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The Bombing of Braunschweig (or Brunswick) in World War II on the night of 14/15 of October 1944 by No. 5 Group Royal Air Force (RAF) marked the high point of the destruction of Henry the Lion's city in the Second World War. The air raid, part of Operation Hurricane, caused a massive firestorm because of which Braunschweig burnt continuously for two and a half days. Moreover, the attack destroyed Braunschweig's mediaeval downtown core (more than 90% of it) thereby changing the city's appearance right down to the present day.

Braunschweig in 1944

The first bombing of Braunschweig by the RAF came on 17 August 1940, and killed 7 people. From that day on the air raids became ever more numerous, precise and devastating in their effect. Beginning on 27 January 1943, United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) bombers attacked German cities by day as well as night. From February 1944 ("Big Week"), Braunschweig was a regular target for British and American bomber squadrons, with the RAF doing the nighttime raids, and the USAAF doing the daytime ones. This sharing of duty was set forth in the 1943 Casablanca Conference and was known as the combined bomber offensive (CBO), a joint action of the United Kingdom's and the United States' bombing forces.

Armament industry in and around Braunschweig

All together, Braunschweig – at the beginning of the twentieth century mainly a working-class industrial city – was subjected to 42 air raids by British and American bombers during the Second World War. The raids were aimed at munitions works (particularly at warplane, tank, and optical and precision instrument production) in and around Braunschweig, the harbour, various research institutions, canneries, railway stations and the railway maintenance works, as well as at the German Research Centre for Aviation.

As a centre of the German armament industry, the city was ringed by a strong and well-manned belt of anti-aircraft guns, making the town a fearsome target for Allied bombers, who could look forward to heavy losses.

Arms works in and around Braunschweig (selection)
  • Braunschweiger Blechwarenwerke (steel plate maker)
  • Braunschweigische Maschinenbauanstalt (BMA) (machine manufacturer)
  • Büssing (motor vehicles)
  • Francke & Heidecke (precision optical instruments, such as cameras)
  • Karges-Hammer (machine manufacturer)
  • Lanico Maschinenbau (machine manufacturer)
  • Luther-Werke (aircraft)
  • Mühlenbau und Industrieaktiengesellschaft (MIAG) (installation and machine manufacturer, armour)
  • Niedersächsische Motorenwerke (NIEMO) (aircraft engines)
  • Schmalbach-Lubeca
  • Schuberth-Werke
  • Selwig & Lange (machine manufacturer)
  • Voigtländer (precision optical instruments, such as telescopic sights)
  • Wilke-Werke (machine manufacturer)
  • Wullbrandt & Seele (machine manufacturer)

Right near Braunschweig also lay:

Furthermore, the airfields at Braunschweig-Waggum, Braunschweig-Broitzem and Braunschweig-Völkenrode as well as, by and by, the whole city, were swallowed up in the destruction.

Preparation for the 15 October 1944 air raid

Raid's purpose

On 13 October, the RAF received orders to carry out Operation Hurricane. The purpose of this action was on the one hand to demonstrate the Allied bomber forces' destructive might, and on the other hand also to make clear Allied air superiority. The orders included the following passage:

“In order to demonstrate to the enemy in Germany generally the overwhelming superiority of the Allied Air Forces in this theatre … the intention is to apply within the shortest practical period the maximum effort of the Royal Air Force Bomber Command and the 8th United States Bomber Command against objectives in the densely populated Ruhr.”RAF diary October 1944

Operation Hurricane foresaw Duisburg as its main goal for the RAF's thousand or so bombers, and Cologne for the USAAF's 1,200 or so bombers. A further 233 RAF bombers were detailed for Braunschweig, that in October 1944 had about 150,000 inhabitants.

The planning for the attack on Braunschweig was finalized as of 15 August 1944. After Darmstadt became one of the first German cities to be destroyed using a new tactic (a special target marking technique, fan-shaped flying formation, staggering of explosive and incendiary bombs) on 11 September 1944, resulting in about 11,500 deaths, the Allies turned their attention to Braunschweig.

