14/04/2026
Amazing Story of How a Local Institution for the Blind Helped the Avro War Effort.
The Manchester region experienced numerous Luftwaffe bombing attacks during WW2. Beginning with raids in June 1940 they continued through the horrific Manchester Blitz in December with air raids continuing right through until March 1945.
With the region’s significant input to the war effort, it’s not surprising that our local aircraft manufacturing facilities were impacted. Ringway Airport was bombed on the 28th November 1940 which delayed until 9th January 1941 the first flight of the Avro Lancaster (or rather the Avro Manchester Mk.III as it was still known at the time). Fairey Aviation at Heaton Chapel was damaged on 8th May 1941, the Barrage Balloon depot at Bowlee near Middleton was attacked on 7th March 1942, and on July 3rd 1942 two Ju88s failed to find the de Havilland propeller factory at Lostock near Bolton eventually dropping their bombs on New Mills and Hayfield.
Avro survived the war relatively unscathed. Apart from the attack on Ringway which caused minimal damage, twelve Avro Manchester bombers were completely destroyed on 21st December 1940 at Metropolitan Vickers in Trafford Park. Woodford Aerodrome was never attacked despite the existence of Luftwaffe target maps showing the aerodrome and surrounding areas. However, Chadderton one of the largest aircraft manufacturing facilities in Europe with some of the office block painted to simulate semi-detached houses, was damaged in an opportunistic strike in the spring of 1941.
14th April 1941 was Easter Bank Holiday Monday. Avro at that time were working around the clock but the management had offered either Good Friday or Easter Monday as a day off. Bizarrely, working on Good Friday was double time and for some unknown reason Easter Monday would have been only time and a half! Not surprisingly the work force chose to take Easter Monday off.
Not so for the German raiders. On that Monday an air raid alert was sounded at 14:53, 12 enemy aircraft made a low-level daylight raid towards Manchester. Approaching from the northeast one of them, a Junkers Ju88 found the Chadderton factory, circled once, made a steep turn to avoid power cables and then made a bombing run from north to south following the railway like that ran down the eastern side of the factory.
At 15:03 the Ju88 released four high-explosive bombs. The first bomb went through the roof and exploded on the floor of the assembly department leaving a crater about 9 feet across and four feet deep, but with little damage to machinery or aircraft. Bomb 2 entered a different part of the assembly sheds. It failed to explode but bounced off the concrete floor, passed through sections of Avro Manchester bombers under construction, destroyed three assembly jigs and damaged a blast wall. It was later defused by the local bomb disposal team. Bomb 3 made a direct hit on a rivet store on the southern boundary of the factory. The store was demolished and the blast and flying debris caused extensive damage to adjacent roofing. The fourth bomb landed in a field outside the factory without exploding and was later made safe and removed.
Thankfully thick blast walls had worked well but there was damage to several airframes, minor damage to plant and equipment but extensive damage to the roof. Fortunately, there were no casualties. The raider made an escape to the west flying so low it was below the elevation for most of the local anti-aircraft guns though the Home Guard protecting the factory unsuccessfully fired small calibre machine guns. Unconfirmed reports suggest that the Ju88 was shot down by coastal command aircraft as it made for home over the North Sea.
The bomb that had demolished the rivet store had scattered millions of rivets of various sizes far and wide. Collecting these valuable items was a huge task in itself but sorting them into their relevant sizes and types became a massive problem. Following an inspirational idea, volunteers from the nearby Henshaw's Institution for the Blind were enlisted to help and they performed a magnificent job rapidly sorting and categorising the rivets purely by feel.
Henshaw's Institution for the Blind is still going, now known as Henshaws. They provide a comprehensive range of residential, education training and community care services for blind and partially sighted people of all ages in the North of England. The Avro Heritage Museum is so thankful for their incredible and unique role they played in helping Avro in their time of need.
