The Day the Ground Exploded: The Forgotten Disaster at RAF Fauld

The Day the Ground Exploded: The Forgotten Disaster at RAF Fauld

Imagine going about an ordinary Monday morning in the Staffordshire countryside when, without warning, the ground beneath you erupts. Thousands of tonnes of bombs explode underground, buildings are destroyed, a farm disappears and an enormous crater is torn into the landscape. This was not an enemy air raid. It was one of Britain’s most devastating wartime accidents.

Image: Aerial view of the crater and surrounding devastation caused by the RAF Fauld explosion photographed by the Royal Air Force on 4 December 1944/ Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain.

Today I want to discover more about the RAF Fauld explosion, which happened near Hanbury in Staffordshire on the 27th of November 1944. By this point Britain had been at war for more than five years, but beneath this peaceful stretch of countryside was something few people passing through the area would ever have imagined.

Image: Storemen stacking 250-lb MC bombs in one of the underground tunnels at No. 21 Maintenance Unit, RAF Fauld, near Hanbury, Staffordshire. Photograph by B. J. Daventry, Royal Air Force official photographer / Wikimedia Commons. Public Domain.

RAF Fauld was home to a huge underground munitions store. Old gypsum mine workings had been adapted into chambers where thousands of tonnes of bombs and other explosives could be stored. RAF personnel worked there alongside civilian workers and Italian prisoners of war, handling the enormous quantities of ammunition needed to keep Britain’s wartime air operations supplied.

At around 11am that morning, disaster struck. An explosion began inside the underground complex and it rapidly developed into a catastrophic chain reaction. Around 4,000 tonnes of bombs were stored approximately 90 feet beneath the ground, and the force of the resulting explosion was enormous. Earth, rock and debris were thrown across the surrounding countryside as the landscape above the store was ripped apart.

Upper Castle Hayes Farm, which stood close to the site, was destroyed, while other buildings in the area were badly damaged. A nearby reservoir was also breached, sending water and mud into the surrounding workings and adding to the destruction. For the people of Hanbury and the surrounding villages, the scene must have been almost impossible to comprehend. Only moments earlier they had been surrounded by ordinary Staffordshire countryside; now part of it looked more like a battlefield.

The human cost was terrible. Seventy people lost their lives in the disaster, including RAF personnel, civilian workers, Italian prisoners of war and local people. Eighteen of those who died have no known grave, and the crater itself became their final resting place.

The exact cause of the explosion was never firmly established, although later evidence suggested that an accident during the handling of munitions underground may have triggered the disaster. Whatever the precise sequence of events, a routine day at an ammunition depot had turned into one of the most terrible accidents experienced in Britain during the Second World War.

Perhaps the most haunting part of this story is that the evidence of what happened that morning has never completely disappeared. The enormous Fauld crater remains in the Staffordshire countryside today. Trees and vegetation have gradually reclaimed the landscape, but beneath that peaceful appearance lies the reminder of what happened there more than eighty years ago.

When we think about the Second World War, we often think about the people fighting on the front line, the aircraft flying overhead and the great battles that decided the course of the conflict. But behind all of that were thousands of people working in factories, depots, maintenance units and ammunition stores, often carrying out dangerous jobs every single day.

The people who lost their lives at Fauld were part of that wartime story too, and I think they deserve to be remembered.

Had you heard about the RAF Fauld explosion before, or is this a part of Britain’s wartime history that was completely new to you?

Tostig Godwinson: The King’s Brother Who Returned With an Invasion Army

Tostig Godwinson: The King’s Brother Who Returned With an Invasion Army

Imagine being driven from one of the most powerful positions in England. You believe your own brother has betrayed you. Less than a year later, that brother is King of England - and you return with a foreign army.

That was the extraordinary position of Tostig Godwinson in 1066.

In our recent Norman Conquest posts, we have looked at the men who believed England’s crown should be theirs.