Braunschweig was to be largely destroyed not only as an important centre of the armament industry, but also, and above all, as a living place, thereby making it uninhabitable and useless. The goal, namely the greatest possible destruction, was to be reached through detailed attack plans and careful execution thereof, and also using the attributes of the materiel that was to be deployed (see under 14 October 1944 mission orders and 15/10/1944). The means whereby the goal was to be reached would be the aforesaid firestorm, whose production was no accident; it was scientifically based (see under Literature, Jörg Friedrich) and developed through painstakingly detailed work.

On 13 October, the chief meteorologist at High Wycombe advised RAF Bomber Command Headquarters of the weather forecast for the weekend of 14-15 October: Slight cloudiness, good visibility throughout the night, moderate winds. The next day, Marshal of the Royal Air Force Arthur "Bomber" Harris issued the orders to carry out the attack on Braunschweig and other cities. The operation was codenamed "SKATE".

RAF Bomber Command had sought four times in vain during 1944 to inflict lasting destruction upon Braunschweig, failing each time as a result of, among other things, bad weather and strong defences.

On Saturday 14 October 1944 at No. 5 Group's headquarters at Morton Hall, the preparations for the attack were finalized.

14 October 1944 mission orders

Partial transcription of mission orders with slight, handwritten alterations:
  • Mission: At least 220 aircraft from No. 5 Group will attack the target. Furthermore 1000 aircraft from No. 1 Group, 3, 4 and 6 Groups COD (codename for Duisburg) at 0129 and 0325 hours.
  • Mission goal: To complete destruction of an enemy industrial centre.
  • Mission date: Night of 14/15 October 1944.
  • Mission forces: 53 Base – more than 80 aircraft; 55 Base – more than 100 aircraft; 49 Squadron – more than 18 aircraft; 54 Base – 13 aircraft (106 Squadron) plus flare and marker forces.
  • Target: SKATE (codename for Braunschweig).
  • H-Hour (attack time): Provisionally 0230 hours; Time over target H to H + 6 (six minutes after H-Hour) (2 × 3 min. waves); Aircraft are to be spread evenly over the Time over target, but aircraft with the longer delays are to attack in the first wave.
  • Bomb load and fusing: 51 aircraft: 1 × 2000 HC (Blockbuster bombs) plus Maximum "J"-Cluster (incendiary bombs).
Remainder: 1 × 1000 MC/GP (explosive bombs with impact fuses) plus maximum inc (ie incendiary) bombs preferably in scattering containers, otherwise clusters.
(Note: A Lancaster's maximum bomb load was somewhat more than 6 tonnes. The given bomb load of "1 × 1000 MC/GP 1000 lb., or 454 kg plus maximum inc bombs" means that the room for the bomb load was filled with incendiary bombs up to the highest allowable starting weight, making the available fuel a factor for consideration. It follows that more than 80% of the Lancaster bomb loads for the attack on Braunschweig consisted of incendiary bombs.
  • Photography: All aircraft are to carry night cameras and flashes fused to explode at point 6 of aircraft height.
  • Attack: The target radiates in places from the marking point outwards, to be attacked with delayed bombing.
  • Target marking: Attack time-10 (minutes): blind marking. Green target markers are to be dropped into the middle of the target. They are to be refreshed at Attack time-5; Red marking bombs are to be dropped over the target at Attack time -9, -7 and -5.
  • Bombardment allocation: Crews are to target red target markers so that the middle bomb in their load strikes the target's centre.

    • Air raid's progress

    Approaching the target

    According to plan, the RAF's No. 5 Group began its flight to the target, Braunschweig, towards 2300 hours local time on 14 OctoberDuring the war Britain was on time daylight saving, In the winter time was set to British Summer Time and in the summer to Double Summer Time, so local time and British time were the same . At the same time, a further thousand RAF bombers from other groups began bombing Duisburg. The group bound for Braunschweig took a course leading far south of the target that lay ahead to avoid the Ruhr area, which was defended quite heavily by a band of anti-aircraft batteries. Near Paderborn it turned towards the north, overflew Hanover, and then proceeded to Braunschweig. The group consisted of 233 heavy, four-engine bombers – Lancasters, types I and III – each with a bomb load of about six tonnes. The Lancasters were guided by seven Mosquitos.

