Swansea — the Three Nights' Blitz
19–21 February 1941 · Swansea, West Glamorgan
View this record on the map →- Date
- 19–21 February 1941
- Record type
- Historic bombing area
- Bomb type
- mixed
- Location
- Swansea, West Glamorgan
- Position accuracy
- Confirmed event, area-level point only (exact site not verified)
What happened
Over three consecutive nights the Luftwaffe dropped 1,273 high-explosive bombs and around 56,000 incendiaries on Swansea. Forty-one acres of the town centre were destroyed. The docks were the strategic objective; the shopping streets were what burned.
Casualty note
230 people were killed. Injured figures differ between sources: 409 (Swansea Museum) and 397 (Visit Swansea Bay). Properties destroyed given as 857 or 850, with 11,000 damaged. These are town-wide totals for the three nights and belong to no single location.
Also worth knowing
The centre was never rebuilt as it had been. Ben Evans, the department store that had served the town for over fifty years, was destroyed and never reopened — its site is now Castle Square.