70 years on – deadly attack on Upper Barrakka remembered
The daily noon gun firing ceremony at the Saluting Battery in Valletta yesterday took on poignant meaning as it marked the 70th anniversary of being subjected to a deadly direct hit during an enemy raid. On December 24, 1941, the enemy launched four...
The daily noon gun firing ceremony at the Saluting Battery in Valletta yesterday took on poignant meaning as it marked the 70th anniversary of being subjected to a deadly direct hit during an enemy raid.
18-year-old Samuel Ginies died buried under the debris of the Upper Barrakka balcony
On December 24, 1941, the enemy launched four attacks on the island. In the morning a raid was carried out by four JU 88 bombers and Valletta was targeted. The worst hit area was Upper Barrakka and its surroundings.
A substantial part of the balcony and the arches were demolished. Civilian properties in Battery Street, St Ursola Street and Melita Street were also damaged or destroyed.
Eighteen-year-old Samuel Ginies from Sliema died buried under the debris as he was taking cover below the Upper Barrakka balcony during the attack.
Ginies was attached to the gun position located on the Saluting Battery and had been called up for service and joined the Royal Army Medical Corps, Fondazzjoni Wirt Artna said yesterday.
The attack did not go unpunished as two of the enemy bombers were hit and damaged, FWA recalled .
FWA marked the historic anniversary at the Saluting Battery yesterday with the sounding of the air raid warning, followed with the firing of the gun and a two-minute silence to honour Ginies. It was followed with the sounding of the Raiders Passed using an original Second World War manual siren.
Malta was heavily bombarded in 1941 with the attacks directed against HMS Illustrious and the dockyard area, bringing a new dimension to the war experience in Malta.
The Russian diversion of the German war effort gave Malta a relatively quiet interlude in the course of which the island was used extensively for offensive operations against Axis shipping.
This led to a renewed and reinvigorated German resolve to neutralise Malta. In December 1941, the Luftwaffe returned to Sicily giving start to an unrelenting six-month blitz. Towards the end of 1941 there were no less than 169 enemy raids on Malta.
Between December 18 and 31, the island sustained daily attacks. Not even Christmas Day was spared.