Strafing of British Trains

Discussion in 'United Kingdom' started by popeye1975, Dec 6, 2016.

  1. popeye1975

    popeye1975 Junior Member

    I seem to remember a book that was mentioned to me a while back that detailed attacks by German ground-attack aircraft on trains in the UK...has anyone heard of it?
     
  2. CL1

    CL1 116th LAA and 92nd (Loyals) LAA,Royal Artillery

    My Grandfather worked in a signal box near Sandwich in Kent throughout the war. Bf109s often roamed up and down the railway lines shooting up trains as they went, killing civilians routinely. They worked over (shot up) his signal box several times, enough for the army to put a bofors in the field, next door.
    The very next 109 was blown out of the sky. This was summer 1940, a clear three years before we started 'working on the railways' in France.
    Trains in England were fair game to the Luftwaffe fighters, none of these trains had military markings and the British certainly never cried 'war crime' at these activities. The strafing of trains
     
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  3. CL1

    CL1 116th LAA and 92nd (Loyals) LAA,Royal Artillery

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  4. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    I can't remember the details but I've read that the British recorded Luftwaffe POWs talking about what great sport it was shooting up civilian targets in 1940.
     
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  5. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    Dave,

    I recall that as well. I think it was a broader effort by British Intelligence to record German Officer POW's from all services and the point of the published report was the widespread atrocities of which the officers were quite proud. I'm sure there is a thread on that topic.
     
  6. ARPCDHG

    ARPCDHG Member

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  7. Swiper

    Swiper Resident Sospan

    Plenty in the Southern Way specials (3 Parts - all excellent), also lots in LFBOB about Tip 'n Run. Exploration of morality is exceptionally interesting, and to me its fairly clear the Tip 'n Run campaign was astonishingly efficient use of resources to generate terror and potentially break the population's morale. Rather lucky the Germans never expanded further upon it and it generally remained a pretty small beer endeavour.

    Usually more in local history jobbos, but above are very comprehensive (mostly of Southern Region, suspect GWR would have seen a fair mix as well).

    https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_s...tripbooks&field-keywords=southern+way+wartime
    https://www.amazon.co.uk/Luftwaffe-...F8&qid=1481109119&sr=1-7&keywords=Tip+and+run

    Circumstances of the RHDR downing of an aircraft still remains unclear.

    Regarding D3 No. 2365's KO of the FW 190... the loco wasn't destroyed when its boiler went up (despite catastrophic damage), she was fully repaired and slogged on for many more years! Its a great travesty she didn't survive into preservation. The story of clipping the engine doesn't sit well with me, feel we've missed a few angles - most likely the rupturing boiler's detonation and huge amount of shards generated peppered the a/c, causing catastrophic damage/steam blinds/disorientates pilot and at low level...
     
  8. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    This is related in "Soldaten.On Fighting,Killing and Dying" by Sonke Neitzel and Harald Welzer plus other recollections which can only be described as "excesses".
     
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  9. Roy Martin

    Roy Martin Senior Member

    During the war I lived alongside the Southern Railway line in south Dorset. There were a number of instances of aircraft attacking trains and attempting to bomb the track. The latter resulted in a number of near misses, but I don't remember the railway being put out of action.
     
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  10. popeye1975

    popeye1975 Junior Member

    This thread is based on a story my Dad told me of him returning back on leave from London when his train was attacked and damaged by German aircraft. He eventually got o his ship (or shore base) only to be put on a charge for being adrift!
     
  11. Pat Atkins

    Pat Atkins Well-Known Member

    As a boy, my father was crossing a road in Brighton when a German fighter walked its fire up the road, around (but thankfully, not through) him, and on towards the Brighton-Lewes line viaduct; he thinks there was a train crossing over at the time and the German was trying to shoot it up. His mother thought Hitler had sent a fanatical Nazi airborne assassin across the Channel specifically to eliminate her son, whose contribution to the Allied war effort as a Boy Scout was no doubt incalculable...

    On another occasion 24 FW190s fighter-bombers attacked the town pretty indiscriminately (24 civilians and 130 injured, several as a result of strafing), and also knocked out a pier and two spans of the viaduct by bouncing a bomb - accidentally, surely - off the road and through a house before hitting the span. That was 25th May 1943; there was speculation that the Marine Gate flats (which looked rather military), the gasworks and the railways were the main targets. The viaduct was back in operation in a week. By that stage of the war I'm not sure what the military point of such isolated raids was, really, though they may have had a propaganda value.
     
