Five Brothers and a War

Neighborhood Bombing

As the Germans continued their assault on England from their bases in Holland, the RAF intensified its efforts to find and destroy them. The RAF organized a squadron of “Hawker Hurricane” fighter planes each with a small bomb hooked underneath—and renamed “Hawker Hurribombers”.

Because the fighters were small and nimble, they could more easily evade German anti aircraft measures. The downside, of course, is that the bomb payload had to be kept light, and therefore the destructive power of each bomb was greatly limited. One day, Kees watched an RAF mission attack the area where V-2 rockets were launched, not far from the van Pelt home. One plane after the next swooped to the right and down into attack mode. The last fighter dropped out of formation like the others, but his attack was different from the others in that he dropped his bomb far earlier than his fellow pilots. Kees retreated from the window to avoid the explosion he anticipated. The shock wave was intense, and the ensuing thunderous sound signaled just how close to his family’s house the bomb had fallen. The subsequent clattering of shattering glass emphasized the proximity. Because the explosion was almost directly in line with the Margrietstraat, the shock wave travelled up the street without hitting any windows. However, as it hit the homes facing the explosion, windows were almost lifted out of their frames to shatter on the ground. Shortly afterward the shockwave and sound wave shot past the home, it began “raining” pulverized concrete and other grayish dirt, turning the entire neighborhood a monotonous gray as the dust settled. As soon as they could, Kees and Piet hurried to the house that was hit, which was on the Margrietstraat’s sister/mirror street, the Cliviastraat, across the Lobelialaan vijver from the Margrietstraat—a virtual continuation of the Margrietstraat. It turned out that the bomb had come down just in front of a house on the corner of the Cliviastraat and the Petuniaplein, which is the mirror image street of the Phloxplein, which adjoins the Margrietstraat. The house was very badly damaged with cracked walls leaning precariously. They went inside to see if anyone had been hurt or killed. They did find an elderly man, lying on a bed, covered in gray cement dust. All they could see was a pair of scared eyes looking at them. They cleaned off his face somewhat but waited for the medical people to show up. The next day they heard he had died from a piece of shrapnel in his back.

van Pelt

Five Brothers and a War

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