The Blitz by Juliet Gardiner has cemented her place in my history-loving heart. I adored her Wartime: Britain 1939-1945 when I first read it in 2007 and was worried that this would pale in comparison, particularly since it covers such a short period (7 September 1940 – 10 May 1941) and one that Gardiner has handled repeatedly already. But I was wrong. The anecdotes and sources all seem fresh compared to what I’ve read from her before with the kinds of interesting details (on sanitation in shelters, changes to BBC radio programming, and concerns about collecting pensions, to name but a few of the eclectic topics discussed) that I’ve never come across before. This was my first book of 2011, begun on 1 January and finished just over twenty-four hours later, and it was the perfect way to start the year being intelligent, fascinating, and incredibly informative.
As usual, Gardiner excels at bringing to light the little things that are usually glossed over or ignored. I’ve lost count of the number of books I’ve read about WWII, all of which cover the blitz in vary levels of detail, but it’s the facets of everyday life, of how people prepared each afternoon before a raid, of how the mass burials were conducted afterwards, that are so often ignored. But I love that stuff. Learning about a typical evening in the life of a fire warden is my idea of a good time, the more specific the detail the better. Adorable stories about royalty are also always encouraged:
Since the railway into Coventry was so disrupted [after the first raid], the King motored from Windsor, arriving on Saturday morning. He offered to bring his own sandwiches so the royal visit would not strain Coventry’s limited resources…(p. 153)
Though intellectually I knew how disorganized things had been, particularly at the beginning of the blitz, Gardiner’s statistics and examples really brought that home for me:
In effect, one person in every six in London was without a home. And with the loss of a home went the loss of the means of sustenance: no food, no cooking facilities, only the clothes the victims stood up in – and those would often be filthy, soot- and brick-dust-stained, wet and torn, and smelling of cordite and charred wood. And often the places that suffered the most in the blitz were working-class areas clustered around docks and factories, where people had little money or resources, or opportunity to leave. (p. 116)
But if the Londoners were both unable and apparently unwilling to leave, Britons elsewhere were, sensibly if not courageous, fleeing their cities after the first raids. Yes, I can understand the logic of needing people to stay behind and put out fires and whatnot but, I have to tell you, I would be running for the hills. My sense of self-preservation is much stronger than my sense of patriotism. In Plymouth, for example:
It has been estimated that as many as 30,000 people left the city every night after the raids had begun. They would pour out into the countryside by train (vouchers were issued), car or by lorry if they could manage to hitch a life, by bicycle, or trudging on foot. An endless column, clutching all they could carry, most of them with no specific destination, no idea who might put them up, just determined to get away. They were sometimes dubbed the ‘yellow convoy’ or the ‘funk express’ by a judgmental press. While it is hard to think of a more rational response to the raids, their absence cast a heavy burden on those who ‘stayed put’ as they were instructed to do. On them fell increased fire-watching duties and other Civil Defence functions, and it is no wonder that resentment smouldered against those who left. (p. 312)
I loved the bits that discussed citizen’s frustration with the information (or lack thereof) being provided by both the government and the BBC. In many cases this silence led to misinformation as informal rumours among civilians inflated the casualty numbers or exaggerated the damage done. As Gardiner describes it, the Ministry of Information (also known as ‘the Ministry of Aggravation and Mysteries’ and ‘the Ministry of Disinformation’) “patronized and infantilized the population” (p. 161). Frustrated with being dismissed this way, many turned to alternative sources for more reliable news, even if it was coming from the enemy:
Thirty per cent of adult Britons with radios were reported to listen to Lord Haw-Haw regularly by January 1940, although his appeal had begun to wane by the time the blitz started, and of the sixteen million who turned in to BBC’s main nine o’clock news bulletin, six million turned over to Radio Hamburg afterwards. This was partly due to fascination at the unerring inside knowledge of Britain in wartime that Joyce [Lord Haw-Haw] seemed to possess, but also to the feeling that the BBC was too much under the thumb of the government, that what it told the people was propaganda rather than an accurate account of the situation. (p. 171)
I was delighted to see some very familiar sources quoted: Nella Last was mentioned several times, as were Persephone favourites Vere Hodgson and Marghanita Laski. How I wished that I had my copy of Few Eggs and No Oranges at hand to delve straight into after I finished this! But, alas, it is currently still enroute somewhere between Vancouver and Calgary (hopefully closer to Vancouver by now!). I do enjoy the variety of perspectives Gardiner includes: usual suspects like Duff and Diana Cooper and Harold Nicolson (husband of Vita Sackville-West) appear regularly but leading literary lights appear almost as frequently, particularly John Betjeman (who worked for the Ministry of Information) and Virginia Woolf. Gardiner’s bibliography is one great TBR list for readers like me! I’m particularly eager to get my hands on Nicolson’s Diaries and Letters, 1939-1945.
