Regarding the publicity of the 70th anniversary of the German air raid over Bournemouth.
All those years ago with my older brother in our back garden in St Swithuns Road, we first heard the roar of planes then looked up and saw a plane very low with a cross on its side fly over from the direction of Bournemouth West, simultaneously we heard a bomb blast.
I have always wondered if, with the planes flying in formation, did they all drop their bombs together (we only heard one blast), did they just have one bomb each, how many planes were there, did they all drop their bombs and did they all go off?
Obviously the bomb we heard was the one nearest to us 300 yards away that demolished Shamrock & Rambler coach station killing one worker – forgotten amongst many.
It is where we went to try to stop fire spreading to a garage next door to the coach station.
We did not realise there was more than one plane, one bomb or we could have helped at the Metropole 400 yards away.
Obviously the plane we saw must have been on the extreme left of the formation as all the other bombs fell on Central Hotel, Beales, West Cinema, Metropole Hotel, Cairns House must have been to the right of the plane we saw, with no bombs further left. My RAF pilot brother Harold was on his last leave with us before he was killed aged 21, shot down over Anzio in Italy, he was on leave after training for his wings in Canada (with rationing the sweets, Life Savors, he brought back for us from Canada were magic). I treasured wearing his RAF overcoat they returned to us.
KEN ADAMS, Glen Road, Poole
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