Air raids on Friedrichshafen
During the Second World War there were eleven Allied air raids on Friedrichshafen with a total of one thousand dead and wounded and the almost complete destruction of the old Lake Constance city .
Friedrichshafen
Friedrichshafen , named after the Württemberg King Friedrich I , was created in 1811 from the merger of the village settlement at Hofen Monastery and the imperial city of Buchhorn . Even before the Second World War, the city of 30,000 was shaped by well-known industrial companies such as Dornier-Werke , MTU Friedrichshafen , Luftschiffbau Zeppelin , ZF Friedrichshafen and their suppliers. Because of this sizeable cluster of industries, the city was a target for Allied air raids. It should be noted, however, that not only industrial areas on the outskirts but also densely populated inner-city districts were targeted ( moral bombing strategy ).
Würzburg giant and weapon of retaliation 2
The Allies erroneously suspected that there was also a production line with parts manufacturing for the Würzburg giant within the Zeppelin airship company . This radar device in the development stage was an essential aid of the Kammhuber line , named after the general of the night hunting and commander of the night fighters Josef Kammhuber .
What the Allies did not find out, however, was that the Luftschiffbau Zeppelin was to start manufacturing parts for the large rocket Aggregat 4 , better known under the propaganda name of Vergeltungswaffe 2 - V2 for short. In fact, on June 21, 1943 and October 8, 1943, there were two targeted air raids on Luftschiffbau Zeppelin in Friedrichshafen, which more or less by chance prevented the production of Retaliatory Weapons 2.
April 28, 1944
On April 28, 1944, the Allies targeted a residential area for the first time. The attack lasted from 2:00 a.m. to 2:50 a.m. 185,000 incendiary bombs , 580 high- explosive bombs and 170 air mines were dropped in these fifty minutes . 136 people died. The hospitals and emergency rooms recorded 375 wounded people after the attack.
literature
- Raimund Hug-Biegelmann: Friedrichshafen in the air war 1939–1945 . City of Friedrichshafen, Friedrichshafen 2003, ISBN 3-89549-302-3 .
- Hans Willbold: The aerial warfare between the Danube and Lake Constance: preparations, airfields and their occupancy, air raids, crashes . Federsee-Verlag, Bad Buchau 2002, ISBN 3-925171-54-1 , pp. 216-226.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ p. 186, The fire. Germany in the bombing war 1940–1945. Propylaea, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-548-60432-3 .
- ↑ SWR4: First air raid on Friedrichshafen on June 21, 2013, accessed on January 4, 2015
- ↑ City of Friedrichshafen - The Second World War: Friedrichshafen and the Second World War ( Memento of the original from January 4, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. accessed on January 4, 2015
