WWI: The night a lost Zeppelin bombed Derby

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On February 1, 1916, a German Zeppelin, lost en route to Liverpool, mistakenly dropped its load of bombs on Derby, resulting in five deaths though comparatively little damage. Maxwell Craven recounts the events that occurred in the early hours of that day.

Damage at Rolls-Royce caused by the bombing raid on February 1, 1916

In 1916, Derby was picking up the pieces after a Zeppelin, on course for Liverpool, dropped its bombs on the town.

The raid occurred just after midnight in the early hours of February 1, claiming five lives along the way.

One victim was a woman who died of a heart attack due to the shock.

Zeppelins, products of the company set up by Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin, were mainly under the control of the Imperial German Navy during the First World War. The rigid, fabric-covered crafts were filled with expandable bags of 1.126m cubic feet of hydrogen gas and powered by four Maybach engines. These gave a maximum speed of 60mph, a ceiling of 10,500ft and a range of 2,600 miles. A crew of about 20 men manned the airships.

The raid on Derby was carried out by an L14 type of Zeppelin, of the L10 class of 12, under the command of Captain Alois Boeker.

It was the second year in which these bombing raids had been carried out and the plan was to attack Liverpool and Birmingham.

So, on the night of January 31, nine surviving airships of the L10 class sallied forth from three bases to try to achieve just that. It was a clear night with little wind, essential for the Zeppelins.

It was just under 500 miles to Liverpool but not one of the force actually got nearer than Stoke. The L14 crossed the coast at Holkham, Norfolk, at 6.15pm but had only managed to reach Wisbech 45 minutes later. Zeppelins were slow and ponderous. By 10.15pm they were almost at Shrewsbury and began to turn back, eventually making it to Swadlincote by 11.45pm. They dropped one or two desultory bombs there but hardly mounted a convincing raid.

However, just after midnight on February 1, L14 was over Derby, where it dropped its remaining 21 high explosive bombs and four incendiaries at nine locations on the south side of the city. No-one knows the exact order of the raid, but from the spread of the targets – Royce’s in the south to the Locomotive Works of the Midland Railway in the north and the Etches Park gas works in the east – it suggests that L14 approached from the south, working roughly north along the Osmaston Road at about 8,000ft before bombing the Loco Works and then ending up at the gas works.

Derby received a warning about an impending raid just after 7pm and the authorities had taken steps to douse street lighting, halt tramcars and close businesses. Three airships did pass close by within half an hour, so the precautions may have been effective. But just before midnight, the measures were relaxed enough to make Captain Boeker believe he had reached Liverpool. He released his bombs.

The Royce’s bombs fell harmlessly, while three more fell on the Metalite lamp works on Graham Road.

Five more bombs landed on the Carriage and Wagon Works, three incendiaries hit Fletcher’s lace mill on Osmaston Road and four, possibly five, more incendiaries missed and landed, mostly harmlessly, in the road at Horton Street, one setting a house on fire.

On the corner of Bateman Street, in the garden of Litchurch Villa, another bomb landed harmlessly. Nine more hit the Loco Works and two more, plus an incendiary, hit the gas works, the latter without serious damage, having landed in an open area.

Quite a bit of damage was done at Metalite and the Carriage and Wagon works, but none at Fletcher’s, where the bombs landed in a courtyard. The worst damage was inflicted at the Loco Works, where three men were killed and two injured in the work’s yard, one of the latter subsequently dying. A Mrs Constantine, living nearby, also died of a heart attack during the raid.

Captain Boeker and his crew continued, having off-loaded all their ordnance, via Nottingham and Lincoln, recrossing the coast at 2.10am on February 1, heading for home and a debriefing at which they reported that they had bombed Liverpool.

The Zeppelin that bombed Derby, survived the war, but was sabotaged to stop her falling into the Allies’ hands.

A fascinating booklet, The Bombing of Rolls-Royce at Derby, (Rolls-Royce Heritage Trust, 2002) by Peter Kirk, Peter Felix and Gunter Bartnik, to which I am indebted for most of the research for this article, has an interesting conclusion.

Apparently, the control gondola of L14, with part of the ship’s keel still attached, was placed on display at the Berlin aviation museum in 1936. Unfortunately, the museum was destroyed by Allied bombing on the night of November 22-23, 1943 – wiping out the last relic of the only Zeppelin to have bombed Derby.

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