Source: National Archive, Kew
Director Steve McQueen’s Second World War movie Blitz, released in cinemas in Britain on Friday 1 November, was partly inspired by the real-life disaster at the Bethnal Green tube shelter in 1943.
The National Archives holds records describing the disaster, what led to it and how authorities attempted to hush it up after 173 people died.
When air raid sirens sounded on the evening of Wednesday 3 March people began to stream inside the tube to take cover.
Witnesses inside saw a woman with a young child fall near the bottom of the first flight of steps. A man next to her also fell, and with the poor light and the volume of people, in just a few seconds around 300 people had fallen on top of each other.
Witness Walter Stedman, who was in the ticket hall, told police:
“Within seconds of these people falling, other people had fallen on top of them and they were piled up three or four high… I would say within a minute there were a large number of people screaming and shouting but it was then impossible for any person to extricate himself or herself.” (Document ref: MEPO 3/1942)
Of those killed, 27 were men, 84 were women and 62 were children under 16.
Martin Plaut 