Hello everyone welcome back to the history hit World Wars podcast I'm your host James Rogers and in this episode we're looking at the Blitz but not the Blitz you might think of when you first hear that term and you think of the relentless bombing of London because Because in truth, there were many Blitz across the UK, so many cities and towns that were subject to heavy Lufwaffe

bombardment from Belfast to Grimsby, from Birmingham to Hull. In fact, when I moved to Hull in 2008 to study at

University there were still ominous gaps in the terrace houses and the shadows of

bombardment were all around.

There was even a rumor that the old National Theatre Building down Beverly Road,

which laid their charred and bombed out, was a lasting remnant and memorial of Luthwa for bombing from the war.

And actually, it turned out to be true.

It still stands there today as the last civilian building bombed out during the Second World War.

It's being renovated into a war memorial, I think.

It makes sense though.

Nine out of ten buildings in the city were damaged or destroyed during the war. Yet Hull was just one of many cities in the

Midlands and the north that were subject to bombing. Another city that bore the brunt of

Lufwaer for bombardment was Coventry. It arguably got an even more raw

deal at the hands of the Lufwaffe. Because on the 14th of November 1940, the Lufwaffe launched its

most destructive bombing raid of the Second World War so far.

It took bombing of the UK up to new, never-before-seen levels of destructiveness.

And in this raid, the manufacturing and medieval centers of the city were all but destroyed, if not severely

damaged.

To tell us more, Dan Snow was joined by historian and Coventry resident David McGory,

who takes us through this fateful night and explores the impacts of these traumatic events on the city. It really was an infamous night of bombing, and David

is the expert to take us through it. David, thank you so much coming on the podcast. Explain to me what Coventry was like in 1939, 1940.

Comtry was busy, it was an industrial city. Loads of factories building most of the cars it was becoming

...