Air raid on Wallhausen (helmets)

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Towards the end of the Second World War , on February 22, 1945, there was a heavy air raid on the village of Wallhausen an der Helme , west of Sangerhausen . This was carried out by 19 four-engine, strategic bombers of the United States Army Air Forces of the type B-24 ("Liberator"). At 13:05 when visibility was good, they dropped 166 high- explosive explosive bombs (41.5 tons) on the location classified as a "secondary target". The church and 19 residential buildings were destroyed, 25 houses badly damaged and 50 lightly damaged. A total of 70 people died, including many women and children. It was the greatest catastrophe that has hit Wallhausen in recent history.

Lighter air raids in February and March 1945

  • FEBRUARY 15: US - low-flying aircraft shoot at noon with strafing a passenger train on the block Pfeiffer home at Wallhausen and shoot between Wallhausen Sangerhausen and a tanker on fire.
  • February 19: At 1:45 p.m., a low-flying attack on Wallhausen station takes place . In the neighboring button factory, a workmaid is killed and a worker is wounded.
  • February 21: Air raids on all trains between Nordhausen and Wallhausen take place at noon .
  • March 30th: at 5.30 p.m. there is an air raid on a passenger train on Brandrain near Wallhausen

Operation Clarion

The great attack on Wallhausen and at the same time on the neighboring Sangerhausen took place as part of the Anglo-American Operation Clarion , which on February 22nd and 23rd, 1945 with 6,500 aircraft directed against 200 targets in the German Reich in order to close its traffic connections, the road and rail network prevent. It was the largest and most extensive air war campaign of the Western Allies. The attack height of the 3,500 heavy bombers involved had also been lowered to the "optimum" of 3,000 to 3,900 meters in order to achieve the greatest possible accuracy with the German air defense already reduced. From the 8th Air Force on February 22, 1945, 1,372 heavy bombers of the types B-17 ("Flying Fortresses") and B-24 ("Liberator"), as well as 817 fighter planes / fighter-bombers were on their way over central and western Germany.

The great air raid on Wallhausen on February 22, 1945

B-24 "Liberator" in formation

The air raid on Wallhausen an der Helme took place on February 22, 1945, with a clear view from a height of only 3500 meters, by 19 heavy American B-24 bombers ("Liberator"), which were stationed for the 2nd Air Division in eastern England 8th Air Force belonged to. The bombers came from the south, from the direction of Brücken / Kyffhäusergebirge . Ten of the attacking machines formed bomber group 389 A and nine machines formed group 389 C (this actually included 10 aircraft, one of which, however, got rid of its bomb load in Quakenbrück in the district of Osnabrück ). The plan was to drop 186 high-explosive (HE) 500-pound high-explosive bombs by 20 planes; in fact, 166 of these bombs were dropped by 19 planes on Wallhausen.

The destruction

Wallhausen had no military facilities. The specified target of the attack were the Reichsstrasse 80 through the village and the railway line Sangerhausen-Nordhausen on the northern edge of the village. There was no railway junction and no actual freight yard.

The US Air Force report reported after the mission: a small number of hits on the main track and 5 more explosions on side tracks. At least 70 explosions occurred in the northern half of the "city" (so labeled), with possible hits in a "storage area" that bordered the tracks and other possible hits on the main road.

In Wallhausen, 137 bombs were initially detected, 110 of them on the town and the rest on open fields north of the railroad tracks. The number of bombs dropped was later corrected to 166 according to US data. A bomb hit a station building and destroyed wagons. In the place itself, "terrible destruction was done within seconds." Wallhausen was destroyed to 50%. The post and main streets were no longer passable due to bombs and debris. In the main street, at its two bends in the center of the village (Alter Markt) and at the western exit of the town (Oberfleck, near the school and church), there were two huge bomb craters about 10 meters deep and 20 meters in diameter. 18 houses were completely destroyed, 25 houses with stables were badly damaged and 50 were slightly damaged. The Church of St. Peter and Paul received a direct hit, which destroyed the nave and badly damaged the massive tower. 5 bombs fell on the cemetery : graves were torn open, body parts exposed and tombstones flew a hundred meters. Cattle perished in the stables : 9 horses, 18 cattle, 10 sheep and 15 pigs.

