Combat Dealers Construct An Anderson Shelter

This was on one of the UK "free-view channels" this evening showing the reconstruction of an Anderson Shelter. Although they could be assembled by the householder in the garden and would withstand almost anything but a direct hit the biggest drawback with them is that they had a tendency to be damp.

My mother caught pneumonia after sheltering for many nights, in the early part of the war, in the Anderson Shelter that had been erected in the back garden. The main targets for the Luftwaffe in the area were Sheffield and Doncaster. According to mother the shelter had a trough in the floor to collect water but this was normally full of water in the winter and, therefore, the shelter was damp as well as being cold. The decision was taken after mother and other family members caught Pneumonia that "if they were going to die then they would die in their own home", as mother's mother put it.

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Blowing-Up An Anderson Shelter For A Video Game About The Blitz! | Combat Dealers - YouTube

Just signed Bruce up as our Ambassador at the Airborne Forces Museum taking the place of Richard Todd who sadly died in 2009.
Great bloke , good friend.

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Originally Posted by Flying10uk

This was on one of the UK "free-view channels" this evening showing the reconstruction of an Anderson Shelter. Although they could be assembled by the householder in the garden and would withstand almost anything but a direct hit the biggest drawback with them is that they had a tendency to be damp.

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The Anderson my grandfather built in their back garden was still there when I was a kid in the 1960's...or rather, the bottom half of it was.

My Mum, her older sister and their younger brother never really used it though, as the 3 of them were evacuated from London to go and stay with their grandmother in Falkirk in late 1939. They didn't come back down to London until the summer of 1941.

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Originally Posted by Gil Boyd

Just signed Bruce up as our Ambassador at the Airborne Forces Museum taking the place of Richard Todd who sadly died in 2009.
Great bloke , good friend.

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Used to know Bruce years ago when he first started dealing in militaria, via a good mate who was a big collector, and lived in the same East London area as Bruce was from originally.

I've met Freddie as well, last summer at a show.

Some relatives who lived in Finchley, north London, had the rare and largely unheard of "Wilmot's Fortress type Air Raid Shelter" which was very similar to the Anderson shelter but of a little higher quality. Luckily I have a photograph of the entrance to this actual shelter, below.


Wilmotts Fortress Air Raid Shelter - Berwick Heritage Open Days

Wilmots Fortress Air Raid Shelter - YouTube