Today I want to look more closely at Harold’s own brother. Because before Harold faced William at Hastings, he had another enemy to deal with. And that enemy was part of his own family.

Tostig was born into the enormously powerful Godwin family, the son of Godwin, Earl of Wessex, and the younger brother of Harold Godwinson. Like Harold, he rose rapidly through the political world of Edward the Confessor’s England.

In 1055, Tostig was appointed Earl of Northumbria, giving him authority over a vast and important part of northern England.

But Northumbria was not an easy region to govern. It had its own powerful families, traditions and political rivalries, and Tostig appears never to have won the support of much of the Northumbrian ruling elite.

Contemporary and later accounts portray his government as severe, while his opponents accused him of heavy taxation and harsh treatment. Whatever the exact truth- and our evidence for the eleventh century is often incomplete- resentment towards him became extremely serious.

Then, in October 1065, it exploded. Northumbrian rebels rose against Tostig. His officials and supporters were attacked, his property was seized and the rebels chose Morcar, brother of Edwin, Earl of Mercia, as their new earl.

Tostig looked to King Edward the Confessor for help. But another man was sent to negotiate with the rebels. His brother Harold.

And Harold made a decision that would change their relationship forever.

Rather than attempting to restore Tostig by force, Harold accepted that his brother had lost control of Northumbria and negotiated a settlement which recognised Morcar as earl. Tostig was forced into exile.

From Harold’s point of view, there may have been little alternative. Attempting to impose Tostig on the north could have created a much larger civil war at a dangerous moment for the kingdom.

Tostig saw things very differently. He appears to have believed that Harold had betrayed him and may even have suspected that his brother had encouraged the rebellion against him.

The two brothers who had once belonged to the most powerful family in England were now bitterly divided.

Tostig went to Flanders, where he had important family connections through his wife, Judith.

Then everything changed again. Edward the Confessor died on the 5th of January 1066. The following day, Harold Godwinson became King of England.

For the exiled Tostig, his brother was no longer simply the man he blamed for losing his earldom. He was now the king.

In the spring of 1066, Tostig returned. He sailed to the Isle of Wight and then raided parts of England’s coast before moving northwards.

But the attempt went badly. Forces led by Earls Edwin and Morcar drove him away, and Tostig eventually sought refuge in Scotland.

He still had not finished.

At some point, Tostig joined forces with one of the most formidable warriors in Europe: Harald Hardrada, King of Norway.

Hardrada already had ambitions in England. Now he had something else- an English exile with knowledge of the kingdom and every reason to see Harold removed from the throne.

In September 1066, their forces entered northern England.

On the 20th of September, Hardrada and Tostig met the armies of Edwin and Morcar at the Battle of Fulford, just outside York. They won. York submitted. For a brief moment, the invasion appeared to be succeeding.

But Harold Godwinson was already coming.

The English king marched rapidly north with his army, covering an extraordinary distance to confront the invaders.

On the 25th of September 1066, the brothers finally faced one another at the Battle of Stamford Bridge.

By the end of the day, Harald Hardrada was dead. So was Tostig Godwinson.

Harold had defeated the invasion from the north. But his victory came at an enormous cost.

His army had marched hundreds of miles and fought a major battle. And just three days later, William of Normandy landed on the south coast of England.

Harold would now have to turn around and march south again.

Tostig is an interesting figure because it is tempting simply to describe him as the brother who betrayed Harold. The reality was probably more complicated.

Tostig believed that he had been wronged. Harold may have believed that sacrificing his brother’s position was necessary to prevent England descending into civil war.

Whatever their motives, their family dispute became part of something much larger. And in September 1066, two brothers ended up facing one another on opposite sides of a battlefield.

One of them died there. The other would be dead less than three weeks later.

Do you see Tostig as a traitor to his brother and country, or a man trying to reclaim what he believed had been unjustly taken from him?