Destroyed buildings: Hauptstrasse 66 (“Grüne Tanne” inn), church gate 123 (not rebuilt), church gate 124 (school, not rebuilt); Hauptstrasse 127 (The Beehive, damaged, demolished in 1946), Hauptstrasse 128, 134, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147 (not rebuilt), 148 (not rebuilt), 182, 183 (Am Blauen Tor); Poststrasse 208, 215, 216; At cemetery 221. Also: Hauptstrasse 125: the church.

The castle , the few industrial plants , the air watch and the RAD camp (no longer used as such in 1945) were not hit.

The victims

An eyewitness after the attack: “You could see sad scenes. Relatives looked for their buried relatives. ”. "The comrades of the (fire) -wehr did self-sacrificing work on February 22nd and afterwards with the removal of the bomb damage and the rescue of the dead, some of which had to be housed in the fire-fighting equipment house." Also the population and the members of the factories of Wallhausen According to the stoneware, they participated in the salvage work immediately after the bombing. The foreign workers were also used. The weirs from neighboring towns also helped, especially those from bridges . The Sangerhausen fire brigade was bound by the severe destruction in the station area and the city as a result of the simultaneous air attack.

After the attack and the rescue, 62 civilian German fatalities, two dead Wehrmacht soldiers and four dead Poles were found. Two of about 80 seriously wounded died a little later. During excavation work in the center of the village, the remains of a 12-year-old boy were recovered in 1957. This results in a total of 70 fatalities, 66 German and four Polish. The local chronicler also writes: "In total, we assume 70 people who lost their lives in the attack". A refugee family from East Prussia was also among the dead .

The church register records the names, age and gender of the 50 victims buried in the collective grave in the Wallhausen cemetery. There were 30 adults (up to the age of 86), 20 women and 10 men. 20 victims were children between the ages of one and 14 years. Other burials took place in family graves and in neighboring places.

Apart from the Poles, there were no bomb victims among the foreigners: not the Dutch in the Ratskeller, the French prisoners of war and Poles in the Schieferhof, or the Soviet prisoners of war in Hauptstrasse No. 186.

Burial place and memorial

Monument (from 1956) in Wallhausen
Plaque on mass grave for 50 bomb victims in Wallhausen
Grave field with 50 bomb victims on February 22, 1945 in Wallhausen

With great sympathy from the population, 50 Wallhausen victims were buried in a mass grave in the local cemetery on February 27, 1945 starting at 9 a.m. as part of a funeral service . The bomb victims also included four Poles who perished in the “Grüne Tanne” inn.

At the time of the Soviet occupation zone / GDR, a large wooden cross (with a sloping crossbar) was erected on the edge of the burial site, bearing the inscription: "You fell as heroes, as fighters, as victims against fascism" . The cross was renewed in 1998 (with the same inscription). It still existed in early 2018, with an illegible inscription. At the beginning of April 2018 the cross was no longer there (for restoration?).

The preserved war memorial from 1925 for those who died in World War I in front of the church ruins disappeared after 1945. On September 3, 1949, the damaged church tower was blown up in the presence of the mayor and other personalities of the time. The rubble remained lying for many years as a pile of stones before it was arranged into a kind of memorial on a private initiative in the 1960s. On August 7, 1945, a commission made up of a government building officer, district administrator, mayor and other experts from the Sangerhausen district recommended that the ruins of the church tower should be left standing: “The church tower should be preserved as a landmark in the landscape that can be seen from afar and as a valuable architectural monument stay."

In 1956, not far from the church, a large cube made of red granite with a fire bowl was erected as a memorial / memorial. On its eastern side it bears the inscription: "The victims of February 22, 1945 and the dead of the two world wars call for peace" .

