Flyingbombsandrockets.com
The London SE8 Deptford area was already badly battered bythe Blitz. Now it was on the receiving end of 15 V1 FlyingBombs and 3 V2 Rockets. Between them these killed at least93 people. The Death rate of 5.16 per missile was the 4th highest in South London, which was very much due to the densely packed nature of the terraced housing in this area.
What is really remarkable about the flying bomb attacks on Deptford is the manner in which the Nazis were able to hit Deptford Dockyard and its nearby streets. No fewer than seven V1s and a V2 fell in this concentrated area. If the Nazis were able to select a target, this would have been one of the highest on the list in London. The reason for this is that the dockyard was the home of a US amphibious base, which was being used to support the D-Day landings. Now, whether this was very good aiming or simply a matter of luck will probably never be known, but there was significant damage to military equipment and a loss of life amongst service personnel. There was also a very tragic rocket incident in Adolphus Street on the 9th of January 1945, which killed 15 people. In common with many rocket explosions that winter, fires were ignited in the collapsed buildings due to burning coals from domestic hearths being scattered throughout the debris.