A poem written by a nine-year-old girl shortly after bombs rained on Coventry in 1940 provided an emotional return to the past today as the city remembered those who died in the Blitz.

Air raid sirens as Broadgate was brought to a standstill to recall the 60th anniversary of the bombing of the city – the first in the second world war to be blitzed.

THE CEREMONY IN BROADGATE FROM THE CWN WEBCAM

Music from the 1940s sang by the City of Coventry Children's Choir  filled the air as the Lord Mayor, Cllr Sheila Collins led the remembrance of the thousands of civilians who perished in the evening attack that destroyed much of the city centre, including the cathedral.

The shock to the civilian population was immense, and King George VI wept openly as he visited the smoking ruins the next day.

So intense were the fires, which killed dozens of firefighters, that daylight did not happen the following day as smoke filled the air.

Crews from the West Midlands fire service formed a guard of honour for a civic parade of councillors, the bishop of Coventry and dignitaries from bombed German cities, and they also lay a wreath commemorating their fallen colleagues.

WORKERS CLEARING THE RUBBLE AFTER THE RAID

Children from Potters Green Primary School read an evocative poem about the city’s destruction. Called The Heart of an Age-Old City, it was written by Pamela Rayner, nee Ross, a nine-year-old living in Coventry at the time, just after the air raid.

The heart of an age-old city,
Was burnt to an empty shell:
But it isn’t the bricks and mortar,
That will live in the end to tell:

But the life, and the love and laughter,
That were lost on that terrible night,
When the vault of the sky was flaming red
With the burning city’s light.

For the City will rise from the ruins,
As the Phoenix rose from its nest,
The people will help with the building,
And God will do the rest

And the life and the life and the laughter,
Will rise with the wall and the seeds,
For never a life God loses
Never a laughs but He heeds

So the garden will prosper and flourish
And the life, love and laughter go on,
When the smouldering ruins are finished,
And the twisted girders are gone.

Speaking before a two minutes’ silence Cllr Collins said she could remember the haunting sound of the sirens as she sat in an air-raid shelter with her sister and parents, and under the stairs before her family had an Anderson shelter.

She said:

“On this night 60 years ago Coventry suffered loss of loved ones and destruction of our most precious buildings.

“Today cannot pass without reflecting on the city’s darkest hours that were to follow."

She said that she was proud of the fact that Coventry has more twin cities than any other in the world.

Cllr Collins added:

”The centre of Coventry, a busy, industrial town, was largely destroyed by fire and bombs.

”Within a few years other cities throughout Europe, like Dresden and Volgograd, suffered similar experiences.

“But out of this similar destruction grew comradeship and an awareness of the effects of war. To these cities Coventry held out its hand of friendship.”