Auction - How Hitler mapped out blitz on city (Sheffield Blitz maps)

MAPS drawn up to show Hitler’s plans for a catastrophic bombing onslaught on Sheffield are to go under hammer this week.

The detailed maps show targets for the Luftwaffe as part of Hitler’s assault on Britain during World War Two.

Railways, waterways, industrial complexes, council buildings and even hospitals are all highlighted on the maps as intended targets.

They were produced for Hitler’s war machine as part of his plans - codenamed Operation Sea Lion - to invade the United Kingdom from 1940 onwards.

Following the Germans’ defeat in the Battle of Britain, however, Sea Lion was postponed indefinitely in September 1940 and it was never carried out.

Two months later, however, in December 1940, Sheffield was bombed over two nights by the Luftwaffe. Operation Crucible killed 660 people, injured 1,500 and made 40,000 homeless.

Bombs demolished 3,000 homes and a further 3,000 were badly damaged.

The maps for the raids will be auctioned in Ludlow, Shropshire, on Thursday.

Richard Westwood-Brookes, of Mullock’s Auctioneers, who will sell the maps at their next sale at Ludlow Racecourse, said: “The map shows how detailed the Germans’ plans for destruction of this country were.

“The maps of Sheffield are part of a pack covering the region, which contains several similarly detailed maps of the area including maps of Rotherham, Lincoln, Grimsby, Derby and Leicester.

“They are accompanied by a book of photographs showing particular targets such as bridges, factories, canals, and dockyards, so the Luftwaffe pilots could easily identify targets.

“It is certainly a chilling feeling looking at one of these maps and realising Hitler had it in for your town, your street, and your home.”

The Sheffield maps include one of the north of the city, with targets marked in purple including steelworks and rolling mills near Penistone Road, the main electricity station which stood near Parkwood Springs, Neepsend Gas Works, Neepsend Brick Works, and industrial units at Kelham Island.

Hillsborough Barracks and the Royal Infirmary are both marked in red.

“What is interesting about the maps, and one of the biggest questions for me, is were the Nazis planning on bombing Sheffield’s hospitals?” said Mr Westwood-Brookes.

“Some of these locations are highlighted on the maps in red, which you would perhaps think was code for places to avoid.

“But there are railway stations, army barracks and air spaces also highlighted in red, which would be prime targets during war.”

Mr Westwood-Brookes said the maps were found in the home of an RAF officer whose task at the end of the war had been to clear out Hitler’s geographical library, where all the detailed plans of attack were stored.

“The library was based in a castle in Austria,” said Mr Westwood-Brookes.

“To give an idea of how much was in there, he was told to commandeer a train with at least 10 five-tonne wagons and 500 other containers.”

From: http://www.thestar.co.uk/news/how_hitler_mapped_out_blitz_on_city_1_3683001

Article: John Wesley’s Epworth Diary by Colin Ella - part 26 Poor attendance at St Andrew’s

I CAME again to Epworth on Sunday, 6th August, 1788, a short while before the service at the church.

I went along to the church and I was quite impressed by how Mr Gibson conducted the prayers and also by what he had to say in his sermon.

But oh dear me, what a pathetically small audience were there to hear him - no more than twenty folk, and most of these had only come because they knew I was there.

I was informed that the attendance at St Andrew’s had been poor for a long time, but then, what could be done to remedy it?

Many of our own people in Epworth now chose to worship only in our own meeting room.

Furthermore they would have liked to have taken communion there too, instead of just at the church.

As far as I was concerned I would have preferred that our members stayed with the Anglicans, but in all honesty, I felt there was little I could do to prevent the steady drift away from them.

In the main, Mr Gibson’s sermons were not of a kind to set a good example, and in all conscience, I could not persuade the Methodists to hear him, nor indeed take the sacraments when that man of straw was the celebrant.

I was also now feeling my years and thinking my earthly time was almost over and I had fears for the future of our work in Epworth.

Epworth was not the only area presenting this problem - far from it. It was the same wherever the Anglican parson neither loved nor preached the true gospel.

My long and heartfelt desire for our Movement to remain within the framework of the Church of England was looking bleaker by the day.

We really were on the move and I could see the time when our separation would be complete.

I was ever and always a clergyman of the Church of England and I still truthfully saw the Methodist Cause as an evangelical extension of the Church of England.

I left Epworth by my chaise on the following Wednesday and made for Sheffield.

I preached to a very large congregation there, in fact, the largest I had ever seen at a morning gathering.

As we were approaching Derby on the Friday there was an extremely loud crack from underneath the chaise and in a moment we had overturned.

My companion on this trip, Jenny Smith, and myself, were pretty badly shaken but we both managed to crawl out by the fore windows. We then discovered that the axletree had snapped clean in half.

This was no great surprise to me, for it was the sort of thing I had experienced on numerous occasions. I was little the worse, the only inconvenience being that the broken glass had cut my glove on my right hand.

Next week in Part 27 - Long and Hard Travels

From: http://www.epworthbells.co.uk/community/nostalgia/john_wesley_s_epworth_diary_by_colin_ella_part_26_poor_attendance_at_st_andrew_s_1_3207413