    Eliminating German air defences through deception

    One hundred and forty-one training craft flew simulated attacks on Heligoland, 20 Mosquitos went to Hamburg, eight to Mannheim, 16 to Berlin and two to Düsseldorf. Moreover, 140 further craft were deployed for other diversionary manoeuvres. Also, strips of tinfoil (codename: "Windows") were scattered into the air in great amounts to jam the German air defence system's radar stations, thereby rendering them very nearly useless on this night.

    Marking the target

    The Mosquitos were responsible for a technique, specially developed by No. 5 Group, of marking the innermost areas of the target. The target marking technique had undergone ongoing improvements through the war years and had now been perfected. Once over the city, the Pathfinder aircraft dropped their markers of various colours, brightly lighting the target up. Southwest of the downtown core fell the first red flare. Over the Dom-Insel – the site of Braunschweig Cathedral, and also the target point of the attack – a green flare was dropped, a so-called "blind marker". These craft in turn gave forth about 60 flares from a height of 1 000 m, which then slowly floated down to the ground, each burning for about 3 to 7 minutes. These lit markers were called "Christmas tree" by the Germans for their characteristic appearance. Given the clear night (report from filmed intelligence: "Visibility: excellent"), the problem-free overflight, the flawless marking of the target, the conditions for this attack were, from the British point of view, optimal.

    The ruin of old Braunschweig

    The last all-clear siren signal on Saturday 14 October had only just faded away about midnight, only to be replaced by a new alert signal at about 0150 on 15 October – the RAF attack had begun. Although the air raid only lasted about 40 minutes, Sunday 15 October 1944 would go down in the city's history as the day when Braunschweig's old town was laid waste. Not only had No. 5 Group developed a special target marking technique, but also an ingenious bombing procedure which was designed to cause the greatest possible damage. It was called "sector bombing". It employed the cathedral as a reckoning point for the "master bomber" in the lead plane. The green marker on the Dom-Insel served to guide the bomb aimers in all following aircraft, who flew in over it from various directions in a fan-shaped formation, whereupon they dropped their bombs.

    RAF films of the attack
    This air raid on Braunschweig was filmed by a Lancaster with the registration "L 463 Y", specially outfitted for the task. The craft flew, like most of the throng besetting the city that night, at a height of 4 950 m over Braunschweig at 260 km/h. The filming was done with three "Eyemo"-type cameras. The time of the attack's onset was noted as 0233 hours. A copy of the resulting film can be found today at the Städtisches Museum Braunschweig.

    The film is provided with the following informational text:

    "Bomber Command … made a heavy and concentrated attack on the industrial town of Brunswick, which is one of Germany’s biggest centres for the aircraft and engineering industries. As the aircraft with the cameras runs up to the target the fires can be seen spreading rapidly all over the city and by the time the aircraft is over the target the whole city is ablaze and the streets can been seen clearly outlined."

    The firestorm
    Before long, about 847 tonnes of bombs had been dropped on the city, first about 12,000 explosive bombs – the so-called "Blockbusters" – in many "carpets" on the old half-timbered town to get the intended firestorm started in the most efficient way – with the old town's wooden houses. The blast waves blew the houses' roofs off, exposing the insides, blew windowpanes out, splintered the inner structure, broke walls down, tore electricity and water supplies up, and drove firefighters and rescue service personnel, as well as damage observers into cellars and bunkers.

    After the wave of explosive bombs came about 200,000 phosphorus and incendiary bombs whose job was to ignite the firestorm, for as with attacks on other cities, for instance Hamburg (Operation Gomorrah), the firestorm was no accident, but rather a carefully planned tactic that was the result of years of thorough scientific research. It would be completing its task even after the bombers had long returned to England.

    By about 0310 hours, about 40 minutes after the first explosive bombs had been dropped on Braunschweig, the RAF bombing was over.

