From September 1940 the Nazi Luftwaffe pounded British cities, aiming to destroy morale as well as lives. Reichsmarschall Goring believed remorseless bombing would make Britain sue for peace. Hull was particularly heavily bombed in 1940-41, and by 1945 it had been the most bombed city outside London. However, the government and press anonymised Hull as ‘a North East coastal town’. Nazi propaganda, in contrast, used this blotting out of Hull with reports of Luftwaffe attacks on the ‘coastal town the United Press correspondent doesn’t mention by name’, highlighting their successful targeting. On 10th May 1941, the day after three nights of devastating bombing and fire destruction in Hull, one German newspaper reported ‘above all, the east English port of Hull was heavily affected’. We can ask whether the suffering in Hull, which wartime Britain downplayed, has ever been properly considered. Remembrance Day commemorations now look more widely than concentrating only on those in the forces who died, and include remembering the suffering on the ‘home front’.
Victoria Taylor specialises in aviation history, and is the Assistant Editor of the online platform for this study’ From Balloons to Drones’. Among the awards she has won is the 2020 Royal Airforce Museum Doctoral Academic Prize for research on the Luftwaffe and National Socialism before and in World War 11. She is a consultant for television and radio programmes on wartime aviation. Twitter: @SpitfireFilly
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