New Book Details Swansea’s Wartime Experience as a Nazi Target

As individuals gather at war memorials throughout Swansea for Remembrance commemorations, the destructive three-night blitz of February 1941 will be a primary focus. Despite the severity of that bombing, the narrative of Swansea’s home front – encompassing how civilians managed during wartime – is considerably more varied. A new publication by author and local historian Bernard Lewis seeks to offer a broader understanding of Swansea’s World War Two experience. The book, titled “Swansea and the Second World War,” posits that while the bombing and subsequent reaction mirrored those in other urban centers like Coventry, Liverpool, Plymouth, and London, distinct elements differentiated Swansea’s situation from the 1930s through the 1950s. These distinctions are rooted in the region’s industrial composition, demographic characteristics, and geographical layout. Mr. Lewis stated: “Swansea suffered no more and no less than lots of places across the UK, but the way in which it impacted us is different.” He added: “That’s why I believe we need to talk about the concentration of industry here, the relatively small population, and the beautiful but dangerous landscape.” The blitz, occurring from February 19 to 21, 1941, resulted in over 200 fatalities out of the 384 individuals who would perish in 40 Luftwaffe air raids targeting Swansea during the entire war. Within that brief period, bombers deployed 1,273 high explosives and more than 56,000 incendiary devices across approximately 40 acres, obliterating the former town center. This represented a greater concentration of ordnance than in any British conurbation apart from London. Nevertheless, the narrative commences significantly earlier. By the late 1930s, even while then-Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain proclaimed “peace in our time,” defensive strategies for Swansea were already being developed. Given the dense concentration of heavy industry within a confined area, the region consistently ranked among the Nazis’ primary targets. Mr. Lewis elucidated: “Within a 10-mile radius you have the docks, copper works, iron and steel, coal transport, and the oil refinery at Llandarcy.” In 1938, Howell L. Lang-Coath, the Swansea town clerk, was designated as the air raid precautions controller, initiating the establishment of civil defense services deemed essential for wartime. However, with a population of only a quarter of a million, Swansea experienced a shortage of the workforce necessary for such a defensive undertaking. Mr. Lewis commented: “Other towns and cities had it far worse, but they had greater populations to fill the roles, and were spread out over a much bigger area; some parts of London were hardly touched by the [capital’s own] blitz, and must have wondered if there was actually a war going on at all.” He continued: “Whereas in Swansea the simple act of responding to the disaster necessitated enrolling 2.5% of the community, and that’s before you consider men who’d gone away to fight, and those who were too old or young or infirm to take part.” An additional challenge arose from the government’s choice to intern Italian immigrants as foreign aliens following Mussolini’s entry into the war. “Italians had settled in Swansea from the mid to late 19th Century onwards, and had generally assimilated into Swansea society incredibly well.” “However, with the hysteria of war, many of the shops and cafes they ran were looted and had their windows broken.” “This was not only terrifying for the Italian families who believed they were part of the Welsh community, it also put a further strain on the whole Swansea economy and infrastructure as the businesses they ran were precisely the ones who were helping to administer rationing and keep food coming.” Although Swansea urgently required adult migrant labor, similar to the influx seen in London, it instead received a wave of children from other bombed cities throughout the UK and as part of the Jewish Kindertransport, which evacuated young people from mainland Europe. Mr. Lewis stated: “These youngsters obviously needed people to care for them – as foster parents and teachers – and that further diminished the labour pool who could contribute to the war effort.” By 1941, Swansea relied on women and men of advanced and young ages to maintain its operational systems. During the peak of the crisis, it was reported that the Home Guard could only provide one rifle for every three recruits, leading many to conduct patrols armed with clubs and pitchforks. In 1943, the town encountered an additional pressure with the deployment of the US Army’s 2nd Infantry Division. “There was a lot of resentment from local men; in common with the rest of the UK, ‘the Yanks’ were seen as ‘overpaid, oversexed and over here’.” “Outbreaks of violence weren’t uncommon between the two groups, but I’ve been able to find at least a hundred marriages between GIs and Swansea girls, including the great-grandparents of Welsh footballer Joe Rodon.” In contrast to the expansive industrial complexes of Birmingham or Manchester, Swansea’s geographical characteristics confined its population and industry to a concentrated zone, bordered by the sea to the south and a chain of hills to the north and west. “You’ve got Kilvey Hill behind you, which acted both as a target for bombers, and a sort of funnel which maximised the damage.” “If the bombers drop anything short of Kilvey Hill after coming off the seaward side, it would either hit the docks and the town, or else cause a firestorm which would roll down from the higher ground. In that horseshoe you have very densely packed inhabitants, which greatly increased the risk of injury and death.” Mr. Lewis further posits that the extensive beaches along the coastline rendered the region a plausible, if not probable, target for a German invasion. Consequently, more than 100 pillboxes were erected; however, the threat of an amphibious landing diminished almost immediately after their completion. Nevertheless, arguably the most significant geographical legacy is evident in Swansea’s contemporary architecture. Mr. Lewis observed: “Swansea is a mismatch of Victorian buildings and 1950s ‘shoeboxes’, thrown up after the war to replace the bombed-out sites.” “Much of the post-war planning was ugly and cheap, but today we wear our scars proudly, and they have become part of our collective personality.”