So we can conclude that Source B is quite useful in helping to understand the effects of the Blitz on the British people because its evidence is reliable, whereas Source C is not very useful because there is no proof that this is the genuine feeling of the British people, and not a mere set-up by the British government.
3. Source D is a photograph showing the aftermath of an air raid, with people wandering around, and their possessions lying in the road. It gives a very negative view of the war because it shows the devastation that the war brought upon the people. The evidence it gives is that there was no security for anyone’s belongings, and that the people were dealing with the bombing with a ‘resigned acceptance’. This means that they had accepted the fact that they had just been in an air raid, but had not yet come to terms with the devastation and destruction. We see this because the people in the photograph do not seem to be doing much. There is a woman standing against the wall just staring into space, and a man in the middle of the street with a very blank expression.
Source D supports the evidence given by Source B about the damage done in some ways, and contradicts it in others. A similarity between the sources is that they are both give a negative impression of the effects of the war. Source B shows that so many people were killed, and Source D shows that the bombing resulted in a lot of destruction. Also, the message that they brought across must have had a similar effect, as the government did not release either of these pictures until much later.
But the two sources also contradict each other in the evidence that they give. Source B shows an organised activity taking place. The people have got their acts together and have begun to sort the problem out. Men in uniform have begun collecting the bodies, whereas in Source D, there is no sense of organisation, and the people are just “sorting personal property”. There is no official clear-up or organised activity, which means that the damage done in Source D must have been thought to be less serious than the damage done in Source B, where officials were required to come and sort it out.
Also, the damage done through the level of suffering in each source is different. Source D shows that the bombing caused homelessness and unhappiness, whereas Source B shows that the bombing caused death.
So, in conclusion, we see that the evidence given by Source D does support the evidence given by Source B because the impression of the damage caused by the bombing is similar, but the evidence contradicts the evidence of Source B because the two sources show different levels of suffering caused by the air raids.
The evidence given in Source D does not support the evidence given in Source C. The people in the photograph in Source C appear to have accepted the fact that they have been bombed, and are trying to make the best out of the situation, whereas the people in Source D are in a state of ‘resigned acceptance’ and so have not really accepted the whole situation.
Source C shows that the bombing did not damage the unity and spirit of the people as they all have their arms around each other and have huge smiles on their faces, whereas in Source D, the people look very divided and unhappy, as they are standing on their own with either blank or miserable expressions.
The main reason why the evidence of Source D does not support the evidence of Source C about the damage done is that Source C does not actually show the damage done. The two photographs are showing completely different things. Source D show the damage done, whereas Source C is showing that the people stood united through the bombing. The only damage Source C does show is that the people’s belongings were put out of place by the explosions, and so this could be a way how Source D supports the evidence of Source C, but again, the reliability of this source can be called into question, and so there is no concrete proof of support.
So, in conclusion, we see that the evidence given by Source D does not support the evidence given by Source C about the damage done during the air raids because the two photographs are showing completely different things.
4. The government had cause for concern about the morale of the British people in the autumn of 1940 for a number of reasons. These reasons can be divided into three categories. First is the fact that the public had become very annoyed with the government, secondly the physical consequences of the bombing were upsetting the people and finally the spread of rumours.
The government was concerned with the fact that the public had become very annoyed with them because they were taking the law into their own hands, and had lost all respect for any government authority. This was shown in many ways. Perhaps the most extreme example was when one hundred East Enders took possession of the Savoy Hotel, on 15th September 1940, and insisted on staying there during the air raids, which completely contradicted government recommendations. This example is the only one of its kind in London, but elsewhere, like Liverpool, it was happening more frequently, with members of the public refusing to do as they were told.
Source F describes another quite extreme example of the loss of respect for the authorities. In a time when the King and Queen were very highly respected, much more than now, the source tells us that when visiting a bombsite, they were “booed”. This was very shocking and showed the government the extent of the discontent of the people.
Another reason for the loss of morale in the British public was that they had realised that their government had been unprepared for the night raids and had only planned for a swift gigantic attack during the day. This meant that defences against the night raids were very poor, but what annoyed the people more was the fact that they could not feel safe at all, because there were not enough shelters for everyone. Knowledge of the fact that they could be killed at any moment will surely have upset the people, and severely affected morale. We are told in Source E, that as an alternative to shelters, people started going to “Euston and Paddington” which are underground train stations, where they felt they would be safe. The government had outlawed this because it was very dangerous when the lines were still active, but the people ignored the government, which again shows how people had begun taking the law into their own hands and had lost respect for the government, a justifiable reason to be concerned.