  12. dthievin

    dthievin New Member

    In 1944 and 1945 my father was stationed with the RCAF at Tholthorpe, about 12 miles south of York. His crew successfully completed 28 operations and were among the extremely lucky to return. He wrote a fascinating journal upon his return to Canada that mentions a strafing by German planes at Tholthorpe while he was preparing for his next bombing operation. He never specified the dates.

    I've searched high and low to find more about this. Wikipedia of course devotes generously to Operation Gisela on March 3/4, 1945, a most plausible similarity to my father's experience, but absolutely nothing that mentions Tholthorpe. No lives were lost at the base, but my father concludes his remarks by saying the offending enemy planes went after a nearby train and inflicted serious damage, probably with fatalities, on its occupants. Again nothing has turned up about this for me, but I'm hoping that British readers might have clearer resources than I've been able to find in Canada.
     
  13. snailer

    snailer Country Member

    Hello,

    The Tholthorpe Station ORB for 4th March 1945 records that an enemy intruder strafed the airfield a 1:00 AM.

    I’ve only checked that date but if you look through the other pages you might find something that matches your Father’s recollections.

    Royal Canadian Air Force operations record book... - Héritage
     
  14. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    These intruder raids of 3/4 March 1945 were carried out under Operation Gisela. 200 Luftwaffe night fighters were vectored on to bomber stations throughout Eastern England.The modus operandi was to engage the returning bomber force as the aircraft were conducting their final approach or in the landing circuit and also to pick up targets of opportunity.

    20 bomber aircraft were downed over their home bases and others survived by being diverted to other airfields.Locally an intruder targeted No 460 Squadron Lancaster NG 502 AR J and shot the Lancaster down over Langworth a few miles NE of Lincoln.Sweeping north and east of Scampton an Observer Corps member going on night shift was killed when his car was strafed by the same aircraft.The JU 88 flying too low, hit telephone wires and crashed after strafing the observer's car. The crew of four lie in Scampton St John's,The Baptist Churchyard

    At Gainsborough,an intruder swept north up the Trent machine gunning the main thoroughfare road which runs parallel to the Trent causing the deaths of 3 civilians.3 miles north of Gainsborough,a No 12 Squadron Lancaster,ME 323 PH P was brought down by an intruder between East Stockwith and Blyton while engaged on night flying training.

    Recently a memorial has been erected in East Stockwith to remember the crew...no survivors

    As said,the station ORBs should record events such as intruder attacks on their aircraft and airfields.
     
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  15. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    The RFC/RAF shot up a good many trains in WW1 and had in effect established such as legitimate targets for WW2
     
  16. dthievin

    dthievin New Member

    Snailer, thanks a million for this. Great help indeed.
     
  17. hutt

    hutt Member

    27th AA Brigade diaries contain a lot of daily reports, particularly covering the Tip and Run raids in 1942 and there are specific mentions of attacks on railway targets and trains. This is for the south coast. Its possible that later AA Command / Group diaries might contain similar detail that would mention the raid in addition to the RAF records. If you are serious, maybe start with 5 AA Group diaries?
     
  18. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    The Tip and Run raids references gives support to the record of bombing and strafing of English south coastal targets.The operation started in March 1942 and ended in June 1943 when the Luftwaffe units were posted to the Med.At the outset,there were only 43 x 40mm anti air guns in position for the south coast and these were primary for military installation defence.

    The fall of North Africa to the Allies signalled to the Germans that they should improve air defence in the Med.This became a priority which reduced the Tip and Run raids to night operations with about one third of of the daylight force.On the other hand Goring is reported saying that the Luftwaffe losses were too much for the policy to continue.

    The shipping,military and industrial targets were opportune and covered the coastal strips from Great Yarmouth in the east to the Lizzard in the west .This meant anything was bombed and raked with fire...civilians, it would seem, were looked on as a legitimate target.... validated feedback on these raids were picked up covertly from Luftwaffe POWs who from recorded evidence,wallowed in this type of operation......"Soldaten on Fighting,Killing and Dying"

    Further, the interrogation of a Luftwaffe pilot POW adds weight behind the Germany policy when he revealed that he was told "to attack anything and everything liable to terrorise the British public.....trains,motor buses and gatherings of people.Herds of cattle and sheep had been mentioned specifically at the briefing as likely targets"
     
  19. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    It is recorded that RAF Ludford Magna (No 101 Squadron solely in residence ) was attacked by Gisela intruders on 4 March 1945....no damage reported but bomb craters evident along with the results of cannon fire.
     
  20. Little Friend

    Little Friend Senior Member

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    I'm sure that I have posted these before ? I took these at Ulceby Cross, Lincolnshire 2003.

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    Inside the front cover. The front cover is at the end of page one.
     
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