Air raid on Kassel on October 22, 1943
Along with Dresden , Hamburg , Pforzheim and Darmstadt, Kassel is one of the German cities with the highest number of victims from Allied air raids . The city experienced the heaviest air raid on October 22, 1943 under the British Area Bombing Directive .
Importance as a target
During the Second World War , the Kassel district of North Holland with the Henschel & Sohn plant located there formed an important armaments center, in particular for locomotives ( BR 52 ), tanks ( "Tiger" ) and trucks of the company . To the southwest of the city, the Henschel subsidiary Henschel Flugmotorenbau GmbH (HFM) , founded in 1936 in the Lohwald near Altenbauna (today's Volkswagen factory Kassel in Baunatal ), manufactured DB 601 aircraft engines . The engine construction plant in Kassel (MWK), a branch of the Dessau Junkers aircraft and engine works , manufactured aircraft engines and parts in Bettenhausen in the east of Kassel. The Gerhard-Fieseler-Werke were active in aircraft construction at three locations on the outskirts.
Due to the dense development with the easily inflammable half-timbered houses in the old town area, Kassel was early on the list of cities that were particularly suitable for a widespread fire bomb attack according to the British Area Bombing Directive .
The attack from 22./23. October 1943
In a first attack on October 3, 1943, the approaching bomber formations encountered a closed cloud cover. In addition, there was a strong westerly wind, so that the luminous markings were driven to the east and only the northern outskirts and the Fieseler works were hit. The surrounding communities of Kassel suffered severe damage in some cases (including Vellmar , Heckershausen , Sandershausen ).
On the afternoon of October 22nd, another 569 bombers took off from England and reached the city at around 8:45 p.m. Due to diversionary maneuvers such as the dropping of marker bombs over Frankfurt and the setting of so-called "Christmas trees" over Cologne , the air alarm was triggered very late in Kassel.
Like about a year later in the air raid on Darmstadt , a fan tactic was used. The bomber groups marked the target area around Martinsplatz in the form of a quarter circle in order to achieve a more precise bombardment and to maximize the destruction. After this setting of the luminous markings (also popularly called "Christmas trees" here) the actual attack began, to which the entire medieval old town was to fall victim within 22 minutes . First, thousands of high-explosive bombs and hundreds of heavy air mines were dropped. Roofs, windows and doors were torn open by the pressure waves of the explosions. After that, more than 420,000 stick bombs were dropped over the city area, which fell into the torn roof trusses of the mostly half-timbered houses and set them on fire within a very short time . Since Kassel is about 150 kilometers from the next larger city, the Kassel fire brigade , which had to rely on itself, was far too weak and completely overwhelmed. According to statistics, two incendiary bombs were dropped on every square meter, resulting in a firestorm . It did not peak until 45 minutes after the attack and became a deadly trap for many residents in the basements.
Due to the destruction of the command post of the air warning service, the all-clear could not be given. The communication between the districts had already collapsed half an hour after the start of the attack. The people stayed in their basement. Because connections between all Kassel city center buildings had been created by means of wall breakthroughs, there were still last possible escape routes. However, since the entire old town was set on fire, most of the old town's residents could no longer escape the inferno. 25 Lancaster and 18 Halifax bombers never returned to their bases.
The consequences
Around 7,000 people were killed in the attack on Kassel. While 80 percent of all residential buildings in the outer districts were destroyed, the old town was almost cremated with around 97 percent destruction. On aerial photographs, the city was still burning after seven days. There were 48 cubic meters of rubble for every inhabitant.
The responsible district authority for Kassel had given the population completely inadequate information and had already made mistakes in building policy before the attack. This was shown most clearly in the large number of people who were not slain in their cellars, but instead suffocated. The continuous cellar system under the city had led to chaotic conditions, as many residents could not find any exits to the surface and got lost in the narrow rooms and corridors. Furthermore, they were supposed to take part in the fire fighting themselves , although the majority of those who remained in the city, mostly women and children, had for the most part never received an introduction to crises such as an air raid .
The industrial plants also suffered severe production losses. In the Fieseler aircraft factory, for example, a complete monthly production of aircraft was lost, in the flak ammunition factory around a third of the total production volume over the next few months. The industry did not return to its old delivery schedule until March 1944.
reconstruction
The first plans to rebuild Kassel after the war were based on plans to transform Kassel into the National Socialist Gau capital Hessen-Nassau from the 1930s. The exhibition “Kassel builds on” led to a scandal in 1946 after the city councilor, who had switched to the SPD, presented old plans for the conversion to the district capital in the exhibition , whereby the term “district capital” was only pasted over.
In 1947 a competition entitled “Development proposal for the reconstruction of the city of Kassel” was held. The first prize went to Hans Högg, whose plan provided for the extensive preservation of the previous urban structures. This did not happen, however, rather the remnants of the historical buildings were largely cleared away. Kassel, which was once described as one of the most beautiful cities in Europe, was to be developed into a modern metropolis under the slogan “car- friendly city ”. There were hardly any efforts to preserve or reconstruct historical buildings. This also had its origin in the endeavors of the modern age, which tried to overcome the urban structures from the Middle Ages, and thus also the hygienic and social conditions in the old towns at the turn of the century, through concepts such as the garden city . The rubble of the city center was piled up on the Rosenhang on Karlsaue , which significantly changed its profile.
Apart from the wooden half-timbered houses in the old town, many architectural monuments only fell victim to reconstruction and not to the acts of war that had damaged them but not completely destroyed them. This affected, for example, the neo-classical Nahl house, the reconstruction of which had already begun, but then had to give way to the construction of stairs street. On the other hand, corrections to the cityscape could also be made; the opulent State Theater was demolished and the opening of Friedrichsplatz to the Aue was restored.
See also
literature
- Werner Dettmar: The destruction of Kassel in October 1943. Hesse, Fuldabrück 1983, ISBN 3-924259-00-3
- Gebhard Aders : Bomb warfare / strategies of destruction. licoverlag 2004, ISBN 3-937490-90-6
- Martin Middlebrook and Chris Everitt: The Bomber Command War Diaries . Midland Publishing, 2011. p. 346. ISBN 978-1-85780-335-8
Web links
- Pictures of the bombed city
- Contribution to the Regiowiki of the Hessische / Niedersächsische Allgemeine
Individual evidence
- ↑ Barbara Ettinger: "Architektur in Kassel", p. 75 in: "Kulturstadt Kassel", Thomas Walliczek (ed.), Phoenix Verlag, Kassel, ISBN 3-9809900-0-1
- ↑ a b Barbara Ettinger: "Architecture in Kassel", p. 76 in: "Kulturstadt Kassel", Thomas Walliczek (ed.), Phoenix Verlag, Kassel, ISBN 3-9809900-0-1
- ↑ Barbara Ettinger-Brinckmann: "Architektur in Kassel", p. 74 in: "Kulturstadt Kassel", Thomas Walliczek (ed.), Phoenix Verlag, Kassel, ISBN 3-9809900-0-1 , quoting from: "Kassel im 18 . Century - Residence and City "