The Children Sent to Safety Who Found Themselves in Danger at Sea

The Children Sent to Safety Who Found Themselves in Danger at Sea

Two days ago, we looked at the heartbreaking story of the SS City of Benares, and yesterday we looked more closely at the Children’s Overseas Reception Board, the government scheme which sent British children abroad in the hope of keeping them safe from the war. Today I want to go back a few weeks before the City of Benares disaster, because another ship carrying children had already shown just how dangerous these journeys could be.

Her name was the SS Volendam.

In August 1940, the Volendam left Britain carrying hundreds of passengers, including around 320 children travelling under the CORB scheme. They were heading towards Canada, where families were waiting to give them homes away from the bombing and the threat of invasion in Britain.

I keep thinking about what those children must have felt as they left. For some it may have seemed like a great adventure, but behind them were Mums and Dads who had made an incredibly difficult decision. They were sending their children across the sea because they believed that, however painful the separation, it might give them the best chance of staying safe.

During the night of the 30th and 31st of August 1940, that sense of safety disappeared. At the time, the Volendam was sailing in Convoy OB-205 when she was torpedoed by the German U-boat U-60.

The torpedo hit the front of the ship and water began pouring into her holds. With the Volendam badly damaged, the order was given to abandon ship, and hundreds of people now had to make their way into lifeboats in the darkness.

Thankfully, the children had practised what to do before leaving port. Contemporary accounts describe them remaining remarkably calm as they were taken from their cabins and brought to their boat stations, with some reportedly singing “Roll Out the Barrel” while they waited to be rescued.

It is difficult to imagine the scene. Children who had been sent abroad to escape the dangers of war were now sitting in lifeboats at sea after the ship beneath them had been torpedoed.

But this story had an outcome that could so easily have been very different. Other ships came to their aid and all of the children were rescued, along with the other passengers. One member of the Volendam’s crew, the purser, sadly lost his life during the evacuation.

The Volendam herself did not sink. She was eventually taken in tow, and when she was later examined an extraordinary discovery was made: another torpedo had become lodged in her bow without exploding.

When I read that, I cannot help thinking how narrowly disaster had been avoided. Had that second torpedo exploded, the story of the Volendam might have been remembered very differently.

The children were brought back to Britain, but for some families the ordeal did not end there. Parents still had to decide whether to try again and send their children abroad on another ship.

Remarkably, two of the children who had survived the Volendam were later sent abroad again and were among the CORB children aboard the SS City of Benares.

And this is where the story connects so painfully with the one we looked at two days ago.

Less than three weeks later, on the 17th of September 1940, the SS City of Benares was torpedoed while carrying another group of children towards Canada. This time there was no fortunate ending. Seventy-seven children lost their lives, and the government-sponsored scheme was suspended.

Looking at these stories together makes the decision facing parents in 1940 seem even more impossible. Keep your children at home while Britain faced bombing and the possibility of invasion, or send them away across a dangerous sea in the hope that somewhere far away from home might be safer.

Yesterday I asked what you would have done if you had been one of those parents. After reading what happened aboard the Volendam, I think that question becomes even harder.

If your child had survived the Volendam and returned home, would you have been able to let them leave Britain for a second time?

I would love to hear what you think, and if your family has a connection to the children who were sent abroad during the war, please do share their story.

The First Anglo-Afghan War - Part Six: Britain Had Returned to Kabul, So Why Did It Leave?

The First Anglo-Afghan War - Part Six: Britain Had Returned to Kabul, So Why Did It Leave?

In Part Five, we followed Major-General George Pollock and the British-led forces as they fought their way back towards Kabul in 1842. Only months earlier, the retreat from the Afghan capital had ended in disaster. Now British troops had returned. But they were not going to stay.

Today I want to finish the story of the First Anglo-Afghan War, because what happened next raises a rather uncomfortable question. After three years of fighting, what had Britain actually achieved?

