Air raid on Wangerooge on April 25, 1945
On April 25, 1945, shortly before the end of World War II in Europe, there was a heavy air raid on Wangerooge by 482 British, Canadian and French bombers of the Allied air forces. It was rather a failure, since almost all the bunkered gun batteries remained intact and the island, which had been declared a fortress , did not surrender. The initiative for this attack came from the Canadian ground forces , who were assigned the task of conquering the East Frisian coast. It was one of the last major attacks by the Royal Air Force (RAF) against the German Reich .
prehistory
Before and during the Second World War, Wangerooge (especially on the north side of the island in the dunes ) was equipped with around ten large and medium-caliber gun batteries. Each battery had two to six guns with the associated crew, ammunition and command bunkers , so that there were about 100 bunkers on the island . The purpose of the facilities was, on the one hand, the defense against enemy naval forces, but above all the protection of the fairway to the Reich war port of Wilhelmshaven, 30 kilometers to the south . Most of the cannons were also used for air defense against the Allied bomber units flying into Germany. There were also numerous searchlights - and other small-caliber flak positions , especially to protect the airfield against low-flying aircraft . In addition, various radar radio measuring devices of a flight reporting control unit ( Würzburg , Freya and Wassermann radar devices ) were set up on the island . As a result, flight targets up to 400 kilometers away could be recorded and own interceptors could be guided to the target even when hunting at night .
Even in the last days of the war, Wangerooge was declared a fortress when the Allied troops advanced on the mainland . The island was prepared as a battlefield in the event of an invasion by means of entrenchments , such as armored trenches and trenches, and the laying of around 10,000 mines . The soldiers prepared for an invasion with ground fighting and set up flame thrower , machine gun and anti- tank gun positions.
Justification for the air strike
The initiative for the major attack on Wangerooge came from the headquarters of the Canadian troops , whose land forces within the 21st Army Group were supposed to conquer the East Frisian coast including the islands . At the time of the decision on April 24, 1945, the headquarters was near Meppen in Emsland . The British Field Marshal Montgomery was also in favor of heavy bombing in order to prevent high losses in the event of a possible invasion. In historical retrospect, the urgent military necessity of the bombing of Wangerooge, as well as that of the major attack on Heligoland on April 18 and 19, 1945, is doubtful. The advance of the Allies on the mainland was rapid. The air attack possibly came about because of the high material superiority that one wanted to use.
The Canadians had an extensive dossier on the island's military situation. The findings came from aerial reconnaissance and espionage sources. However, the defenses and the number of batteries and their guns were significantly overestimated. The firepower of the coastal defense was much lower, since numerous artillery pieces had already been brought to other theaters of war during the war (for example to Las Palmas in 1941 as military aid for the Spanish dictator Franco ). In the empty positions, the Wehrmacht had set up dummy guns made of wood as a deception .
The attack
departure
A total of 482 bombers of the Royal Air Force (RAF 256), the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF 206) and the Forces aériennes françaises libres (FAFL 18) started the attack at around 2:30 p.m. on 25 airfields in southern England . 466 four-engined bombers of the types Halifax (308) and Lancaster (158) and 16 twin-engined target marker aircraft of the type Mosquito were launched. The aircraft crews comprised around 3,300 men with 2,176 tons of bomb cargo.
Target of attack
The aim was to destroy the large-caliber sea target batteries that were suspected to be on the island and viewed as a threat to further military operations. But there were only four ready-to-use heavy anti-aircraft guns and three heavy flak batteries. The tactical air strike was aimed specifically at the military installations and not at the civilian population.
Start and implementation
The 51-meter-high Wassermann-type radio measuring device set up on Wangerooge (near the west tower) with a range of 400 kilometers has already located the bomber formations gathering over south-east England.
At 4:47 p.m., a pre-alarm was triggered for the population, who then went to the air raid shelters in the village. The island's population expected an attack, as Heligoland had been the target of a serious attack about a week earlier . In spite of this, the alarm was not given great importance, as large groups of bombers flew into Germany every day.
At 4:59 p.m., mosquito bombers set their target markers over the bunkers in the dunes. It was only at this point in time, when the bomber pulks were over the island, that it was certain that the major attack was aimed at Wangerooge. At 5 p.m. the flak positions opened fire, which they ceased soon afterwards. Their cannons were partially jammed by flying debris.
At 5:16 p.m. the attack was canceled because the "master bomber" considered further bombing to be pointless in view of the destruction. In only about fifteen minutes, over 6,000 high- explosive bombs (type: 500lb ( 227 kg ) and 1000lb ( 454 kg )) fell in three waves of attack , which left a crater landscape.
losses
During their attack, the Allies lost six bombers through collisions in the air, only one bomber was shot down. Of the 50 crew members of the crashed aircraft, only one survived.
Died on the ground:
- 131 German soldiers
- 121 forced laborers from the Netherlands , Belgium , Poland , France and Morocco
- 6 naval assistants
- 21 local women and children
Two military bunkers , each with a crew of 20, including a command bunker, were hit directly. The 120 people injured by the attack were transported to the mainland to a hospital in Wittmund .
Balance sheet
Militarily, the air strike was a failure; because almost all of the gun batteries were ready for action again after a few hours. In view of the many bombs, the losses among the island's population were comparatively small. The attack caused higher losses among foreign forced laborers. Their barracks were completely unprotected and they were not allowed to enter bunkers.
Commemoration
A command bunker with 20 people was hit by a bomb in the attack. Since it only contained body parts, it was locked and declared a war grave. Today an inscription plaque and a large cross remind of the event. In 1951 the Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge (VDK) established a cemetery of honor near the island village. 238 victims of the bomb attack were there reburied . During the air raid, some bunkers and guns and more than half of the houses were destroyed. The bunkers that remained intact were blown up by the Allies in June 1945.
surrender
The air attack did not lead to the surrender of the Wangerooge fortress . Instead, the fortress commander spread slogans to hold out. The fighting against enemy aircraft continued at a low level in late April and early May 1945. The last shot at Wangerooge was fired on May 4, 1945 by an anti-aircraft battery to prevent British fighter planes from attacking German motor ships. Only after the partial capitulation was signed on May 4, 1945 in Wendisch Evern , for which the German signatories were authorized by Reich President Karl Dönitz , who remained in the Mürwik special area , did the Second World War begin on May 5 at 7 a.m. in northwest Germany and also on Wangerooge to an end. On May 11, 1945, individual Allied soldiers entered the island for the first time and landed with two aircraft. The military occupation took place from May 20, 1945 by Canadian troops.
today
Until the 1970s, numerous remains of bunkers and bomb craters were still visible in the dunes . The Café Pudding emerged from a gun emplacement. Since the end of the war, efforts have been made to remove the remains of the war due to tourism . Today there are hardly any traces of the military past to be found, as they are covered with sand or overgrown by plants. In some of the bomb craters , ecologically valuable small biotopes have developed over the decades .
See also
literature
- Hans Jürgen Jürgens: Testimonies from a disastrous time. A war diary on the events of 1939–1945 in the Wangerooge-Spiekeroog-Langeoog area and the situation in the Reich and on the fronts , CL Mettcker & Sons, Jever 1989, 6th edition 2003, ISBN 3-87542-008-X