Splinter net lace from World War II

 

I saw these examples of splinter net in the lace exhibition at the Castle Museum in Nottingham. They were made by Tatham and Co in the 1950s but are of the type produced in World War II. Splinter nets were applied to windows to stop the glass shattering in the event of bomb explosions. Even small bomb explosions can cause glass to break into sharp fragments and flying or falling glass caused many wartime injuries.

These nets not only protected those inside the house but also people walking past in the street. Instead of splinter net, some householders used strips of paper glued on to the window in a grid or criss-cross pattern. Ideally the strips were fixed to both sides of the window, with those on the outside matching the pattern on the inside. Households were allocated rolls of gummed brown paper for the purpose, which had gum on one side that had to be moistened to make it sticky.

I was surprise by the variety of nets and wondered whether they were used for different purposes. Some of them are simple woven nets while others are patterned. Some are fairly dense, and would have obscured the light making the rooms inside quite dark, and there are wartime accounts saying that some people chose not to use splinter nets because of this reason. I also wondered how householders kept the nets clean, as dirty windows and nets would also have obscure the light, although perhaps that wasn’t a concern if you were in an area that was subject to regular bombing.