Members of the public can now research information about bombs falling on their area during World War Two thanks to a new online resource using an interactive map.

The Bomb Sight project maps the London WW2 bomb census between 7/10/1940 and 06/06/1941. Previously available only by viewing in the Reading Room at The National Archives, Kew Bomb Sight is making the maps available to citizen researchers, academics and students. They will be able to explore where the bombs fell and to discover memories and photographs from the period.

The map shows the location of bombs dropped on London during the Blitz and reveals the devastation caused over the eight-month period.

The year-long project, called Bomb Sight, was devised by a team from the University of Portsmouth using data from the National Archives.

Dr Kate Jones, the University of Portsmouth geographer who devised the project, said: "When you look at these maps and see the proliferation of bombs dropped on the capital, it does illustrate the meaning of the word Blitz, which comes from the German meaning lightning."

The project has scanned original 1940s bomb census maps , geo-referenced the maps and digitally captured the geographical locations of all the falling bombs recorded on the original map.

You can use the interactive web-mapping application to explore and search for different bomb locations across London. Click on individual bombs and find out information relating to the neighbouring area by reviewing contextual images and memories from the Blitz.

You can also explore statistics for different areas and see how many bombs fell in different wards and boroughs in London as well as read memories of Londoners contributed to the BBC WW2People's War and images from the Imperial War Museum to allow you to visualise what it was like in London at such a difficult time

http://bombsight.org

 

 

December 8, 2012