The Wartime Memories Project

- Air Raid Precautions and ARP Wardens on the Home Front during the Second World War -


Allied Forces Index
skip to content


This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this site you agree to accept cookies.


If you enjoy this site

please consider making a donation.



    Site Home

    WW2 Home

    Add Stories

    WW2 Search

    Library

    Help & FAQs


 WW2 Features

    Airfields

    Allied Army

    Allied Air Forces

    Allied Navy

    Axis Forces

    Home Front

    Battles

    Prisoners of War

    Allied Ships

    Women at War

    Those Who Served

    Day-by-Day

    Library

    The Great War

 Submissions

    Add Stories

    Time Capsule

    TWMP on Facebook



    Childrens Bookshop

 FAQ's

    Help & FAQs

    Glossary

    Volunteering

    Contact us

    News

    Bookshop

    About


Advertisements











World War 2 Two II WW2 WWII 1939 1945

Air Raid Precautions and ARP Wardens on the Home Front



Those known to have served with

Air Raid Precautions and ARP Wardens on the Home Front

during the Second World War 1939-1945.

The names on this list have been submitted by relatives, friends, neighbours and others who wish to remember them, if you have any names to add or any recollections or photos of those listed, please Add a Name to this List

Records of Air Raid Precautions and ARP Wardens on the Home Front from other sources.


The Wartime Memories Project is the original WW1 and WW2 commemoration website.

Announcements



  • The Wartime Memories Project has been running for 24 years. If you would like to support us, a donation, no matter how small, would be much appreciated, annually we need to raise enough funds to pay for our web hosting and admin or this site will vanish from the web.
  • 18th April 2024 - Please note we currently have a huge backlog of submitted material, our volunteers are working through this as quickly as possible and all names, stories and photos will be added to the site. If you have already submitted a story to the site and your UID reference number is higher than 263925 your information is still in the queue, please do not resubmit, we are working through them as quickly as possible.
  • Looking for help with Family History Research?   Please read our Family History FAQ's
  • The free to access section of The Wartime Memories Project website is run by volunteers and funded by donations from our visitors. If the information here has been helpful or you have enjoyed reaching the stories please conside making a donation, no matter how small, would be much appreciated, annually we need to raise enough funds to pay for our web hosting or this site will vanish from the web.
    If you enjoy this site

    please consider making a donation.

Want to find out more about your relative's service? Want to know what life was like during the War? Our Library contains an ever growing number diary entries, personal letters and other documents, most transcribed into plain text.



We are now on Facebook. Like this page to receive our updates.

If you have a general question please post it on our Facebook page.


Wanted: Digital copies of Group photographs, Scrapbooks, Autograph books, photo albums, newspaper clippings, letters, postcards and ephemera relating to WW2. We would like to obtain digital copies of any documents or photographs relating to WW2 you may have at home.

If you have any unwanted photographs, documents or items from the First or Second World War, please do not destroy them. The Wartime Memories Project will give them a good home and ensure that they are used for educational purposes. Please get in touch for the postal address, do not sent them to our PO Box as packages are not accepted. World War 1 One ww1 wwII second 1939 1945 battalion
Did you know? We also have a section on The Great War. and a Timecapsule to preserve stories from other conflicts for future generations.



Want to know more about Air Raid Precautions and ARP Wardens on the Home Front?


There are:14850 items tagged Air Raid Precautions and ARP Wardens on the Home Front available in our Library

  These include information on officers, regimental histories, letters, diary entries, personal accounts and information about actions during the Second World War.


John William Scott

This photo shows four ARP wardens in Sunderland, I think this group would have been in Roker or Monkwearmouth area, near to the shipyards on the River Wear. My Granfather John William Scott is centre of back row. I don't know much about it except that I can remember him talking of riding around on his bike telling people to make sure the blackout was intact. I believe that the Tyne & Wear Archive Service have listings of the personel but as I am in Australia I have not as yet accessed the information.

Val Long



Reginald Cleaver flight eng. 419 Sqd.

