Saturday 17th September 

My great, great grandmother 
Lived to age ninety four
A Master Mariner's wife
Nearly blown up in the war
A German fighter plane 
Strafed the beach and more
A high explosive bomb 
Landed almost next door
Broken debris and glass 
Covered her bedroom floor
Surviving this onslaught 
A lucky lady, for sure

Love you both so much 
Precious sons 
xxxxx 

The Cornishman Newspaper of September 3rd 1942

"DAYLIGHT RAID IN SOUTH-WEST
COASTAL TOWN BOMBED AND MACHINE GUNNED

Sweeping in at a very low level, their wing-tips nearly touching, two enemy ‘planes were responsible for a considerable amount of damage at a South Western coastal town on Friday afternoon. In addition to dropping bombs, the ‘planes indulged in both machine-gunning and cannon-gunning.

There was only one fatal casualty, whilst eleven people had to be removed to hospital, and there were several other cases which received attention at the first-aid post.

The damage to property was extensive, and scores of people have been rendered homeless. People were taken completely by surprise; so much so, indeed, that the ‘planes circled over the housetops for the first time, before beginning machine-gunning, some people waved to the pilots under the impression that they were British planes.

Crowds of people were gathered on the beach at the time, and it will never be known just why some of them were not killed by the bullets as the enemy planes raked the foreshore.

A bomb fell right in the centre of an open space – where four roads meet, with the result that it either brought down and completely demolished or at least badly damaged houses on every side.

The three houses to suffer the worst were not more than twenty yards from the lip of the crater, and they had come down like match wood.

NONAGENARIAN’S PLUCK

In a nearby house, her bed littered with fragments of broken glass and debris, lay Mrs. J. H. Carbines aged ninety. She showed the true British spirit by resolutely refusing to be removed after the bombing, though she was at last taken out of the stricken house. She suffered nothing worse than shock.

In all the houses nearest to the crater there were scenes of complete destruction, with all the contents of the houses jumbled together in an inextricable mass. The fact that there were not more injuries in this part of the town must be put down to the time which the incident occurred, when many people would be out shopping or on the beach.

The attack was the Nazi’s farewell, for they sped away out to sea, flying together almost on the water-line, and so passing out of sight, their days bad deed accomplished."

The nonagenerian in the report above, was my great, great grandmother. Mrs John Hooper Carbines, (1849 – 1943)