The Story of the Southampton Blitz

[@MaxTSanches]

My mother and father told me stories of their time as children in Southampton and Totton during the war. Thanks, mom & dad. :)

[@jwmarshallsay]

I am an expert on the Blitz of Portsmouth. I knew Southampton was badly hit, and this documentary really shows how severe it really was. My sincere sympathy to the families who suffered. God bless them all.

[@RICHARDHAYSOM-us5tu]

Thanks for good short film. Helped explain how things were in Southampton -
This in The era of my grandchildren’s Great Grandparents’ life on the home front in wartime Soton

[@rivco5008]

My mom was 13 in 1940, living in a part of Southampton called Bitterne. The house she was born in is still there, I found it on Google Earth.
On many levels she never got over what she went through in the fall and winter of 1940.
She met my dad, a US Navy sailor from Los Angeles in 1944 when she was in the WAAF, and came to America in 1950. Landed in New York City, then the train all the way to California where she lived for the next 52 years.
She died on 6 October 2002 & we all still miss her.

[@marvinc9994]

"Bitterne"
Where I was born! Mum told me about the various raids on that part of Southampton, and how she had to WALK every day into the town Centre - to Plummers, opposite Watts Park, where she worked as a hairdresser and beautician.She was eventually bombed out from there, and had to move north for work. One thing she remarked on was how BEAUTIFUL the High Street looked in those days (with trams going under the Bargate) - until it was virtually wiped out by the Luftwaffe. SO much was destroyed in that horrid war - all thanks to the evil ambitions of one man. I have HUGE respect for that generation - and feel sometimes that they were in many respects betrayed, somehow.

[@dazdeluxe6672]

@@marvinc9994 ​ @marvinc9994 You think it was one Man? It was caused by the European Royals and Their bankers, fighting over colonies, after ww2 We were doing the same as the Nazis and killing millions of Africans to try and take Our colonies back, killing Men Who fought for Us in the war ( the mau mau for example). Hitler wanted to copy Us, He admired the way We brutalised and enslaved India, He is quoted as saying that They wanted to do the same in Russia. WW1 was caused by Germany wanting a slice of middle Eastern oil, read about the Berlin to Baghdad railway They were building.

[@rollogillespie9169]

My Mother was born 1915 and from Shirley. She was cycling home during a raid and said "I should not have been outside but gone to a shelter." A bomb exploded across the road, and she had a fractured femur and huge scarring from the shrapnel.

[@hazharibo7439]

I'm from near Coventry. We got flattened too

[@VincentComet-l8e]

Unfortunately, as in other towns and cities, Architects & Town Planners (who were supposed to be on our side) contributed greatly to the destruction and vandalism originally caused by the Luftwaffe, with results visible to this day…

[@michaelfoy]

Agreed....I come from Portsmouth and grew up playing on bombsites in the late 50's....Now live in Exeter, which Hitler had bombed just to destroy what had been a Beautiful medieval city....The Re-builds unfortunately happened in grey concrete-time, ugly and out-of-place buildings.... after just a few years.....Southampton still had overgrown bombsites around the docks area in the 80's......

[@therespectedlex9794]

I didn't know the civic centre was bombed.

[@angieell2632]

I live in Southampton, grew up in Eastleigh. An old lady I worked with as a teenager, who worked at pirellis during the war, told me that they had to dig a mass grave under The Common Park cos they didn't have time to dig separate ones. I dont know if they moved them all after the war ended or if its still there??

[@shaneanderson7438]

Well i know in the grave yard in the common there are 100s of grave stones dating back 1912, then there's 100s in one section of army men from 1940

[@ashleymoye6829]

Do you have locations for some of these images? Can only figure out the High Street ones

[@peterw4338]

Strange as Rotterdam was bombed even more yet is the most successful port in Europe.

[@davidfarmer2049]

Why cant we just listen to the account with out silly violins in back ground.

[@nirvairsingh1678]

Imy wish to see Southampton I am from panjab can you give me sponser

[@cumception6999]

Don’t know why you would want to see it. Not much here to see but if that’s what you want then go for it

[@therespectedlex9794]

Get your cousin to give you the money. Or sponsor your family to go back to India.