001 BAYNHAM RA - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 002 CARTER B - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 003 COOP G - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 004 CROSS OF - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 005 GLENISTER RB - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 006 HANDCOCK GS - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 007 JONES E - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 008 MOORE NJ - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 009 MORTLOCK CR - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 010 RAINES EM - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 011 REES A - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 012 RIXON CJ - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 013 RUDD F - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 014 SIMPKINS L - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 015 SQUIRES AH - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 016 THOMPSON AE - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD 017 WISE PJ - - 06/11/1944 CIVILIAN WAR DEAD
UK, WWII Civilian Deaths, 1939-1945 Name: Beryl Carter Estimated Birth Year: abt 1943 Death Date: 6 Nov 1944 Death Place: Luton, Bedfordshire, England Age at Death: 1 Father: Stanley England & Wales, Civil Registration Death Index, 1916-2007 Name: Beryl Carter Death Age: 1 Birth Date: abt 1943 Registration Date: Dec 1944 Registration district: Luton Inferred County: Bedfordshire Volume: 3b Page: 490 Looks as though 17 people including Beryl were killed that night. TD
That morning, of November 6th 1944, it was eight minutes to ten in the morning, they’d been building for a year a new canteen and offices over the top of the Department where I working. The Clerk of the Works had moved out at 9 o’clock that morning, finished! Eight minutes to ten, a V2 rocket hit the corner of it and flattened the lot an hour later! That’s when it happened, there were four people around me that were killed. Two of those I think were killed by the blast, not a mark on them, by the blast. I was funnily enough sitting in the office talking to my boss at the time and that was another funny thing because he had taken the job on, he was retired. He’d taken the job on to keep it open for his son-in-law who’d had to go into the Services and he treated me like a granddaughter and I was sitting talking to him waiting for the canteen wagon to come round with sandwiches on. He was never without his trilby on and his glasses and he always used to take his small change out and put it in a bag or something for his little grandson. This day he was standing at the desk, I was sitting by the side of him on a chair he was standing at the desk counting his change out to give to his grandson. With the V2 rocket you get no warning, they travel faster than sound anyway you see. You get the sound of them travelling after the explosion because they travel faster than sound. You got no warning at all with those. One minute we were sitting there talking and the next minute the only thing I remember was that I was up to here (up to Mrs. Lynn’s neck) in all sorts of bricks and mortar with a metal frame down around me. And this hissing noise which I realised afterwards was coming from the heating system, which used to blow hot air into the huge workshop. BBC - WW2 People's War - Wartime memories of Luton and Maulden Part One
1939 REGISTER TRANSCRIPTION 77 Biscot Road, Luton M.B., Bedfordshire NAME DOB OCCUPATION Stanley Carter 06 Mar 1910 Certificated Assistant Elementary School Master Kathleen M Carter 02 Feb 1912 Unpaid Domestic Duties Annie E Thompson 01 May 1875 Unpaid Domestic Duties Marie Lawrence (Snazinuntch) 05 Dec 1923 At School