    The hot masses of air were sucked upwards by the powerful thermal that arose from the conflagration. Cooler air was thereby brought down from great heights, making the local weather much like a windstorm with constantly changing winds that only worsened the fires, thereby further strengthening the winds, which were actually strong enough to sweep small pieces of furniture up and toss people about.

    About three and a half hours later, towards 6:30 in the morning, the firestorm reached its peak in the downtown core. About 150 ha of historic old Braunschweig was going up in flames. The city's tallest church steeples – those of St. Andrew’s at about 100 m tall – could be seen burning far beyond the town, and they also rained embers down over the whole city. Streets, buildings and the ruins of the downtown core were heavily littered with incendiary bombs, greatly slowing rescue vehicles and fire engines, which had to fight their way through this and many other dangers in the firestorm to reach into the fire.

    The city burnt so intensely and brightly that the light from the fire could be seen far and wide. From all directions, helpers and firefighters thronged into the burning town to help. They came from, among other places, Hanover to the west and Helmstedt in the east, from Celle to the north and Quedlinburg to the south.

    Within the 24 hours of Operation Hurricane, the RAF dropped about 10,000 tonnes of bombs in all on Duisburg and Braunschweig, the greatest bomb load dropped on any one day in the Second World War.

    Rescue of 23,000 trapped people
    The many fires in the downtown core quickly grew together into one widespread conflagration. However, in this area were six large bunkers and two air raid shelters, all quite overfull, in which 23,000 people had sought refuge from the attack. While these thousands waited in seeming safety inside their thick-walled shelters for the all-clear signal, outside the firestorm raged.

    The fire brigade very soon realized the threat to these 23,000 trapped people – the fire was growing ever hotter, and the oxygen in the bunkers and shelters thereby ever thinner. The danger was clearly that the victims would either suffocate for lack of oxygen if they stayed in the bunkers, or be burnt alive if they tried to leave and escape through the firestorm outside.

    Die Wassergasse ("water alley")

    Lieutenant of the Fire Brigade Rudolf Prescher (born 1912 in Dresden; died 1997 in Braunschweig) is to be thanked for the initiative that yielded the solution to the problem of how to rescue these people. Towards 5 o'clock in the morning – before the firestorm had reached its full intensity – the idea of building a "water alley" was conceived, through or under which the trapped people could flee their shelters – which were now endangering their lives – for safe areas of the city. The firefighters, of course, first had to risk their lives by going into the fire to set this system up.

    The water alley consisted of a long hose that had to be kept under a constant water mist to shield it against the fire's tremendous heat as the firefighters led the hose through to the shelters where the people were trapped. The reach of each of the little jets issuing from the holes in the hose overlapped each other making a continuous, artificial "rain zone".

    The bunkers were reached towards 7 o'clock Sunday morning, after the fire storm had reached its greatest intensity. All the trapped people were still alive, but had no idea what lay outside for them. All 23,000 managed to get out of the danger zone and reach safe areas, such as the museum park. Only in one air raid shelter – the one at Schöppenstedter Straße 31 – did the help come too late. Here, 95 of the 104 people had died for lack of oxygen by the time the fire brigade reached them. The firestorm had been so intense in this particular part of the city that it had used up nearly all the oxygen, making it possible to save no more than nine people.

    Statistics relating to 15 October 1944

    Destroyed buildings (selection)

    A great part of Braunschweig's tightly packed downtown core was made up of about 800 half-timbered houses, many of which dated back to the Middle Ages. There were also stone buildings dating mainly from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The narrow streets with their wooden half-timbered houses that could so easily catch fire and burn, all built cheek by jowl with each other, saw to it that the British tactics were successful. First dropping explosive bombs, and then incendiary bombs, not only started a fire, but made sure it would spread quickly and turn into a firestorm that raged for 2½ days, destroying virtually everything. Braunschweig lost many irreplaceable cultural monuments in the short time after the air raid.

    In an ironic twist of fate, the old cathedral, which the RAF had used as a reckoning point for the whole operation, and which the Nazis had turned into a "National Shrine" in 1935, was left standing.

