How Manchester & Liverpool United During World War II
Passions Rivalries and Allegiances! A Tale of Two Cities
“When the will defies fear, when duty throws the gauntlet down to fate, when honour scorns to compromise with death - that is heroism”
. Robert G. Ingersoll (August 11, 1833 – July 21, 1899)
Never Surrender
Flattering histories penned by the homegrown are often the powdery sweep of blush that define a city’s cheekbones. Simultaneously the symbols, philosophies and characteristics that contribute to city pride will always be viewed through rose-tinted spectacles. There is an elaborate tapestry that both binds and separates the cities of Liverpool and Manchester. A complex and centuries-old saga that includes architecture, art, industry, independence and of course sport. Most believe the beautiful game to be the overriding reason the two cities clash. In truth the rivalry is far older and runs far deeper than any game of football. It is also true that there’s a quiet and unwavering patriotic emotion that will forever fasten Liverpool and Manchester together.
Between 1939 and 1945 tens of millions were slaughtered or driven out of their homes in a maelstrom of ethnic cleansing. Deemed inferior, non-human, an alien threat. Six million Jews almost all of which were non-combatants met their deaths. Across Europe, more than 39 million men, women and children lost their lives to war-related causes. More than half of which were civilians.
On our 'Great Isle', both Liverpool and Manchester found themselves on the frontline. As port cities and epicentres of industry, German strategy would see Manchester and Liverpool subjected to horrific attacks, most notably during the Blitz. Though targeted regularly on the 28th and 29th of November 1940, Liverpool endured its first major air raid. Night after night the Luftwaffe rained bombs on Liverpool in a brutal and sustained aerial attack. The Luftwaffe, who used the BSK (Ballistische Schussmess Kamera) to measure their tactical effectiveness and record kills, tore through the city. 30 parachute mines each weighing a ton, 3000 incendiaries and butterfly bombs, and 355 tons of high explosives were unleashed on Merseyside. Some of Liverpool’s most beautiful and historic buildings, roads and homes became but a memory. Graveyards of rubble, where grandparents, mothers, fathers, and their children lay buried. 166 lives were lost in a single hit on Durning Road air-raid-shelter. A loss Churchill himself described as the "single worst incident of the war”. Then came something of a lull. 20 days respite, 20 days to take stock of the strange fruit war bears. Death, desperation, hunger, and homelessness.
Devastation after German attacks on Liverpool.
Between the 20th and 23rd of December 1940, the Luftwaffe once more had Liverpool in its sights. For 3 consecutive nights, Liverpool yet again suffered an intense German onslaught. The skies turned crimson as shells burst overhead. Each night the docks which housed a huge amount of timber, army stores and explosives were targeted. Hell was let loose, and Liverpool was in flames for the second time. Liverpool’s firefighters now faced a task unprecedented. Neither they nor their equipment could manage the demands placed on them. Largely untrained and protected by nothing more than boiler suits and tin hats, the firestorm around them served to highlight the shortcomings of the AFS. With only 40 or so self-propelled pumps the remaining 430 were trailer pumps. To be of any use vehicles were required to tow them, there were none. Bewildered and unable to contain the blaze Liverpool’s firefighters were in desperate need of reinforcements. It was then ‘Manchester Man’ came to shore up ‘Liverpool Gent’.
In what would turn out to be a self-sacrificing gesture, Manchester sent 200 of its firefighters and 30 of its pumps to Liverpool to help extinguish fire and fury. Side by side, shoulder to shoulder in true Blitz spirit the men of Liverpool and Manchester worked to put out fires. Forth St Cotton warehouse, the Cunard Building, St Georges Hall, Princes Dock, Wapping Dock, and the Olympia Theatre, to name but a few were all ablaze. How could those ‘Manchester Men’ have known their own city would just a day later suffer its heaviest air-raids. Between the 22nd and 23rd of December, almost 2000 incendiaries and 500 tons of high explosives were launched at the city of Manchester. Its railways, warehouses, docks, factories, and innocents. Flames of fires still burning in Liverpool lit the Luftwaffe’s way. With 200 of their firefighters in Liverpool Manchester’s civilian defences were depleted. 400 fires erupted, 2000 were injured and maimed, and more than 700 perished. Every inch of the city looked to be ablaze. Volunteers and untrained part-timers were left to put out what was left of Manchester Cathedral, Cross St Chapel, Victoria Station, and Old Trafford. Textiles, cotton and clothing kept on George St, Portland St, and Piccadilly, were kindling for the Luftwaffe. So fiercely did the fires in those areas burn the military had no choice but to dynamite surrounding buildings to create fire breaks. Amidst the mayhem of what became known as the Christmas Blitz, bright flashes of heroism from both Liverpudlian and Mancunian illuminated dark days. Ernie Irwin, Alfred Philpott, Charles Pote and Eric Calverley, four Merseyside railwaymen are remembered in a plaque at Hamilton Square Station. A locomotive carrying invaluable ammunition caught fire. While the raid was at its peak with bombs and mines falling about them, the four managed to get the train under a water crane. If that train had exploded the damage to Birkenhead would have been immense. In Manchester, a parachute mine hit the city’s tug-fire tender the M.S.C. Firefly. It pierced the deck locker which was alongside the engine room but did not explode. Sub-lieutenant Brooke-Smith, not knowing whether or not the mine was live chose to diffuse it.
The Manchester Blitz, also knows as The Christmas Blitz, caused significant damage in 1940.
An estimated 1400 lost their lives in Manchester and its surrounding Burroughs during the Blitz. In Liverpool, that figure reached 4000. In total Great Britain lost 70,000 civilians. 40,000 of which were lost in the seven months between September 1940 and May 1941. A further 385,000 men and boys fell during combat, losses so great they still reverberate today. For a time, the mutual suffering experienced in WW2 moved the people of Liverpool and Manchester towards a more heightened sense of social solidarity. How could it not when the men of Liverpool and Manchester had exhausted themselves tackling fires to protect the cities they loved. Though both cities bled, they hid their wounds with impressive dignity. Both cities survived under the protection of an underlying resilience, depth and toughness of character Mancunian and Liverpudlian man have always had. Today, Liverpool and Manchester’s rivalry is as it ever was, rife. Twin cities frenemies to the bitter end and if we're honest would we want to change it. After all, it is well-documented siblings are prone to fight.
“It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it”
Robert E. Lee, (January 19, 1807 – October 12, 1870)