There must have been a reason for this sudden loss in respect for the government, and it seems that it was due to a sudden loss in morale of the British people due to the direct consequences of the bombing, which were upsetting and frightening the people.
The main problem the government faced was the fact that they were not ready to defend against the different types of bombs and they did not know what to expect. Each type of bomb had a different effect, which meant that the public could not relax and stayed worried and eventually, as we see in Source G, it led to “flights of entire communities into the countryside, or ‘trekking’ as it was called”. If the people were worried and frightened, they were upset, and if they were upset, then morale would drop. This is why the government were very concerned in the autumn of 1940.
What also left people very upset was that the government had not prepared for the amount of homelessness, and when there are incidents like Clydebank, where twelve thousand homes were destroyed, it is obvious that morale would drop, as people would not be happy without homes to live in. To make it worse, when people from other cities heard about incidents like Clydebank, they would start getting worried about whether their houses would be destroyed, and again, worried people were upset people, and upset people caused a drop in morale.
The problem with the bombing was that even though Hitler had ordered specific targets to be bombed, the bombing was very inaccurate and so innocent people were always killed, and in a member of the public’s mind, an innocent person dead is far worse than a soldier dead, and this was upsetting them greatly. All this caused a huge loss in morale and this was why the government was concerned about morale.
Another cause for an upset public was Coventration. On the night of 14th November, with the aid of the X-Gerat radar beams, the Germans managed to set fire to the whole of Coventry. As Coventry was a small city at the time, it was easy to set fire to it with the new more accurate X-Gerat beams, and what the public would have seen was a whole city going up in flames in one night. After seeing this, they would think that all their cities were going be destroyed just as easily. This thought was terrifying people and made them upset, which meant a drop in morale.
What was also annoying the public was that after they heard about the deaths of their own relatives, they heard the BBC reporting that the casualties were “slight”, which is not how they would have wanted to hear their deaths being reported. Even though it was a way of trying to raise morale, by reporting that the war was not having too bad an effect as people thought, it was actually angering the people and making them upset and annoyed, which caused a huge drop in morale.
Another reason why the government was concerned about the morale was that very negative and harmful rumours had started spreading rapidly. In the week of 17th May, the Mass Observer had reported that trainloads of unidentified corpses had been sent to Liverpool for mass cremation, that a curfew had been imposed in certain areas, that many people had been carrying white flags (the sign of surrender) and that 500,000 people had already been killed. All these facts were grossly untrue. For example, the total number of people that died during the Blitz was 60,000, a number much less that 500,000. But the public were not to know whether they were true or not, and once they heard them, the rumours would have stuck in their minds and would have made the people very upset, as they thought of what had happened to their own country.
So in conclusion, the reason why the government was concerned about the morale of the British people in the autumn of 1940, is because there was a lot of evidence that suggested that morale had fallen greatly, and for the government, a fall in morale meant two things: loss of support and effort for the war, and a loss of support in the next general election.
5. I agree with the statement saying that the impression that the British faced the Blitz with courage and unity is a myth because there is some evidence to suggest that they had become divided and had lost hope. But on the other hand, I do not agree either because there is much evidence to suggest that they did face the Blitz with courage and unity.
Evidence to suggest that the British faced the Blitz without courage and unity comes from comments made by Herbert Morrison, the Minister for Home Security, on 7th May 1941. He said that he was worried about the effects of the raids on morale because people could not stand the intensive bombing and that sooner or later, morale in London would go, just like it had in Plymouth. This is illustrated in Source F in which the feeling of the people is described as “bitter” and that the King and Queen were “booed” when they visited the destroyed areas. If they are being described as “bitter” and they are booing the King and Queen, something mostly unheard of in those days, they cannot be facing the Blitz with courage and unity because they are separated from the King and Queen.
Also, on 2nd December 1940, the Bishop of Winchester described the people as “broken in spirit after sleepless nights.” He even went on to say that they were “struggling to get out” and that “morale [had] collapsed. Everywhere there was fear.” If people were making comments like these two men were, how can we believe that the people faced the Blitz with courage and unity? These two comments actually state quite the contrary. They describe the people as having lost their “grit” as they had “broken in spirit” and say that the people faced the Blitz not with courage but with fright. Source E illustrates this fear well where it describes the mothers and young children as being “hysterical” and that when the sirens went, the people ran “madly for shelters”. Of course they would go to the shelters to escape the bombing, but they are described as running “madly” or like ‘headless chickens’, which shows that they were frightened, not brave.