    Along with whole streets in the downtown core, many important historic buildings were largely or utterly destroyed. What follows is a selection of those:

    Building time built Condition after 15 October 1944
    Aegidienkirche (church) 13th - 15th cen. heavily damaged
    Alte Waage 1534 utterly destroyed, from 1990 - 1994 rebuilt
    Andreas-Kirche (church) about 1230 heavily damaged
    Bierbaumsches Haus 1523 utterly destroyed
    Braunschweiger Schloss (Palace) 1833 - 1841 heavily damaged, demolished in 1960 amid great controversy; being partly reconstructed (2007)
    Brüdern-Kirche (church) about 1361 heavily damaged
    Burg Dankwarderode (castle) 1887 - 1906 heavily damaged
    Gewandhaus (cloth hall) before 1268 heavily damaged
    Hagenmarkt-Apotheke 1677 utterly destroyed
    Haus Salve Hospes 1805 heavily damaged
    Katharinen-Kirche (church) about 1200 heavily damaged
    Liberei 1412 - 1422 heavily damaged
    Magnikirche (church) about 1031 heavily damaged
    Martineum 1415 utterly destroyed
    Martini-Kirche (church) about 1195 heavily damaged
    Meinhardshof about 1320 utterly destroyed
    Mumme-Haus (brewery) 16 cen. utterly destroyed
    Nicolai-Kirche (church) 1710 - 1712 utterly destroyed
    Pauli-Kirche (church) 1901/06 heavily damaged
    Petri-Kirche (church) before 1195 heavily damaged
    Stechinelli-Haus 1690 heavily damaged
    Staatstheater 1861 heavily damaged

    On the next morning, 16 October, Braunschweig lay under a thick cloud of smoke. A British reconnaissance aircraft sent to take photographs of the bombing's aftermath for analysis actually had to turn back and return to England without completing its job, which had been rendered impossible by the opaque pall that hung over the town.

    By the evening of 17 October, the last of the fire's main hotspots had been put out, but it took another three days to quench lesser fires, until 20 October. Eighty thousand of the townsfolk were left homeless by the attack.

    The destruction was so widespread and thorough that ordinary people and the experts alike, even years after the war, were convinced that the attack had come from one of the dread "thousand-bomber attacks", such as the one that had laid Cologne waste. The extent of the damage could seemingly not otherwise be explained. Only after the British opened their military archives did it become plain that it had been "only" 233 bombers.

    The victims

    The exact number of victims of the 15 October attack is unknown. The given figures range from 484 to 640 dead, 95 of those by suffocation at the Schöppenstedter Straße 31 shelter alone. Nowadays, historians put the number at more than a thousand.

    These "light" losses – compared with those suffered in the great air raids on Dresden, Hamburg, Pforzheim and other German cities – according to expert opinions stem from various factors. For one thing, Braunschweig lay on the direct flight path, that is, the "lane" leading to Magdeburg and Berlin, and right near the armament industry centres of Salzgitter (Hermann-Göring-Werke) and Wolfsburg (Volkswagen Works), meaning that Braunschweigers were used to – even in a sense "trained for" – quickly responding to alarms (there were 2,040 warnings and 620 air raid alarms between 1939 and 1945). This may have prepared them for the attack, even though many of the earlier attacks from which they had sought shelter actually targeted the other cities mentioned. Furthermore, the city also had at its disposal a great number of the latest type of air raid bunkers and blockhouses known as Hochbunkers . Lastly, the fire brigade's "water alley" alone saved 23,000 people's lives.

    The RAF lost a single Lancaster bomber to anti-aircraft fire that night.

    Bunkers in Braunschweig
    Braunschweig Armour

    Braunschweig had, compared to other German cities, a great number of the most modern air raid bunkers, which nevertheless suffered from regular overcrowding as the war wore on. As modern and robust as they were, the fact is that the so-called Braunschweig Armour was developed at the Institute for Building Materials, Massive Construction and Fire Protection of the Braunschweig Technical College. It became a kind of safety standard for building air raid bunkers throughout the Reich.

