Book Description

"The King Cried for Coventry" is a factual account of a "Who do you think you are?"- style family history quest to uncover the story of civilian fireman called Frank Archer. He was killed in April 1941 in the Blitz on Coventry. The investigation started with a tiny and fragile newspaper clipping announcing his death. It was found among the effects of the author's deceased grandmother. The story that unfolds is one of an ordinary young family caught up in an extraordinarily fierce assault on one of Britain's proud cities. Although far from the first such raid (London, in particular, having been repeatedly targeted prior to this), the fury that was unleashed against Coventry during the first Blitz was unprecedented at the time it first occurred. It marked a new type of attack that was overwhelmingly intense. Fireman Frank Archer was killed in the April 1941 Blitz raid on Coventry. But how and where did he die? What happened to his family? Answering these questions provides a window through which one can glimpse the war experience of this representative family, and how they coped. Doing so illustrates the reality of one of the greatest disasters British people have faced, and the way those left behind are affected for decades after.