Pollock reached Kabul in September 1842, and he was soon joined by Major-General William Nott, whose force had travelled north from Kandahar. One of their most important objectives was to recover the British prisoners who had been held following the uprising and disastrous retreat earlier that year. Around 95 hostages were recovered, including soldiers, women and children. For families who had spent months not knowing what would happen to them, their return was one of the few happier moments in an otherwise grim campaign.

But the British return to Kabul was also intended to send a message. The humiliation of January 1842 had badly damaged Britain's military reputation, and those in command wanted to demonstrate that the destruction of the retreating column had not gone unanswered.

Before leaving Kabul, British troops destroyed parts of the city, including its famous covered bazaar. The destruction was intended as an act of retribution, but it did not remain neatly contained. Looting followed and fire spread through parts of Kabul. It was a harsh ending to a war which had already brought enormous suffering to soldiers and civilians alike.

And then something rather remarkable happened. The British left. On the 12th of October 1842, Pollock's army began its journey back towards India. There would be no renewed attempt to permanently occupy Kabul. No attempt to rebuild the political arrangement Britain had tried to impose only a few years earlier. The cost had simply become too great.

And perhaps the clearest indication of how badly the original plan had failed can be found in what happened next. At the beginning of the war, Britain had invaded Afghanistan partly to remove Dost Mohammad Khan from power. The British had replaced him with Shah Shuja, believing that a ruler friendly towards British interests would make Afghanistan more secure.

But Shah Shuja had been murdered in 1842. Dost Mohammad, meanwhile, had been held in British custody. After the British withdrawal, he was released. He returned to Afghanistan, and by 1843 was once again ruling from Kabul.

The man Britain had gone to such lengths to remove was back on the throne. Dost Mohammad would rule for another two decades, until his death in 1863.

It is difficult to look at the First Anglo-Afghan War without thinking about the enormous price that had been paid. Thousands of soldiers and camp followers had died. Families had been separated. Kabul had experienced rebellion, fighting and destruction. And the British East India Company had spent huge sums of money on a campaign which had failed to produce the political settlement it had originally wanted.

Britain could claim that its army had returned to Kabul, recovered the prisoners and restored some of the military reputation lost during the retreat. But the larger ambition had failed. Afghanistan had not become the secure, compliant state British planners had imagined. Instead, the war had demonstrated just how difficult it could be for an outside power to control the politics of the country.

By the end of 1842, British forces were withdrawing back towards India. And Dost Mohammad was preparing to return. After invasion, occupation, rebellion, one of the most disastrous retreats in British military history and finally a march back to Kabul... Britain had ended the war remarkably close to where it had begun.

That is perhaps what makes the First Anglo-Afghan War such a fascinating part of Victorian history. It began with fears about Russian influence and Britain's determination to shape events beyond the borders of India. It ended with thousands dead and the ruler Britain had removed returning to power.

So, after following the story from the invasion of 1839 to the withdrawal in 1842, what do you think? Was there ever any realistic chance that Britain's plan for Afghanistan could have worked? Or was this a war that should never have been fought in the first place?

I would love to hear your thoughts.

 

Would You Have Sent Your Child Overseas to Escape the War?

Would You Have Sent Your Child Overseas to Escape the War?

Yesterday we looked at the heartbreaking story of the SS City of Benares, and the children who were taken across the Atlantic to what their families hoped would be safety in Canada.

Today I want to look at the wider story behind that voyage, because those children were part of something much bigger. In the summer of 1940, Britain was facing the very real threat of bombing and invasion. For thousands of parents, one terrifying question began to emerge.

Would their children be safer if they were sent away from Britain altogether?

The government created the Children’s Overseas Reception Board, which was usually known as CORB, to organise the evacuation of British children overseas. Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa all offered homes. The idea attracted enormous interest from worried families. Thousands of parents applied for places, hoping that sending their children overseas might protect them from the bombing and the threat of invasion at home. On paper, it must have sounded very reassuring. 

But I cannot imagine that the decision was ever simple.