    Year built Location Places Remarks
    1 1940 Alte Kochenhauerstraße 813 still standing, on synagogue property
    2 1940/41 Alte Waage 220 still standing
    3 1941/42 Bockstwete 750 still standing, altered
    4 1941/42 Borsigstraße/Bebelhof 800 torn down
    5 ? Kaiserstraße 642 still standing
    6 ? Kalenwall (old railway station) 428 still standing, altered
    7 1941/42 Kralenriede 500 still standing
    8 1941/42 Ludwigstraße 236 still standing
    9 1941/42 Madamenweg 1.500 still standing, altered for use as flats
    10 ab 1942 Glogaustraße in Melverode 350 still standing
    11 1941/42 Methfesselstraße 1.250 still standing, altered
    12 1941/42 Münzstraße (Polizei) 450 still standing
    13 1940/41 Okerstraße 944 still standing, altered for use as flats
    14 1944 Ritterstraße 840 still standing, altered for use as flats
    15 1940/41 Auerstraße in Rühme 650 torn down
    16 1940/41 Sack 700 still standing, altered
    17 1940/41 Salzdahlumer Straße 986 still standing, altered
    18 ? Stollen im Nussberg 10.000 demolished with explosives
    19 ? Stollen im Windmühlenberg 1.000 eliminated

    Fire brigades from Braunschweig and other cities deployed against the firestorm

    According to estimates, especially during the night of the bombing as well as in the next six days until the last fires were put out, about 4,500 firefighters were deployed. They came from up to 90 km (55 miles) away, and included not only members of city fire brigades from, among other places, Blankenburg, Celle, Gifhorn, Hanover, Helmstedt, Hildesheim, Peine, Salzgitter, Wernigerode and Wolfenbüttel, but also volunteers and members of plant fire brigades at the various factories in Braunschweig and the surrounding area. They are to be thanked for the fact that the city was not utterly burnt down that night.

    Aftermath

    The bombing in the Nazi press

    Even on the night of the attack, the National Socialists seized the opportunity to make the victims an instrument in their quest for total war, for already by the next day, 16 October, with Braunschweig still burning, the local Nazi propaganda newspaper, the Braunschweiger Tageszeitung, came out with the headline "Die teuflische Fratze des Gegners. Schwerer Terrorangriff auf Braunschweig – Volksgemeinschaft in der Bewährung" ("The foe's devilish antics. Heavy terror attack on Braunschweig – Population put to the test"), and Südhannover-Braunschweig Gauleiter Hartmann Lauterbacher's (1909-1988) pithy words of perseverance to "the Braunschweigers". On 19 October, the number of "fallen" was given as 405, and on 20 October appeared a full-page death notice with 344 names. On 22 October, one week after the disastrous attack, there was a "memorial act" for the victims, both at the State Cathedral ("Staatsdom") – as the Nazis called Braunschweig's cathedral – and at the Schlossplatz, the square in front of Braunschweig Palace.

    The same night, Braunschweig had another heavy air raid. This time the bombers were USAAF B-17 Flying Fortresses. The last air raid on Braunschweig came on the morning of 31 March 1945, carried out by the 392nd US Bomber Group. Their main target was the East Railway Station.

    RAF Bomber Command Campaign Diary: 15/10/1944

    In the RAF Bomber Command's campaign diary can be found the following entry about the 15 October 1944 attack on Braunschweig:

    RAF Bomber Command Campaign Diary October 1944
    14/15 October 1944:
    * Not only could Bomber Command dispatch more than 2,000 sorties to Duisburg in less than 24 hours, but there was still effort to spare for No 5 Group to attack Brunswick with 233 Lancasters and 7 Mosquitos. The various diversions and fighter support operations laid on by Bomber Command were so successful that only 1 Lancaster was lost from this raid. Bomber Command had attempted to destroy Brunswick 4 times so far in 1944 and No 5 Group finally achieved that aim on this night, using their own marking methods. It was Brunswick's worst raid of the war and the old centre was completely destroyed. A local report says 'the whole town, even the smaller districts, was particularly hard hit'. It was estimated by the local officials that 1,000 bombers had carried out the raid.

