In message , Mark Brader
writes

Paul Terry:
What is the OED's first illustrative reference to "tube shelter"?

In the Supplement, it's from "Darkness Falls from the Air", a 1942 novel
by Nigel Balchin. "We went... by tube... I wanted to see how the tube
shelter business was working out."

The expression was in use long before the Bethnal Green disaster.

I don't know if the above has been "antedated", as they say, in the OED2
or the online edition.

Well, Henry Moore's famous "Grey tube shelter" dates from 1940 - I
*think* the title is contemporary, but am not su

http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2001/moore/fig04.htm

--
Paul Terry