Parents had to say goodbye without really knowing how long they would be apart from their children. Children left carrying luggage, labels and a few belongings from home, before travelling across the sea to live with people that they had never met. Some of the children would not see their families again for years.

Between July and September 1940, 2,664 children were sent overseas through the scheme.

Most went to Canada, others to Australia, South Africa and New Zealand. For many families, it was exactly what they had hoped for. A chance to get their children away from the bombing. But there was another danger. The journey itself.

On the 30th of August 1940, the SS Volendam, carrying hundreds of children across the Atlantic, was torpedoed. Thankfully, the children were rescued, but it was a frightening reminder that sending children abroad carried dangers of its own. Tomorrow we will find out more about this.

Yesterday’s story of the City of Benares also showed just how dangerous the Atlantic had become. When the ship was torpedoed on the 17th of September 1940, 77 children were among those who lost their lives. After that tragedy, the government suspended the overseas evacuation scheme.

When I read about CORB, I keep coming back to the parents. Imagine being told that you could send your child somewhere safer. Then imagine having to watch them leave, knowing that you had no idea when you would see them again. There really was no easy choice.

Keep them close while Britain was being bombed...or send them thousands of miles away during dangerous times.

What would you have done?

Would you have sent your child overseas if you had been offered a place?

And if someone in your family was evacuated overseas during the war, I would especially love to hear their story.

Harold Godwinson: The English King Who Won One Battle - Then Had to Fight for His Crown Again

Harold Godwinson: The English King Who Won One Battle - Then Had to Fight for His Crown Again

Imagine becoming King of England in January.

By September, one rival has invaded from the north.

You defeat him in one of the bloodiest battles of the year.

Then, before you have even had time to recover, news arrives that another invasion fleet has landed hundreds of miles away.

That was the position Harold Godwinson found himself in during 1066.

In our recent Medieval posts, we have been looking at the men who believed England’s crown should be theirs, including Harald Hardrada of Norway and William, Duke of Normandy.

Today I want to look more closely at the man who actually became king.

Harold Godwinson.

Harold was born into one of the most powerful families in England. His father, Godwin, Earl of Wessex, had risen to enormous influence during the reign of Edward the Confessor, and by the 1050s Harold himself had become one of the most important nobles in the kingdom.

He was not simply a court figure.

Harold had military experience, had fought in Wales and had shown himself capable of leading armies. By the final years of Edward the Confessor’s reign, he was arguably the most powerful man in England beneath the king himself.

Then, on the 5th of January 1066, Edward died.

According to English sources, Edward entrusted the kingdom to Harold shortly before his death. The following day, the 6th of January, Harold was crowned King of England.

But almost immediately, his crown was challenged.

William of Normandy claimed that Edward had previously promised the throne to him and that Harold himself had sworn an oath supporting William’s claim.

Whether that oath meant what William later said it meant is still debated.

Harold also faced danger from within his own family.

His estranged brother Tostig Godwinson, who was the former Earl of Northumbria, joined forces with Harald Hardrada, the King of Norway.

In September 1066, Hardrada and Tostig invaded northern England.

Harold reacted with amazing speed.

He marched his army north and, on the 25th of September 1066, met them at the Battle of Stamford Bridge.

The English won a crushing victory.

Harald Hardrada was killed.

Tostig was killed.

For a moment, Harold had survived one of the greatest threats to his throne.

Then came the news he must have dreaded.

William of Normandy had landed on the south coast.

Harold now had to turn his exhausted army around and march south again.

Less than three weeks after Stamford Bridge, on the 14th of October 1066, Harold faced William near Hastings.

The English army took up a strong defensive position on Senlac Hill. For much of the day, Harold’s shield wall held against repeated Norman attacks.

But eventually the English line began to break.

By the end of the battle, Harold was dead.

