Horror of the Blitz revealed as never before with haunting colourised photos showing Londoners pulled from the rubble of Nazi bomb blasts and half-destroyed hospitals
The historical images bring the horrifying reality of the war closer, showing the terror people had to endure during the aerial bombardment.
THE horror of the Blitz has been revealed as never before in a series of haunting colourised photos showing Londoners living under the daily threat of Nazi attacks.
The harrowing pictures also show the heroic teamwork and struggle the embattled population had to face during the bombings.
The historical images, the work of Welsh electrician, Royston Leonard, bring the real devastation of the war to the twenty-first century with the colouring making the struggle of people even more palpable.
One picture shows people sleeping rough inside Aldwych Tube Station to escape the bombings.
Another captures a lonely child cuddling a toy doll, sitting in the middle of the rubble, while another one shows nurses in a partly-destroyed hospital, who defiantly carry on working.
The images reveal how people tried to bring some happiness to their lives even during such trying times, with one showing a child sleeping in a shelter decorated for Christmas.
In another one British troops are placing the Union Jack in the middle of a bombarded street in London.
Some of the images show the other face of the war; these are capturing a fleet of Germain Heinkel He 111 s flying in formation during the Battle of Britain.
The restorer, Mr Leonard was driven to preserve the heroic acts and power of everyday people.
He said: “The pictures show the team work of the men and women fighting to keep things working through the Blitz from saving lives to keeping people in air raids.
“It’s a time when we all pulled together and I think it’s important to show the work of men and women which can so easily be forgotten in time.
“I personally find the picture of the nurses collecting blankets from beds in the bombed building really
striking, saving even these small items made a big difference.”
Some 32,000 civilians lost their lives with 87,000 seriously injured during the Blitz, which was a German bombing offensive against Britain during the Second World War.
The term was first used by the British press as an abbreviation of Blitzkrieg (lightening war).
The bombings also saw two million homes destroyed, with famous landmarks such as Buckingham
Palace, Westminster Abbey and the Chamber of the House of Commons all sustaining damage.
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