Downhills Shelter Tragedy – new film

This short documentary pays respects to those local residents who were tragically killed in what was Tottenham’s largest single death-toll throughout the Second World War.

Early on during the London ‘Blitz’ on 19th September 1940 at 10.30pm, the ‘Downhills’ Air-Raid Shelter located underground at the southern end of Lordship Rec took a direct hit by a bomb from a German war plane. Around 2-300 people were inside at the time. It is believed that, as well as the 42 known victims (including some in houses by the shelter), dozens more died.

Local people and emergency services helped to rescue as many as possible, and people around the park put up the wounded and shocked in their homes.

The terrible  incident then faded into memory.

In the 2000s a member of the Friends of Lordship Rec, Ray Swain, did extensive research to uncover the full details of what had happened, and to track down survivors and families of those who had died.

In 2010 the Friends held a commemoration ceremony at the site, with survivors, family members and various dignitories. The Friends then appealed for public donations to build a memorial with a plaque listing all those known to have died in the tragedy. That memorial can be seen by the woodland.