In 1916, an explosion tore through the Barnbow Munitions Factory in Leeds, killing 35 women in an instant.

They were known as the Barnbow Lasses. Young workers fueling the First World War from the factory floor… until disaster struck.

For decades, the truth of what happened that night was softened, reshaped, and in some cases, silenced entirely.

In this episode of Memory and Valour, I sit down with author Antony J. Bell to explore the Barnbow explosion and the story of his own ancestor, Sarah Ann Jennings; one of the women killed. Drawing from his book A Penny a Shell, we uncover how memory, grief, and family history intersect with one of Britain’s deadliest wartime industrial disasters.