WW2 Iconic Blitz, Daily Mail, Newspaper Cover.

One of the most sought after and iconic newspaper front covers from WW2. This Daily Mail dated 31st December 1940, details the London Blitz from the night of 29th/30th December 1940.

Called the ‘Second Great Fire of London’, the fire around St. Pauls was recorded in the iconic photo taken by Herbert Mason from the roof of the daily Mail building, of which he stated:

I focused at intervals as the great dome loomed up through the smoke... The glare of many fires and sweeping clouds of smoke kept hiding the shape. Then a wind sprang up. Suddenly, the shining cross, dome, and towers stood out like a symbol in the inferno. The scene was unbelievable. In that moment or two, I released my shutter.

Another witness to the inferno was American correspondent Ernie Pyle, who stated:

Into the dark shadowed spaces below us, while we watched, whole batches of incendiary bombs fell. We saw two dozen go off in two seconds. They flashed terrifically, then quickly simmered down to pinpoints of dazzling white, burning ferociously... The greatest of all the fires was directly in front of us. Flames seemed to whip hundreds of feet into the air. Pinkish-white smoke ballooned upward in a great cloud, and out of this cloud there gradually took shape—so faintly at first that we weren't sure we saw correctly—the gigantic dome of St Paul's Cathedral. St Paul's was surrounded by fire, but it came through. It stood there in its enormous proportions—growing slowly clearer and clearer, the way objects take shape at dawn. It was like a picture of some miraculous figure that appears before peace-hungry soldiers on a battlefield.

The paper is in remarkably good condition with all six pages intact with only minor aging and very few if any tears.

Code: 386