On the night of August 28, 1940, German planes dropped bombs over London and other places in Britain. The air raid started around 9 pm and lasted for more than seven hours.
During the early hours of August 29th, a woman identified as Mrs. Plume gave birth to a 7-pound baby boy inside an Anderson air raid shelter buried in the back garden of a house in North London.
[He] was the first baby to be born in a shelter. He has been named John Anderson Plume, after Sir John Anderson, Minister for Home Security, after whom Anderson shelters are called.
The birth took place on a blanket-covered wooden bench by the light of a motor-cycle head lamp.
Source: “Many Areas Attacked by German Raiders.” Argus [Melbourne] 30 Aug. 1940: 1.
Image: © 1940 British Pathé (screenshot of Your Anderson Shelter This Winter)