Portsmouth was the worst example of where morale had collapsed because a third of the people wanted to leave, and when the council refused to evacuate any more children, it caused great resentment and ‘latent pacifism’ among the people. To be talking of giving up in the middle of war and to be wanting to leave their towns is surely a sign that the people were not facing the Blitz with courage, but in fact were running away and hiding from it. To add to this, at the time, there seemed to be a constant grumble all over England which was due to the people losing respect for the government and so if they had lost faith in the government within a year of the was beginning, they surely were not facing the Blitz with courage and unity.
What shows that the people were not facing the Blitz as the myth suggests they did is when Churchill ordered that there should be no disclosure of the parachute mines because people were so frightened of them. It also suggests that due to censorship, which is effectively what is happening here, the people may have faced a censored Blitz with courage and unity and that the actual Blitz had been covered from them totally. If this is the case then the statement should be changed from “whether the Brits faced the Blitz” to “whether the Brits faced the censored Blitz”.
There is also evidence to show that the people were not facing the Blitz in unity, as is shown in Source D where the people are facing the bombing with a ‘resigned acceptance’. In the photograph, they look very disjointed and separated from each other. Also, people from the northern parts of Britain, and more generally, anywhere outside London, were carrying on not because they were showing bravery and unity, but because they wanted to outdo the people in London. There were the general feelings that “if London could take it, then so can we”. This showed not unity, but, on the northerners’ part, it showed contempt, and therefore disunity for the people of London.
Evidence disagreeing with the statement, saying that the myth is true; that the people faced the Blitz with courage and unity is shown in how the people are described as having high spirits and to be getting on with life during the bombing. The high spirits were seen when eighty-two out of eighty-eight railway bookstalls felt that victory was inevitable, just after a bombing. If such a high percentage still had high hopes, even after being bombed, then surely they were facing it with courage.
What also shows that they faced the Blitz with courage is their humour. Just after being bombed, when spirits would be expected to be an all time low, shopkeepers were putting signs up saying ‘More open than usual’ and pub owners saying ‘our windows are gone but our spirits are excellent’. Just to make the situation a bit light-hearted, the people were treating the Blitz like a game of cricket, and to be saying that England were still batting, right after a bombing shows great courage because the feeling to be expected is of defeat and surrender.
Even though the people were grumbling about the government in general, they still had complete faith in Winston Churchill, which shows that they did stand united with the government to take on the Blitz. Comments like “you’ll never let us down” and “good old winnie” illustrate the support the people had for him. Even Vere Hodgson, who was totally against Churchill, was saying, “he saved us…build a model in gold”.
Of course sources like Source A and Source C which are telling us that out of the people came a sense of “courage and unshakeable determination” and in the photograph, where we see people with their arms around each, smiling, would be obvious sources to turn to as they give a direct answer, but the problem with these sources is that Source A is a commemorative and celebratory extract and therefore would omit any negative comments and we have no proof that the people in Source C have not been told to stand like that; merely a piece of morale-boosting propaganda set up by the government, and therefore these two sources are very unreliable and cannot be used.
I think that to fully agree or fully disagree with the statement that the British faced the blitz with courage and unity is a myth is not correct as both are very extreme views, and what would be correct is to say that they did not face it with cowardice and disunity, but also that it was not a time where everyone held hands and took the Blitz with smiling faces. A man from Swansea’s comments reflects this and shows what the true picture was like. He said, “People were marvellous – they can take it all right. But not like the bloke said on the wireless – they don’t go about smiling about it – the people who have lost friends and relatives. They don’t go about grinning.” Also there was a sense of grim determination amongst the people. They were saying things like “we shall get used to it”. This suggests that they were not enjoying it but that they were dealing with it.
I believe that the people felt that the Blitz wasn’t a bed of roses, but they did keep on going. This is illustrated in Source G where it tells us that although the people were frightened so much that they used to ‘trek’ to the countryside every night, they still came to work every morning. This shows that they were frightened, but they were also trying their best and acting very brave.
So, no I do not agree with this statement, but I also do not disagree because there is a lot of evidence to suggest that even though the people were frightened, they still kept on going.
