A Higher Call

by Adam Makos

During a night raid, a German bomber mistakenly missed its target, an oil depot east of London, and bombed several homes on London’s East End neighborhood. Hitler had given orders that British cities were not to be bombed, a far cry from the indiscriminate warfare he ordered against Poland's civilians. But a few days later, another German bomber hit British homes again. In response, the British sent bombers to attack Berlin, a raid that also missed its military targets and bombed the city’s civilians. In a speech Hitler warned the British to stop their attacks on German cities, but it was too late—both sides had stepped over the line. Cities and civilians soon became fair game. From then on, both sides bombed each other’s cities at night and called one another “terror bombers.”