    The text makes it plain that RAF Bomber Command was well aware very soon after the 15 October 1944 attack of just how devastating the aftermath was for Braunschweig.

    Statistics of destruction

    Population figure and deaths

    When the Second World War began, Braunschweig had 202,284 inhabitants. By the war's end, this figure had fallen by 26.03% to 149,641. From the effects of war (mainly air raids but also their aftermath, such as having to dispose of or otherwise make safe the duds that the Allies dropped) about 2,905 people died, 1,286 of whom, or 44.3%, were foreigners. These foreigners were predominantly prisoners of war, forced labourers, and concentration camp inmates who worked in the armament industry, and who were forbidden access to the air raid bunkers.

    Destruction of housing, infrastructure, etc.

    Between 1940 and 1945, Braunschweig was targeted by RAF and USAAF air raids 42 times.

    Exact figures are available only for destroyed houses and flats. By the time the war was over, about 20% of Braunschweig's dwellings had been left utterly undamaged, but about 24% of them had been utterly destroyed. The remaining 55% were somewhat damaged, with the extent of damage to any particular dwelling varying greatly with others. In 1943, before the area bombing of Braunschweig, there were 15,897 houses in the city, but by mid-1945, only 2,834 (about 18%) were left undamaged. The city also had 59,826 flats, of which 11,153 (about 19%) were still undamaged by the time the war ended. The level of destruction with regard to residential buildings stood at 35%, leading to homelessness for almost 80% of the townsfolk by war's end. Sixty percent of the city's places of cultural interest, including the municipal buildings, were likewise destroyed, along with about 50% of its industrial areas.

    Overall destruction rate and amount of rubble

    The destruction rate in Braunschweig's downtown core (within the "Oker Ring", the Oker being a river that encircles Braunschweig) stood at about 90%, and the overall figure for Braunschweig as a whole was 42%. The attack on the city produced an estimated 3 670 500 m³ of rubble. These figures put Braunschweig among Germany's most heavily damaged cities in the Second World War.

    After the war

    Reconstruction

    On 17 June 1946, the rubble clearing officially began in Braunschweig. The job took 17 years, with the city only officially declaring the task accomplished in 1963. In actual fact, however, smaller messes were still being cleared up years after that.

    Braunschweig's reconstruction in the 1950s and 1960s proceeded very quickly, as housing was so badly needed, and the city's infrastructure needed to be built all over again. Since the downtown core was a rubble-strewn wasteland, some uninspired city and spatial planners seized the chance to build a new, modern, and above all car-friendly city, an idea promoted by Hans Bernhard Reichow. This once again led in many places to further destruction (through new roadways, for instance) and the removal of city scenery that had become historic, since in part the former city layout was ignored. Ruins were hastily torn down instead of being restored, and the car was raised as the new "yardstick" whereby the "new" Braunschweig was to be measured. Thus was wrought, especially in the downtown core, a "second destruction" of Braunschweig.

    The later destruction of historic buildings and cultural sites, such as the demolition of many mediaeval, baroque and classical buildings or the controversial demolition of the damaged Braunschweiger Schloss (palatial residence) in 1960 led much as with the Dresden Frauenkirche, the Berlin City Palace and other prominent buildings in other cities to a further loss of identity for the local people, and was the cause of much controversy for decades.

    Reconstruction of damaged or destroyed buildings continues in part down to the present day, as can be seen in the partial reconstruction of the Braunschweiger Schloss.

    Memorials

    Meaning and necessity of the destruction
    Already in 1943, the Anglican Bishop and Member of the House of Lords George Bell was putting forth the view that such attacks as these threatened the ethical foundations of Western civilization and destroyed any chance of future reconciliation between the former foes.

    From the point of view of the post-war era, and especially against the background of the British Area Bombing Directive, the question must be raised as to whether the goal of the far-reaching destruction of Braunschweig in October 1944 on the one hand made sense and on the other hand was still truly necessary given that the war was into its final phase. This same debate went on with regard to the destruction of Cologne, Hamburg, Dresden, Pforzheim, Kassel, Essen, Duisburg, Darmstadt, Würzburg, Heilbronn and other cities.

