A NEW Barnet community whose road was hit by a devastating V2 bomb in World War Two came together yesterday to remember the lives lost.
Richard Lawson, 57, of Calton Road, invited his neighbours around to commemorate the blast, which destroyed every house but one along their road on January 20, 1945.
Fourteen people were killed in the attack and around 70 were injured.
Though none of the residents experienced the explosion first-hand, many recounted stories from people who owned their houses before them.
Chris Wright, 60, who has lived in the road for 32 years, said his former neighbour had survived fighting in the war only to perish in the attack.
"He came home on leave from the army without a scratch on him and then he was killed in the bomb," he said.
"It was very sad that he should survive for so long and then die so suddenly in that way."
Only one house remained standing following the bomb, he said, with most being rebuilt in the late 1940s.
"There is a dip in the road outside from where the crater was filled in.
"The impact took the whole street out and pulled down all the houses. Mine was rebuilt in 1949."
The V2 is a long-range rocket that carries a ton of explosives and exceeds the speed of sound, so there is no sign of its approach.
According to an official account recorded in "Barnet at War" by Percy Raboul and John Heathfield, 423 building tradesmen, 30 military men and 300 civil defence workers were sent to repair houses directly following the blast.
A further 130 men were employed in salvaging furniture.
Former Netherlands Road resident Allan Rolfe gives an account of the explosion in the book. He states: "We were digging people out. There was absolute chaos.
"One man was buried up to his neck. Another, a friend of mine, was killed.
"It was the most devastating bombing we had ever experienced."
Ann Leppard, 89, from Calton Road, spoke of two sisters whose house had been flattened in the blast.
She said: "They were definitely quite traumatised by what happened. But they were very strong and quite eccentric. They were survivors.
"One was really deaf, which may have been because of the bomb."
In a short speech, Mr Lawson thanked his neighbours for their interest in such a historic event.
He said: "It was one of the worst loses of life in Barnet, and perhaps the worst in a single incident.
"A V2 also landed in Potters Bar on the same afternoon, so it was quite day in the history of our little part of the world.
"But I think it's very good to come together and remember the good people who lived here and who gave their lives for us."
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