Local residents report that the bombing was not a (public) issue later in the GDR era.

After the political changes in 1989/90, the air raid and its victims were remembered. On the anniversary of 1993, a list of names with the Wallhausen dead appeared in the press. On the 50th anniversary the following was posted: “Announcement: 'Honor the dead'. February 22, 1945 - February 22, 1995. On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the destruction of Wallhausen, a wreath-laying ceremony will take place on Wednesday, February 22, 1995 at 1:00 pm at the memorial in Wallhausen, followed by a memorial service in the church. Hinsching, Mayor ”. 100 wall houses met at the memorial and in the church. The church bells rang from 13:05 as long as the attack had lasted. Mayor Klaus Hinsching put down a bouquet of flowers and gave a memorial address. The local chronicler Klaus Thieme wrote in 2000 on the 55th anniversary: ​​"February 22nd will once again be the anniversary of the terrible day on which American bombers wreaked havoc on our town."

On February 22, 2005, on the edge of the lawn of the communal grave, near the cemetery chapel, a memorial stone was consecrated with the following inscription, which is difficult to read: “Resting place. Victims of the air raid on February 22, 1945. Donated to the Wallhausen community in 2005 ” . More than 400 people took part in a memorial event on February 26, 2005 in the “Haus der Sonne” restaurant.

Every year on February 22nd at 13:05 the (saved, historical) bell of the church of St. Peter and Paul, which has been rebuilt on a smaller floor plan and has no tower, rings as a reminder of the devastating bomb attack.

literature

  • Roger Freeman: Mighty Eighth War Diary . JANEs: London, New York, Sydney 1981. ISBN 0 7106 0038 0 . Pp. 445/446.
  • Karl Kiepe: eyewitness report on the bombing raid on Wallhausen in February 1945. Quoted from Thilo Ziegler: Looking for traces. 1999. p. 22.
  • Karl Nebe: Eyewitness report on the bombing raid on Wallhausen on February 22, 1945. Excerpt from the newspaper "Freiheit" of February 21, 1953.
  • Richard Rasehorn: Collection of materials about the Second World War in the Sangerhausen district. Kelbra 1947.
  • Klaus Thieme (local writer): Collection of material on the history of Wallhausen. Wallhausen community archive.
  • Klaus Thieme (local writer, author of the text contributions): Chronicle of the community of Wallhausen / Helme. Historical chronological table of the community . Published by the Wallhausen / Helme municipality. 1st edition 2008. Foreword: Klaus Hinsching, Mayor.
  • Thilo Ziegler : Looking for traces. The district of Sangerhausen from 1939 to 1945 . Sangerhausen, 1999.
  • Thilo Ziegler : Under the swastika. An outline of the history of the Sangerhausen district from 1933 to 1945 . Sondershausen, 2004.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Roger Freeman: Mighty Eighth War Diary , p. 445.
  2. ↑ Thilo Ziegler: Under the swastika . 2004. p. 227
  3. ↑ Thilo Ziegler: In search of traces . 1999. p. 44.
  4. ^ Kiepe, Nebe: Zeitzeugen, quoted from Thilo Ziegler 1999, pp. 22 and 23.
  5. ^ Klaus Thieme, Ortschronik Wallhausen.
  6. ^ Klaus Thieme: Ortschronik.
  7. ^ Karl Kiepe, quoted from Thilo Ziegler, 1999. p. 22
  8. ↑ From the history of the Wallhausen fire brigade. In: "Goldene Aue Kurier", June 17, 2011
  9. ^ Karl Nebe, quoted from Thilo Ziegler, 1999. pp. 22, 23
  10. ↑ Thilo Ziegler: Under the swastika . 2004. p. 80
  11. ↑ Mitteldeutsche Zeitung of February 23, 1995
  12. ^ Helme-Kurier, February 25, 2000

Web links

Commons : Air raid on Wallhausen  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files