    15 October as a fixed point in the city's history
    In the Main Cemetery in Braunschweig is a memorial, together with the graves of many victims of the 15 October 1944 raid.

    Since the attack, memorial events and exhibitions have been held in Braunschweig every 14-15 October. The events of those two days also echo strongly in local historical literature (see under "Literature"). On 14-15 October 2004 – the sixtieth anniversary of the destruction of Braunschweig's historic old town – there were once again many events. Among other memorials that took place was Benjamin Britten's War Requiem, conducted at the Braunschweig Cathedral in the presence of British Ambassador Sir Peter Torry

    References

    Literature

    • Braunschweiger Zeitung (publisher): Die Bomben-Nacht. Der Luftkrieg vor 60 Jahren. Braunschweig 2004
    • Friedenszentrum Braunschweig e.V. (publisher): Braunschweig im Bombenkrieg. 50 Jahre danach. Den Opfern des Krieges gewidmet. Band 1: Dokumente zur Ausstellung 30.09. – 31.10.1993. Braunschweig 1994
    • ibid.: Braunschweig im Bombenkrieg. 50 Jahre danach. Den Opfern des Krieges gewidmet. Band 2: Dokumente von Zeitzeuginnen und Zeitzeugen: „Bomben auf Braunschweig“. Landesmuseum 11.09. – 16.10.1994. Braunschweig 1994
    • ibid.: Braunschweig im Bombenkrieg. 50 Jahre danach. Den Opfern des Krieges gewidmet. Band 3: Dokumente aus der Gedenknacht 14./15.10.1994: „Die Gerloff-Berichte“. Braunschweig 1994
    • Jörg Friedrich: Der Brand. Deutschland im Bombenkrieg 1940 – 1945, Munich 2002
    • Eckart Grote: Braunschweig im Luftkrieg. Alliierte Film-, Bild- und Einsatzberichte der US-Air Force / British Royal Air Force aus den Jahren 1944/1945 als stadtgeschichtliche Dokumente. Braunschweig 1983
    • ibid.: Braunschweig im Zweitem Weltkrieg. Dokumente einer Zerstörung – Stunde Null – Neubeginn In: Arbeitsberichte aus dem Städtischen Museum Braunschweig, Nr. 65; Braunschweig 1994
    • ibid.: Target Brunswick 1943 – 1945. Luftangriffsziel Braunschweig – Dokumente der Zerstörung. Braunschweig 1994
    • Peter Neumann: Braunschweig als Bombenziel. Aus Aufzeichnungen der Jahre 1944 und 1945 In: Braunschweigisches Jahrbuch, Band 65; Braunschweig 1984
    • Rudolf Prescher: Der rote Hahn über Braunschweig. Luftschutzmaßnahmen und Luftkriegsereignisse in der Stadt Braunschweig 1927 bis 1945, Braunschweig 1955
    • Eckart Schimpf: Nachts, als die Weihnachtsbäume kamen. Eine ganz normale Braunschweiger Kindheit im Chaos von Kriegs- und Nachkriegszeit. Braunschweig 1998
    • Hedda Kalshoven: Ich denk’ so viel an Euch. Ein deutsch-niederländischer Briefwechsel 1920 – 1949. Munich 1995

    Other media

    DVD
    • Braunschweig 1945 – Bombardierung, Befreiung, Leben in Trümmern. Remembered and commented on by Eckard Schimpf. Braunschweiger Zeitung und Archiv Verlag, Braunschweig 2005
    • Feuersturm – Der Bombenkrieg gegen Deutschland. DVD-Edition, SPIEGEL TV history. Polar Film Medien GmbH, Gescher 2003 (contains clips from the original RAF film of the bombardment on 15/10/1944)

    Footnotes

    Further reading

    World War II strategic bombing | World War II operations and battles of Europe | Braunschweig | History of Germany | History of Lower Saxony | 1944

    Bombenangriff auf Braunschweig am 15. Oktober 1944

     

    This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "Bombing of Braunschweig in World War II".

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