When the war began in 1939, I was an apprentice toolmaker at Armstrong Siddeley Motors in Coventry. My name is Reg Cleaver and I was 17 years old. I joined the Air Raid Precautions system and became an ambulance driver attached to No 3 First Aid Post in Livingstone Rd. The building had been the swimming baths. One pool was still open for swimming the other pool had been boarded over and became a reception centre for people injured in the air raids. After work at ASM, I spent most of my time waiting for the call to pick up the next load of dead and injured people from where the bombs had landed. This became very difficult at times as whole buildings were spread all over the roads, enormous bomb craters blocked roads with destroyed buses and trams everywhere. We could be driving along with whole rows of burning buildings each side. The ambulances had canvas sides and at times got badly scorched.

In November 1940, a large bomb exploded in the swimming pool next door destroying the whole building and drenching all of us and the seriously injured people in what had been our First Aid Post. Outside, several of our ambulances had been badly damaged. My own vehicle had been flattened by a huge steel roof truss that had landed on it.

Next morning being very concerned what may have happened to my home and parents, I arrived home: 159 Churchill Ave, Foleshill. My mother kept a small general store opposite to the Riley Motor Works. Fortunately, my parents escaped injury being in the air raid shelter. The house roof had gone and the shop destroyed. A very sad sight - all the stock and provisions, etc all over the pavement and road and mother very shocked.

This became a turning point in my life. A burning hatred of Germans and a determination to hit back. As an apprentice we were considered to be in a reserved occupation and could not be called up into the Forces. The only way into the R.A.F. was to volunteer for air crew. I joined the R.A.F. in early 1941 as a pilot. Strange as it may seem the R.A.F. told me they didn’t need pilots. As I had been an apprentice engineer, I should train as a flight mechanic and engine fitter and transfer to a pilots’ course which I did. The rest of 1941, I was on a Spitfire squadron servicing Merlin engines, etc. I was still awaiting a pilots’ course but was overtaken by events. In 1942, four engine bombers began to arrive in the R.A.F. These needed flight engineers in the crew desperately. Notices on squadron notice boards appeared, asking for skilled ground engineers to volunteer for flight engineer aircrew. After a very short course of a week or two at St Athan in Wales and four or five weeks at English Electric Speke crawling all over Halifax bombers learning all the systems etc. I then found myself as a Sergeant Flight engineer with a crew flying Halifax on an Operational Training Unit, 1659 Heavy Conversion Unit at Topcliffe Yorkshire, becoming second pilot.

From there I was posted to the Royal Canadian Air Force, 419 Squadron at Middleton St George, Durham. From there with an all Canadian crew, I flew a number of bombing operations against German cities during this time, we had some desperate times. On the night of 24-25th June 1943, during an attack on Wuppertal in the Ruhr Valley, nemesis caught up with us. We were attacked by 3 Focke Wulf 190 night fighters and shot down in flames and the aircraft falling to pieces around us in a dive. With the aircraft still in flames, the pilot recovered some control near the ground and we crashed through some trees. This removed the wings and fuel tanks and the fire. The fuselage hit the ground and miraculously we fell out.

This part of my life is a long story which I cannot include now. The rest of the war until April 1945, I suffered as a prisoner of war in various prison and concentration camps.

After liberation and hospital treatment I was flown back to England. After such an upheaval in my life I found it very difficult to settle down to a more normal type of life. In 1948, I found my soulmate and married Betty. I went back to Armstrong Siddeley Motors and helped found the rocket research department in a very interesting and rewarding job. We are still married after 57 years. I consider myself extremely lucky to survive the war as 50% of the Bomber Command aircrew were killed. I think people today would find it difficult to understand what a strange life we aircrew led in those days. In the afternoon we could be at a dance or cinema with girlfriends. That night we could be over Germany with everyone trying to kill us. If we got back the same cycle could be repeated weeks on end. It now seems very unreal.

Reg Cleaver



George Henry Sexton ARP Warden

My father, George Henry Sexton, was an ARP warden. He was aged 60 when he joined, and took a lot of pride in what he was doing. I think they were very brave men, and often risked their lives to save others. Without them doing that job, I think that many lives may have been lost. He has been gone for many years now, but I still remember him in his uniform, and feel very proud that he was my Dad.

Maureen Prior



Sam Taylor Manchester. ARP

I am attempting to find out about my uncle Sam Taylor who was in the ARP during WW2. Sam had his legs blown off during a bombing raid in Manchester, he received a Medal but I do not know what medal he received. Can anyone please help me find out more about my uncle Sam?

