Salute to ATS girl killed by Nazis

YOUNG WOMEN DIED IN DEVASTATING AIR RAID ON NORFOLK TOWN

- NEAL KEELING

BRITAIN was at war and at the age of 22, she had answered her country’s call to defend it. Private Bernadette Bell, from Moston, was serving with the Army’s Auxiliary Territorial Service.

On the morning of May 11, 1943, she and other newly-recruited members of the 103rd Anti-Aircraft Brigade were in their billet on North Drive in Great Yarmouth. But, emerging through mists over the sea were 15 to 20 Focke-Wulf 190 Nazi planes.

The pilots began dropping their deadly cargo of bombs and, due to the hazy weather conditions, men of the Royal Observer Corps on Gorleston Cliffs only had 30 seconds to warn their HQ of an imminent strike. The bombs hit the Norfolk town before the air raid siren could be sounded.

The attack claimed the lives of 26 young women – aged between 18 and 32 – including Bernadette, who had joined the ATS only a few months earlier.