These sound files are extracts (short edited pieces) from longer oral history interviews preserved by Northumberland Archives. These interviews were made as part of a project to collect the memories of people who lived on the Northumberland coast. 

For each person there is a short extract where they introduce themselves and other extracts where they talk about their experience of the bombing of Blyth during the Second World War. 

John and Joan are a married couple from Blyth. They were born during the 1930s.

John and Joan describe the beach defences in Blyth, including concrete block defences on the beach, barbed wire to block access to the beach, gun turrets and Nissen huts in the farmers’ fields. They mention the Submarine base at Blyth being one of the main submarine bases, where John’s father worked. They mention Blyth’s ship building industry. Joan tells the story of her uncle, who worked at the pit, being blown out of bed into his garden when a mine was dropped onto the golf course behind his house on Plessey Road. The mine was aimed to land on the nearby railway line but missed. Joan describes see the aftermath of the bombing and having to climb over mounds of clay to get to school. Joan describes children playing in the shelters at the grammar school, which stayed in place for a time after the war.

John describes being at the cinema during a German attack using incendiary bombs. He described running from the Wallaw Cinema on Union Street to his home on Park Road under attack and seeing tracer bullets from a German aeroplane. John says that he was not frightened at the time, he was just thinking about running home, there was a shelter in the back lane. Joan describes the Anderson shelter in her garden and remembers growing vegetables around it. She talks about feeling scared as soon as the siren went off and that her family slept in everything but “top clothes” so that they would be ready to go to the shelter during the night. The shelter had a stove, bunks, and a kerosene lamp. Joan’s uncle, who worked at the shipyard, was an air raid warden, and her father was in the Home Guard.