The Birth of John Lennon
Future Beatle arrives during brief break from bombing
Contrary to Aunt Mimi’s later recollection, John Lennon was not born during an air-raid. On October 9, 1940, Liverpool was experiencing a brief respite from the intense bombing that had begun in August and would continue until January. The city would suffer 4,000 deaths, the highest number of casualties outside London.
Perhaps Mimi was remembering the ever-present expectation of an imminent raid during those months. In the end, however, the son of Julia Lennon (née Stanley) was delivered without incident at Liverpool Maternity Hospital.
Julia named him John Winston — the Winston being a patriotic tribute to Winston Churchill, Britain’s new Prime Minister.
In 1940 fathers did not show their faces in the delivery room. Alfred Lennon, Julia’s nominal husband and the the biological father, took this a stage further. He would only see his son a handful of times and then not at all for twenty years.
The Lennons legally separated in 1942. John retained his father’s name but Freddie became a bogey man — a family abandoning wastrel in his son’s imagination. In Freddie’s (partial) defence this is a little harsh. It ignores the fact he was actively discouraged from making contact with his son.
That said, Freddie certainly didn’t cover himself in glory. Especially when his next appearance in his son’s life would be at the height of Beatlemania.
