The National Fire Service (NFS) was the single

fire service A fire department (American English) or fire brigade (Commonwealth English), also known as a fire authority, fire district, fire and rescue, or fire service in some areas, is an organization that provides fire prevention and fire suppression se ...

created in

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...

in 1941 during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

; a separate National Fire Service (Northern Ireland) was created in 1942. The NFS was created in August 1941 by the amalgamation of the wartime national

Auxiliary Fire Service The Auxiliary Fire Service (AFS) was first formed in 1938 in Great Britain as part of the Civil Defence Service. Its role was to supplement the work of brigades at local level. The Auxiliary Fire Service and the local brigades were superseded ...

(AFS) and the

local authority Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of public administration within a particular sovereign state. This particular usage of the word government refers specifically to a level of administration that is both geographically-loca ...

fire brigades (about 1,600 of them). It existed until 1948, when it was again split by the

Fire Services Act 1947 The Fire Services Act 1947 was an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom that reorganised fire services in the United Kingdom. It disbanded the National Fire Service and returned the responsibility for running fire services to local authoriti ...

, with fire services reverting to local authority control, although this time there were far fewer brigades, with only one per

county A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesChambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...

and

county borough County borough is a term introduced in 1889 in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, to refer to a borough or a city independent of county council control, similar to the unitary authorities created since the 1990s. An equivalent ter ...

. The NFS had full-time and part-time members, male and female. Its uniform was the traditional dark blue double-breasted tunic, and it adopted the

peaked cap The peaked cap, peaked hat, service cap, barracks cover or combination cap is a form of headgear worn by the armed forces of many nations, as well as many uniformed civilian organisations such as law enforcement agencies and fire departments. It ...

worn by the AFS instead of the peakless sailor-style cap which had been worn by many pre-war fire brigades (including the

London Fire Brigade The London Fire Brigade (LFB) is the fire and rescue service for London, the capital of the United Kingdom. It was formed by the Metropolitan Fire Brigade Act 1865, under the leadership of superintendent Eyre Massey Shaw. It has 5,992staff, in ...

). The peaked cap was retained by fire services after the war. When they were on duty, but in the frequent long stretches between calls, many firemen and firewomen performed vital wartime manufacturing work, in workshops in the fire stations or adjacent to them. This was entirely voluntary, but since many of the wartime personnel had worked in factories before the war it was work with which they were familiar and skilled. War service meant considerable risk, and members of the NFS were called to attend the aftermath of German bombing raids and coastal shelling from France, or often whilst these attacks were still ongoing. Casualties were inevitable, and there is one record of one volunteer who died on duty aged just 19, and was awarded the Certificate for Gallantry as a result. He is buried in the

Hamilton Road Cemetery, Deal Hamilton Road Cemetery is a combined municipal and military burial ground situated in the coastal town of Deal, Kent, in South East England. Opened in May 1856, it was created to provide a new burial ground for Deal at a time when its general p ...

, Kent. The Chief of the Fire Staff and Inspector-in-Chief throughout the war (until 28 February 1947, when he retired) was Sir Aylmer Firebrace, former Chief Officer of the London Fire Brigade. At peak strength the NFS had 370,000 personnel, including 80,000 women. The women were mostly employed on administrative duties. The NFS was divided into about forty Fire Forces. These were subdivided into Divisions. Each Division had two Columns and each Column had five Companies.

Ranks

Notable members

*Sir Frederick Delve (career firefighter and fire service administrator) * Leslie Leete (career firefighter - later successor to Delve as chief officer of London Fire Brigade) Members of the NFS who were well known in civilian life (or later became so) included: * Len Johnson, boxer and civil rights activist (served in Manchester and Cumbria) *

Paul Brooks Paul Brooks is a British-born film producer. Brooks has a Humanities degree in English/Philosophy/Psychology and Sociology from the University of London. He then went into real estate development before moving into film. In 1992 he executive ...

, cricketer (served in London and Coventry) An eleven-minute Second World War documentary that chronicles the birth and work of the NFS survived the war and is available to view on the British Pathe website. Service personnel received Certificate of Service documents. National Fire Service - Certificate of Service Document

National Fire Service - Certificate of Service Document

Footnotes

{{UK fire service Defunct fire and rescue services of the United Kingdom 1941 establishments in the United Kingdom 1948 disestablishments in the United Kingdom Civil defence organisations based in the United Kingdom United Kingdom home front during World War II

Ranks

Notable members

See also

Footnotes