Mrs Glenda Packer.



Edgar Abbott Air Raid Warden

Edgar Abbott was born on 3rd August 1891, had been a ship's carpenter and lived at 168 Grovehill Road, Beverley between 1948-1973, possibly longer. In 1908, he enlisted in the British Army and was discharged on demobilisation on 6th February. 1919. At this time, he was in the 5th Cyclist Battalion of the East Yorkshire Regiment. His wartime duties were East Coast coastal watch but he later fought in France.

In 1943, during the Second World War, Edgar was a Civil Defence Warden for the Borough of Beverley. His son, Edgar Thomas Abbott, served in the Royal Air Force in World War 2.

Theresa Mary Walker



Pte. Albert Edward Hunt Sherwood Foresters

Albert Hunt survived the war and re enlisted as a private in WW2 as he didn't want to carry his rank. He also served as an ARP warden.

Phil



Pte. Donald Thomas Tregidgo ARP Warden

My father, Donald Tregidgo served from the August 1914 Mons campaign through to the Russian Archangel Force in 1919. During that time he said he only slept in a proper bed whilst hospitalised with wounds.

He served as an ARP warden throughout WW2 and was very upset when I went off to serve in Korea.

Chris Tregidgo



Harold Gerrard ARP Ambulance Service

Harold Gerrard, was wounded while serving with the Royal Garrison Artillery. He was entitled to wear a Wound Stripe as authorised under Army Order 204 of 6th July 1916. The terms of this award being met by being named in this list. His next of kin are listed as living in Westhoughton inon the War Office Daily List No. 5552 on 29th of April 1918.

He was a Shop Keeper Confectioner and was an ARP Ambulance Driver in 1939.

Joan Harrison



L/Cpl. John Shrigley Royal Army Medical Corps

Johore Bahru Hospital

Johor Baru football team WW2

My father, John Shrigley, lived in Aspull, where he became an ambulance driver for the A.R.P. He enlisted on 2nd of February 1943 from address of 500 Bolton Road, Aspull, Nr. Wigan. He served in the R.A.M.C. stationed in Johor Bahru General Hospital.

At one point he was sent to convalesce following an operation to replace a fracture with a metal plate on the left side of his head. He received the injury whilst playing football when he was hit in the head. I remember the telegram arriving, and the postman stayed on the doorstep whilst my mother read the details. I think that they had to evacuate the patients from the hospital because the Japanese were advancing on them over the hill.

He was also at some point in Rangoon. He was a friend of Wong Arthur who wrote a letter to “All the Shrigley children” which we received when we were young and dad was away in India. He came home in either 1946 or 1947 on the Troopship Empress of Australia, which docked in Liverpool.




Warden. George Robert Munro Air Raid protection

My grandfather, Bobbie Munro, was born in 1891. He joined up on the 27th of October 1914 and was assigned to the the 7th Battalion, East Kent Regiment. He was promoted to Sergeant and served through various theatres mainly around the Somme. Including battles around Albert, Delville Wood, through 1st and 2nd Passchendaele and god knows how many other battles before ending the war at Pommereuil on Armistice Day.

He was wounded badly in 1917 but returned to service and thankfully he survived and I'm here to remember the sacrifices these men (and women) endured. Ive been to the battlefields and cemeteries which are, strangely, beautiful and peaceful. He was transferred to the army reserves on 28th of March 1919 after demobilization.

During WW2 he served as a fire warden around the East London docks. So proud to have known him in his later years and touched the history.

Ian Yarham









Recomended Reading.

Available at discounted prices.









Links


















    The free section of the Wartime Memories Project website is run by volunteers. We have been helping people find out more about their relatives wartime experiences since 1999 by recording and preserving recollections, documents, photographs and small items.

    The website is paid for out of our own pockets, library subscriptions and from donations made by visitors. The popularity of the site means that it is far exceeding available resources and we currently have a huge backlog of submissions.

    If you are enjoying the site, please consider making a donation, however small to help with the costs of keeping the site running.



    Hosted by:

    The Wartime Memories Project Website

    is archived for preservation by the British Library




    Copyright MCMXCIX - MMXXIV
    - All Rights Reserved

    We do not permit the use of any content from this website for the training of LLMs or for use in Generative AI, it also may not be scraped for the purpose of creating other websites.