Exactly how he died is uncertain. The famous Bayeux Tapestry appears to show a figure struck near the eye by an arrow, but another figure nearby is being cut down by a mounted warrior. Historians still debate which, if either, represents Harold.

What is certain is that his death transformed English history.

William went on to become William the Conqueror, while Harold Godwinson became the last crowned Anglo-Saxon king of England.

I think Harold’s story becomes even more remarkable when we remember how much happened in such a short time.

He became king in January.

Defeated one invasion in September.

Marched almost the length of England.

And fought for his crown again in October.

Whatever we think about the competing claims to the throne, Harold Godwinson’s final year was extraordinary.

Do you think Harold might have defeated William if he had not first been forced to march north and fight Harald Hardrada?

 

SS City of Benares: The Evacuee Children Sent to Safety Who Never Reached Canada

SS City of Benares: The Evacuee Children Sent to Safety Who Never Reached Canada

Imagine saying goodbye to your child because you believed sending them thousands of miles away was the safest thing you could do.

You watch them leave Britain, knowing you may not see them for years.

But at least, you tell yourself, they will be far away from the bombs.

Then the message arrives.

Their ship has been sunk.

In our recent posts, we have been looking at the experiences of children during the Second World War - evacuation, separation from parents and the different ways children learned to live with fear and loss.

Today I want to look at one of the most heart-breaking chapters of that story.

The SS City of Benares.

By the summer of 1940, Britain faced the possibility of invasion and increasing air attacks. Thousands of parents were considering whether their children might be safer not in the British countryside, but on the other side of the world.

The government-backed Children's Overseas Reception Board, usually known as CORB, arranged for children to be evacuated to countries including Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Between July and September 1940, more than 2,600 children were sent overseas under the scheme.

For many parents, Canada must have seemed almost impossibly distant from the war.

On the 13th of September 1940, the SS City of Benares left Liverpool as part of a convoy bound across the Atlantic.

Among those aboard were 90 children travelling under the CORB scheme, aged between five and fifteen, accompanied by adult escorts.

There must have been excitement mixed with fear. Some children were facing a long sea voyage without their parents, heading towards families and homes they had never seen.

Four days later, everything changed.

Late on the night of the 17th of September, in rough Atlantic weather, the City of Benares was attacked by the German submarine U-48.

A torpedo struck the ship.

The City of Benares went down quickly, sinking in little more than half an hour. In darkness, cold and heavy seas, passengers and crew struggled to launch lifeboats. Some boats were damaged or overturned, while people were thrown into the freezing Atlantic.

For the children, the situation was terrifying.

Of the 90 CORB evacuee children, just 13 survived.

Seventy-seven died.

The loss was particularly cruel because these children had been on board the ship for one reason - their families believed they were being taken somewhere safer. The National Archives records that the disaster effectively brought the government-sponsored overseas evacuation programme to an end.

But among the tragedy was an extraordinary story of survival.

One lifeboat, Lifeboat No. 12, was not found during the initial rescue operation.

Inside were survivors including six evacuee boys and their escort, music teacher Mary Cornish.

They remained adrift in the Atlantic for eight days.

Cornish tried to keep the boys' spirits up, food and water were carefully rationed and those in the boat had to endure cold, exhaustion and uncertainty.

Eventually, a Sunderland flying boat spotted them.

Help was called and the survivors were rescued by HMS Anthony.

It is difficult to imagine what those parents at home experienced while waiting for news.

Evacuation is sometimes remembered through photographs of children standing on railway platforms with labels attached to their coats. But the story of the City of Benares reminds us that wartime parents were being asked to make almost impossible decisions.

Keep your child close and risk the bombs.

Send them away and hope that distance would protect them.

For the families of those 77 children, a decision made out of love and desperation to keep them safe ended in unimaginable loss.

And after the sinking of the City of Benares, Britain largely abandoned the idea that sending children across the sea could offer the safety everyone had hoped for.

Had you been a parent in 1940, would you have considered sending your child overseas to escape the war?