Sheffield's Blitz memorial walk launches at bombed sites

10 December 2019

News image — Atkinsons department store was destroyed in the Luftwaffe Blitz on 12 December 1940

Sheffield Newspapers Atkinsons was destroyed in the Luftwaffe Blitz in 12 December 1940 — Atkinsons department store was destroyed in the Luftwaffe Blitz on 12 December 1940

A heritage trail has been set up to take people on a tour of Sheffield's most heavily bombed areas during the blitz in 1940.

The Sheffield Blitz Heritage Trail was created with Heritage Lottery funding to link 12 different sites in the city.

Hundreds died during German Luftwaffe raids on Sheffield between 12 and 15 December, 1940.

The site of Atkinson's department store on The Moor, razed to the ground at the time, is the gateway to trail.

Picture Sheffield Bramall Lane football ground after World War Two bombing — Bramall Lane football ground was hit by Luftwaffe bombs during the Sheffield Blitz

Other sites include Sheffield City Hall, Devonshire Green, the Central Library and Bramall Lane football ground.

Historian Neil Anderson has also written a book, Countdown to the Sheffield Blitz, about the impact on the city.

Sheffield Blitz Trail sites

Sheffield City Hall is still scarred by shrapnel on its outside pillars
Atkinsons department store was razed to the ground and the rest of The Moor shopping area was virtually flattened
Around 70 people died when The Marples Hotel on Fitzalan Square was hit on 12 December 1940. Some bodies are thought to still be buried beneath
Devonshire Green: Mr Anderson said: "People know Devonshire Green as a park nowadays, but in 1940 it was a thriving area of back-to-back housing, totally devastated by the Blitz."
Sheffield Central Library on Surrey Street, still bears a huge crack in the entrance way from when the nearby Marples Hotel was hit. It was the hub of the relief effort, where people went if they had lost loved ones or their homes

Source: Neil Anderson, Sheffield Blitz Heritage Trail

Mr Anderson said family memoirs inspired him to commemorate the Blitz.

"My grandma talked about Sheffield during the war and in the Blitz. It piqued my imagination and I realised how little there is to mark the sacrifices here," he said.