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<\/p>\nIt was the large major bombardment of Bristol during the Blitz<\/p>\n
Winston Churchill, Sir Charles Maby and Mrs Churchill visit a bombed area in Bristol, the day after the Good Friday raid(Image: Mirrorpix)<\/p>\n
On Good Friday 85 years ago, Nazi forces bombarded Bristol in the last of six major air raids to target the city during the terror of the Blitz<\/a>.<\/p>\n The aerial assault from the German Luftwaffe under a full moon on April 11 1941 caused extensive damage to the city and killed 180 people. A further 382 people were injured.<\/p>\n A bomb which was dropped on St Philip\u2019s Bridge outside the power station disrupted the tram system\u2019s electricity supply, leading to the permanent closure of Bristol Tramways. The tram network was given a second life during the war effort after the process of abandonment had begun in 1938.<\/p>\n The Good Friday Raid also saw the 17th century buildings in King Street housing the Llandoger Trow pub badly hit. Two-fifths of it were later demolished.(Image: Bristol Post)<\/p>\n The Luftwaffe carried out the night-time bombing campaign in two phases. The first, which began shortly after 10pm, mostly straddled a north and south line from Bristol Bridge to Horfield<\/a>, according to the University of the West of England’s Bristol Historical Record<\/a>.<\/p>\n The second phase commenced at 00.06 hrs and lasted nearly four hours, during which time high explosives were scattered over the southern part of the city centre along with St. Augustine’s, Bedminster<\/a> and Knowle<\/a>. Avonmouth<\/a> and Fishponds were also targeted.<\/p>\n Prime minister Winston Churchill visited Bristol the day after the bombings; his private secretary John Colville described how the official party led by the Lord Mayor<\/a>, \u201cwalked and motored through devastation such as I had never thought possible\u201d.<\/p>\n In an archive of World War Two memories collated by the BBC<\/a>, Gladys Saunders from Bedminster\u2014who was fourteen and working in the Wills Tobacco Factory at the time of the Good Friday air raid\u2014recounted the terrifying ordeal of hiding in a shelter during the bombardment, which destroyed her home and led to the death of her young cousin.<\/p>\n \u201cDuring this air-raid, we piled into the Anderson Shelter which was in the back garden; my father stayed in the house,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cSuddenly it felt like a train going through a tunnel but a bomb had fallen just behind the Anderson Shelter. I must have been unconscious and when I came round I could see the stars and my father was calling to us to get out; I got up and ran to the house opposite.<\/p>\n \u201cMy mum and sister were taken to hospital, my older sister had a nine month old baby boy who was sat on her lap, unfortunately the bar which was holding the shelter up had fallen on the baby and killed him, my sister had an injured foot, and mum and my other sister were hurt but not too badly.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Anderson Shelter had been well built but nothing could have stopped the bomb; the house was almost cut in half.\u201d<\/p>\n Many other houses on Willway Street, where Ms Saunders lived, were obliterated over the course of the Bristol Blitz and a large number of her neighbours were killed.<\/p>\n A piece of the tramline landed within the churchyard at St Mary Redcliffe on Good Friday in 1941 and has remained in place ever since.(Image: PAUL GILLIS \/ Reach PLC)<\/p>\n The Good Friday air raid was the culmination of a six-month Nazi campaign of aerial terror against Bristol, which was targeted due to its harbour and the city\u2019s status as a hub for aircraft manufacturing, among other industries.<\/p>\n As many as 1400 people were killed between November 24 1940 and April 11 1941 and much of the city centre was destroyed, irrevocably altering Bristol’s landscape<\/a>.<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/0_HE_BRI_010421BT2302.jpg\")
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