ASK Star readers between 1973 and 2009 what page they turned to first every week and it’s a pretty safe bet “Whalley’s World” would be the answer on most lips.

Alan Whalley kept St Helens smiling over four decades as he served up a magic menu of larger than life characters and nuggets of nostalgia every week with his sublime storytelling skill.

Alan passed away last October, but we’re sure he’d be tickled pink to know his award winning words were making a timely comeback to the Star’s pages to inject a little cheer in these unprecedented days. 

This week’s piece from the archives tells of the day Second World War bombs fell on St Helens. 

Today (Sunday, September 6) marks the 80th anniversary of the blasts at Charles Street and surrounding areas.

THE time when five bombs hurtled down to earth, bringing with them death and destruction, is vividly recalled by veteran reader, Ray Sheen who lists the Second World War bomb hits.

And he adds interesting extra detail to earlier tales about the bombing of the old ‘Tin Chapel’ and of the Bruk area of St Helens.

The bombs came from a lone German plane, says Ray of Vincent Street (on September 6, 1940). The first hit the Talbot Street area, near the Bruk.

The second struck the old ‘tin chapel’ in Corporation Street, where Germany’s wartime mouthpiece Lord Haw Haw was said to have visited to give a talk.
Charles Street was blasted by the third bomb “bringing death and destruction to the Cassidy family.”

Varley’s Foundry yard was hit by the fourth bomb and the fifth was dropped past Pocket Nook in the Parr district.

The killer bomb brought panic to Charles Street. 

Its blast rocketed down the street, over the roofs of houses and struck the Theatre Royal.

“It caused damage to the ceiling which later on caused it to fall down on the theatre audience when they were watching Wuthering Heights.

“The Germans carried out most of their wartime bombing raids at night”, says Ray. 

“They got their bearings from Carr Mill Dam and then followed the East Lancashire Road leading them into Liverpool and the docks.”

He wonders if the German bomb crew decided, that dark 1940s night, to avoid facing heavily-defended Liverpool and instead dropped the bombs on St Helens.

“That was the only night that our family got out of bed and went downstairs to shelter under the stairs.”

Their home was quite close to the Charles Street blast.

William Joyce, aka Lord Haw Haw, visited St Helens just before the Second World War, around 1938.

He was a laughable newscaster who, during the war, invented absurd German propaganda.

“He arrived here in a limousine with a black-dressed chauffeur.”

But he then quickly took off, cursing his St Helens audience. 

A fanatical fantasist, he had created huge hostility by describing the detested Sir Oswald Mosley, as “the greatest Englishman.”

Pat and Joe Rotherham, who have lived in Canada for 50 years, also rekindle those bombing memories.

“The bombs that fell along Bishop Road and Gamble Avenue are very memorable for me”, writes Joe.

“Our family lived at 121 Bishop Road and we were bombed out!”
The back of the house was blown away.

“And we were rescued from the cupboard under the stairs, by my father, Augustine Rotherham an air raid warden.

He came looking for places where the bombs had dropped. He opened our front door only to gaze out into the back garden.”

After temporary shelter with neighbours, the Rotherhams were then relocated to Thirlmere Avenue.

Joe, now 75, adds: “Somewhat in a lighter vein, the police came looking for air-raid bomb damage.

“In Gamble Avenue, they drove straight into the new hole in the centre of the road, in front of what was Windlehurst junior school annexe.

“A few years ago I visited St Helens and in Bishop Road could still see bombing crack-lines on the front of the houses.”

John Foxton of Laurel Road, West Park, also recalls: “The stick of bombs fell in the Gamble Avenue and Bishop Road area; and a mine on the Talbot Hotel.

“I remember seeing what I believe was a German flare, presumably hanging from a parachute, being shot down.

“These flares were to illuminate targets for the following bombers.”

There’s another echo of wartime humour revived in a clipping from an old Pilkington magazine. It was forwarded by Norman Owen, an old pal of this page.

It shows that a German bomb must have dropped on the Triplex safety-glass factory. Painter Norman and charge-hand Trevor Wilson are pictured with the large official notice, lettered in red capitals: DANGER: UNEXPLODED BOMB.

After stumbling on the dusty sign during the 1970s, the painters left the notice outside the factory’s office door. It was only after anxious mutterings by the nervous office workers, and total evacuation of the block, that it was removed by safety officer, Ray Ratcliffe, together with a policeman.

However, there was a genuine close brush with bombs for Norman’s wife, Maureen when her home in Somerset Street, Parr was blasted.

She was then little Maureen Marren, staying at the time at her grandparents’ home in Bold Street. “My brother-in-law, Gerald, was in the house when the bomb dropped,” says Norman.

The Marrens then lived at 18 Somerset Street; next door were the Byrons and then the Moores.

When the raid sounded, Gerald’s mother proved a heroine, grabbing him and Dennis and pushing them into the pantry. Running back, she picked up baby John from the settee and rushed into the all-brick pantry.

“She hid them all under the concrete slab in the pantry. Then came the terrible bang.”

Huge clouds of dust started to pour in under the door.

The bomb had dropped in the Moores’ front garden and had wrecked the house.

Mrs Moore was also heroic in ushering her family into the bathroom, at the back of the dwelling, and saving their lives.

ANYONE else got a wartime memory? Share with us please email news@sthelensstar.co.uk

This column was first published in Whalley’s World in 2007. Last Sunday (September 6) marked the 80th anniversary of the Second World War bombs hitting Charles Street and Corporation Street.