The Hoglands Park Air Raid

On the edge of one of Southampton’s green spaces, Hoglands Park, is a small plaque recording an event that took place over 80 years ago. An air-raid shelter located in the park took a direct hit. Over the decades, this tale has become one of the most well-known in Southampton’s wartime story, but parts of the it are still shrouded in mystery.
The bombing occurred on the night of Sunday 1st December 1940, which was the last of three nights of horrific bombing raids that are collectively known as the Southampton Blitz. In particular, the shopping district was badly hit, including one of the largest shops in Southampton, Edwin Jones- a stone’s throw from the shelter.
It is known how many people died in the shelter: fourteen died in the raid itself and a further two died of their injuries in following days. There is no evidence that the shelter was in-filled with quicklime, this is probably an embellishment by later retelling.
The youngest casualty was 11-year-old Kenneth Lahey who died with his older sister, Mary and their father, John. The oldest fatality was 66-year-old John Connelly who had been resident in the Sailor’s Home in Oxford Street.
Later in the war Hoglands Park was taken over by the American army in their preparations for D-Day but did not build anything where the bomb had fallen. It is possible that it became a yard for military vehicles.
This short film introduces the story of the Hoglands Park Raid.

[@Celticcross688]

They are not forgotten ❤

[@montbrehain]

An excellent telling of a little known and sad part of our local history. I have walked by the plaque often and always spare a thought and pay my respects. A few years ago a mate and I went on a "Southampton Blitz" guided tour which took us to many unknown and often overlooked and forgotten shelters. There are many tales like this that deserved to be told and remembered. Thanks for this one...

[@peterw4338]

My mother went to the shelter with her newborn baby, the shelter was packed and she became claustrophobic and ran out to head to her mother’s home. Her living account was that the victims were buried in the shelter and left there.

[@eric-wb7gj]

With a direct hit like that, I'm not sure quite how they would tell who everyone in it was. Years ago I knew a man who was in the fire brigade in Southampton during the early part of the war. He mentioned this very incident, & said he got there soon after, & it was horrible. He didn't elaborate further. His recollection was that they quickly filled the trench in, with remains inside. He had relatives who worked on the railways, & one was an ARP Warden. He stated;- - Due to all the old medieval cellars, they had been knocked through, so the wardens didn't have to come up from below ground during air raids. - Locomotives sometimes fell into these old cellars around the city, where the railway line had been built over them. - Locomotives & teams were sent out to try & find bombs that had dropped near railways. His relative didn't like this as vibrations could set off bombs. - He was working in the fire brigade when the docks got hit hard. There was a large warehouse with rum which caught fire. Due to the fumes, the fire crews got drunk. Their commanding officer came down & was going to put them all up on disciplinary charges, until it was found out what happened. - He used to go up into the brick towers of the Royal South Hants Hospital, & report the angles of where he'd seen the bombs drop back to the command center. A friend of his in the fire brigade did the same watch on different times, but didn't like the RSH, as when he went there, bombs fell nearby.

[@davidknowles3459]

Also in that shelter were some Edwin Jones staff,who couldn't get into the Edwin Jones Shelter.Anold man told me that a jacket had been blown up into a tree.It had been left there,but after a few weeks it was taken down as the arms of the jacket were flapping in the wind,and scaring some people

[@chucks6781]

I remember the yanks at this camp as they always handed out chewing gum to us kids playing cricket on the edge of the park & giving us a Christmas party with a small gift from Santa Claus

[@richardspeed7135]

Sad

[@markchristian241]

There was a tunnel used to go from the globe pub to the air raid shelter it was sealed up it had all the names above the door who lost there lives how would I know I ived in the globe in the late 70s and use to play in the cellar of me dads old pub the globe in Bernard st

[@southerneruk]

According, relations, the pulled out a number of bodies, many were not complete, bits were missing, they did clear up what they could, but the fear was some will never be accounted for because the bodies disintegrated and there were bits of bodies that were buried in the shelter