but don't let's be beastly to the germans

[intrikate88]

Thinking about a Narnia fic I might write (ought to write: I need to remember how to deal with aggravation through writing fic rather than pulling my hair out and plotting to stab people) involving Lucy stealing an ambulance in the middle of an air raid, so I'm showing a real lack of commitment to getting work done researching Blitz records. So far, most of what I'm turning up on the bombing information is limited to the official dates of the Blitz, 7 September 1940 to 10 May 1941. I'm sort of assuming that the evacuation that took the Pevensies out of London was not the false alarm one of 1939, but over the period of the heaviest bombing, but I'm wondering when they might have returned. It seems that in February 1941, there was the highest number of evacuees from London (about 1.37 million), which had come down to 1 million by September.

It would be best to set the story during the summer of 1941, and some articles seem to indicate that there was occasional bombing happening during that time, but I can't find an actual list of dates and locations ANYWHERE. Though I suppose I could just make the chaos happen from an unexploded bomb rather than from one falling from the sky, but still.

Though this comprehensive list of bombs from 7 September 1940 is fascinating and somewhat overwhelming.

I mean, the easy way out is to just set it in 1943 or so when Hitler was dropping doodlebugs, I guess, but I didn't want it to take place too long after The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Anybody else happen to have any useful links?

I also came across this poster, also known as The Time Lucy and Susan Had To Sit on Peter So He Didn't Completely Lose It At A Firefighter And Get Everyone Bound And Gagged And Left In A Tube Station.

Comments

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Hmmm, nothing in particular comes to mind that you would not find on your own, I suspect other than that there were other cities beside London bombed, as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liverpool_Blitz#1942 indicates. As you know, I looked into Liverpool's history recently. Also... I THINK that on the BBC website, in the section on the Home Front of the War, I know I read anecdotes about bombs falling on a ... munitions factory? in Bristol, I thought. Also, when I was trying to site the boys' school (I settled on Reading) I found references to heavy bombing of at least one industrial city in the North, though I can't remember the name. In any event, it wasn't just London and if you come up with a reason for them being elsewhere, that could help, unless you want to stick to London, of course. Do check out the UK War Cabinet sites. Their Twitter feed is providing "real time" events from 70 years ago, and there were some very sad Tweets regarding the fires in Covent Garden, among others.

And this story sounds so awesome. Also, have you seen the Remix challenge that is going up? They might include Narnia!

[intrikate88.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, there were so many other places- Coventry was hit hard, I think their cathedral was demolished. If I remember correctly, Manchester was bombed heavily, and there were a lot of sites out in the countryside that got hit as well, due to counterintelligence efforts that tried to make it look like there were factories where there weren't any.
I feel like I want to stick to London, mostly because there are some details I want to blatantly steal out of Connie Willis's All Clear in terms of ambulance routes and hospitals, and I sort of want Susan telling Lucy that they need to get to the Underground station, though frankly an Anderson shelter anywhere in the country would do just as well... oh, I don't know. And the more I read about how plenty of children were evacuated for several years, I can also see a case to be made for the children staying a very long time at Digory's house.

I will check out the War Cabinet sites!

[lady_songsmith]

Hit up the Cabinet Papers! I've got ukwarcabinet on the Twitter feed and there's been some great stuff about what exactly what hit when and how badly! http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/cabinetpapers/themes/total-war.htm

[intrikate88.livejournal.com]

Cool! I'm not finding quite what I'm looking for on the site, but I've definitely been meaning to get on their Twitter feed.