I was both interested and pleased to see how often the Mass-Observation archives were referenced. As Gardiner points out, they may not have had the most scientific methods (they eavesdropped and reported on conversations in public places in addition to gathering information through their interviews and regular correspondents/diarists) but this documentation is invaluable in giving insight into the general population’s attitudes and reactions to what was going on around them, particularly during a period when media was so heavily censored, compromising its value as a reliable source. The kind of negative and defeatist attitudes that rarely appeared in the press are preserved in the M-O documents. Tom Harrison and his team were in fact hired on by the government to conduct studies on public morale using the M-O tactics during the war.
This wasn’t quite as engaging as Wartime: Britain 1939-1945 but then it didn’t cover nearly as much information. My only quibble was the lack of maps or a timeline. The sheer number of raids across so many regions in such a short period does make it difficult to put each into perspective. Still, it was a wonderful, approachable read and I can’t wait to start Gardiner’s The Thirties (which I have on hold at the library).
This goes stright to the wish-list. The Blitz fascinates me. Thanks for flagging!
I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!
This sounds wonderful! I have never read anything in depth about the Blitz before, and while part of me doesn’t want to as I know it will make me cry, I do think I should. I shall pick this up when I return to England. I love Juliet Gardiner and I know I can always rely on her to produce a well researched, informative, yet enjoyable history of whatever topic she chooses. Other social historians just don’t cut the mustard. I have The Thirties gathering dust back in England and can’t wait to read it come the Winter when I shall be back in London, depressed, unemployed, and with plenty of time to read on my hands. 🙂
“Depressed, unemployed, and with plenty of time to read” – there were certainly lots of people in that particular situation during the ’30s so you’ll be well-prepared to read it!
I did cry while reading this but far less than I expected to…not sure if that’s encouraging or not!
This books sound really interesting and one I will search out I think.
Few Eggs and No Oranges keeps popping up on various blogs and I think I might treat myself to this – though perhaps not in January.
Well done on the first book of the year – keep them coming. I do enjoy your blog and I hope you are settled back now at home.
Glad to hear you’re enjoy the blog; I always like to hear from happy readers!
I’ve had Few Eggs and No Oranges on my shelf for a shamefully long time and have neglected it awfully so it’s only suiting that I want to read it now, the one time I don’t have it to hand!
I still have such a hard time grasping what the point of war is (are the benefits really worth the costs?) so I am always drawn to books like this. Thanks for the review!
In general I’d agree with you Lisa but in the case of WWII I’d have to say that the benefits were well worth the costs (particularly for my family, in German-occupied Czechoslovakia). The human cost of war is always fascinating, if heart-breaking, to read about.
Well, this is headed straight to the wish list here (as well as the author’s backlist). I’m with you — totally fascinated by these sorts of war details, and like you also, I would’ve run for the hills when the bombs started falling…nope, I would’ve run before then! I love pulling WW2 stories out of my daddy, but he was a kid safely over here, so his are more about rationing, POW camps (there was one in his hometown), and “seeing how long they could make one piece of double bubble last.”
You’re in for a treat with Gardiner! I used to love trying to get stories out of my grandmother about the war but she was never particularly eager to tell them (although she would spit whenever someone mentioned Chamberlain because of how he betrayed the Czechs at the Munich Conference). Be happy that the war stories in your family are about bubble gum!
Thanks for this recommendation. Yup, straight onto the list.
My WWII reading is amassing itself in surprising numbers: latest are Mrs. Milburn’s Diaries (Clara Milburn), No Time For Romance (Lucilla Andrews) and Beyond the Vicarage (Noel Streatfeild). And I’ve pulled Vere Hodgson off the shelf for a reread. It’s in my TBR basket by the couch.
I’m not familiar with any of those titles Susan but I’ll definitely be keeping an eye out for them! I love that you have a TBR basket and in such a perfect location too!
What a fantastic review Claire – this period of history interests me greatly too so I’m going to see if I can track down these books in Australia.
It’s difficult being out in the colonies, isn’t it, when it comes to getting copies of these kinds of books? Well worth the effort though!
My fascination with the Blitz shows no sign of letting up and I’ve had my eye on this book for awhile now. So glad to read that you enjoyed it!
Have you ever been to the Imperial War Museum in London? In the makeshift shelter you sit in during a mini-tour the odour of cordite is very present.
And don’t forget to unpack Vere’s diary as soon as you can!
I have not been to the Imperial War Museum yet, which seems a shame considering how often I was in London during my time down in East Sussex. Hopefully I’ll have time to visit next time I’m there!
I think you’ll really enjoy this when you have the chance to read it!
I think Juliet Gardiner is marvelous, but The Thirties bored my face off. Wartime was so amazing though. I have a big crush on London during the Blitz. (London in general really.)
Jenny! No! Don’t tell me things like that about The Thirties, not when I’m so excited about reading it!
I totally understand and share your crush on London though mine is dwarfed by my passion for wartime Britain as a whole.
Juliet Gardiner in The Blitz has practically nothing to say about the location of the airfields of the German bombers nor of the routes taken by these bombers. In fact most of the German bombers came from about 34 airfields in Northern France reaching as far south as Orleans and Nantes. Without the capitulation of France in 1940 there would have been no battle of Britain.
It is indeed a social rather than military history.