Hull Blitz's last victims remembered 70 years on
Victims of the last Luftwaffe attack of World War Two to cause civilian casualties in the UK have been remembered at a ceremony, 70 years on.
Thirteen people were killed and 22 injured when a lone Heinkel 111 bomber flew along Holderness Road in Hull on 17 March 1945. The crew opened fire with machine guns and dropped fragmentation bombs. Many of the dead and injured were just leaving the Savoy cinema at the end of a film performance. The victims are commemorated on a plaque on the site of the cinema. No high explosives were used, so no structural damage to buildings was done. 'Maverick crew' "It was the last Luftwaffe attack on the UK that killed civilians." said local historian Ron Fairfax. "There is no trace in the German archives of the attack and anecdotal evidence suggests it was a maverick crew intent on revenge for the devastation wrought by an Allied air raid on Dresden a few weeks earlier". The aircraft was unopposed as local RAF squadrons had been transferred, anti-aircraft installations had been moved south and the home guard and wartime emergency services had been stood down. The attack was reported at the time as 'an attack on a north east coast town' because of a censorship notice imposed on information from the city. During the course of the 1939-45 war 1,200 people were killed and a further 3,000 injured in the city. Councillor Mary Glew, the city's lord mayor, attended the ceremony at the plaque.