The bombing of Nuremberg was a series of air raids carried out by allied forces of the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) that caused heavy damage throughout the city from 1940 through 1945. Nuremberg was a favored point of attack for allied bombers in World War II even though it was only later included into the radius of action due to its location in the south of Germany. Because Nuremberg was a strong economic and infrastructural hub and had symbolic importance as the "City of the Nuremberg Rally" it was singled out by the Allies as an important target.
The greatest damages occurred from the attack on 2 January 1945 in which 521 RAF bombers dropped 6,000 high-explosive bombs and one million incendiary devices on the city. The population suffered more than 1,800 deaths and 100,000 people lost their homes in this attack. Nuremberg's old town was almost completely destroyed, and the city as a whole was badly damaged. After Würzburg, Nuremberg was one of Bavaria's cities that suffered the most damage in the war, and was also among the most destroyed cities in Germany as a whole. [1]
The eastern half of the city (north of the Pegnitz river) was known as the "steppe" after the destruction and during the clearing of the rubble. The air raids ceased on 11 April 1945. On 20 April, after the Battle of Nuremberg, the city was occupied by units of the 7th US Army.
Nuremberg was an important production location for armaments and the densely populated medieval old town was a well-suited destination for the purposes of the area bombing directive of the Royal Air Force (RAF). Nuremberg, which during the period of Nazi rule was officially given the nickname "City of the Nuremberg Rally", was also a target for attacks with a considerable symbolic effect.
In relation to the total building mass, the inner city had a high proportion of half-timbered houses, i.e. buildings with a high proportion of wood that are highly combustible, and was therefore suitable for an effective attack using a combination of explosive and incendiary bombs. The purpose was to ignite a firestorm to increase the effect of the incendiary bombs. Daytime attacks on industrial and infrastructure targets were mostly carried out by the technically better equipped US Army Air Forces as part of the division of labor of the Allied air fleets in order to achieve a high degree of accuracy, which was technologically only possible to a limited extent. Nighttime area bombardments were mostly flown by the RAF's Pathfinder Force. [2]
In the urban area, but not in the old town, which was most severely affected by the attack of 2 January 1945, there were numerous military targets: [3] The factories of MAN in the south of the city built diesel engines for submarines and relevant components for Panther tanks. Other important companies were Siemens-Schuckert, TeKaDe , Nüral (Nürnberger Aluminiumwerke, now Federal-Mogul), and Diehl. In addition the bombers targeted the Nuremberg motorcycle industry (Zündapp/Neumeyer, Hercules, Triumph, Victoria) and 120 other armament and companies that employed forced labor as well as the facilities of the German Reichsbahn: the marshaling yard in the south of the city and the main railway lines running over Nuremberg. [SL 1]
Until 1942, there were only minor attacks. From 1942 to 1944 there was a fight for air supremacy over Germany which was won by the Allies in large parts. From autumn 1944, airfields of the Allies had moved close enough that it was possible to deploy low-flying aircraft. The following table is based on the information provided by G. W. Schramm. [4]
Date | Aircraft | Bomb load(t) | Description of the air raid | Casualties and damages |
---|---|---|---|---|
1940 | ||||
7 August | Bombs on Fürth/Burgfarrnbach | |||
20/21 December | Bombs on Nazi party rally grounds | |||
1941 | ||||
12/13 October | 152 RAF bombers, esp. Wellington and Whitley | Only 20 high-explosive and 14 incendiary devices hit target; minor damage to Nuremberg but severe damage to Schwabach | 9 casualties; 50 destroyed houses in Schwabach | |
1942 | ||||
28/29 August | RAF bombers | South-west of the city park and the southern city, Alte Kongresshalle/Luitpoldhalle in the Luitpoldarena, die Nuremberg castle | 136 casualties; 152 destroyed houses, 220 fires | |
thereafter | 4 air raid warnings | |||
1943 | ||||
25/26 February | 337 four-engined RAF bombers | Due to low visibility bombs were dropped on the surrounding Knoblauchsland, northern parts of the city, the Dynamit AG plant in Stadeln/Fürth and the fortified church in Kraftshof | 27 casualties; 44 large, 8 medium and 10 minor fires | |
8/9 March starting 11:00 p.m. | 335 four-engined RAF bombers | 358 t high-explosive, 412 t incendiary bombs | Southern old town: Mauthalle; Nuremberg Castle, Siemens-Trafowerk, marshaling yard | 343 casualties; 171 large, 339 minor and 1746 minor fires; time-bombs |
10/11 August 00:48 | 653 four-engined RAF bombersF: Lancaster, Stirling, Halifax | 878 t high-explosive, 878 t incendiary bombs | North, southern old town, Wöhrd; St. Sebald, St. Lorenz; u. a. Germanisches Nationalmuseum, the last remaining hop hall on the Kornmarkt. Fürth, Fischbach and Feucht | 585 casualties; 1732 destroyed, 1156 severely damaged 2386 moderately damaged buildings |
27/28 August | 674 four-engined RAF bombers | Darkness, strong flak and night fighters disturbed the target approach, many bombs fell on southern suburbs. In Nuremberg: Maxfeld, Nordostbahnhof, southern old town, Laufamholz; the companies Neumeyer and MAN | 56 casualties; 458 destroyed, 361 moderately damaged buildings and 1704 with minor damages | |
1944 | ||||
25 February 12:47 p.m. | 172 USAAF Liberator | Target was Fürther Flugzeugwerk Bachmann von Blumenthal & Co. | 138 casualties, 122 injured | |
31 March | 795 RAF bombers: 572 Lancaster, 214 Halifax, 9 Mosquitos | 910 t high-explosive, 1176 t incendiary bombs | "The Nuremberg Raid": The attackers suffered heavy losses: 95 bombers were shot down. In Nuremberg the attack was classified as "moderately severe", further damage in the eastern neighboring towns (Röthenbach an der Pegnitz, Behringersdorf, Lauf an der Pegnitz). | In Nuremberg: 74 casualties and 122 injured; 130 destroyed, 879 moderately damaged buildings and 2505 with minor damages |
10 April 10:48 a.m. | 233 B-17G and 241 USAAF escort fighter planes | Fürth, Nürnberger armament companies: MAN, TEKADE | 82 casualties, 366 injured; 211 destroyed, 214 severely damaged, 1365 moderately damaged buildings and 1800 with minor damages | |
13 air raid warnings | ||||
3 October 11:15 a.m. | 454 USAAF B-17 | Targeted were the MAN facilities but low visibility due to clouds. Instead hit by the bombs: Weinstadel, Viatishaus, 62 Patrician houses | 353 casualties, 1033 injured; 518 destroyed, 738 severely damaged, 1097 moderately damaged buildings and 4109 with minor damages | |
19/20 October | 263 RAF Lancaster and 7 Mosquitos | Southern city and old town. Gustav-Adolf church, MAN, Siemens, marshaling yard | 237 casualties, 10,383 shelterless | |
62 air raid warnings | ||||
25/26 November | RAF Mosquitos | Small interference attack, one train and multiple houses hit | over 60 casualties | |
until 24 December | RAF Mosquitos | Small interference attacks; dubbed "Mosquitos on siren tours" in Britain | ||
1945 | ||||
2 Januar, evening | 514 RAF Lancaster and 7 Mosquitos | 1825 t high-explosive, 479 t incendiary bombs | Complete destruction of the Nuremberg old town with irrecoverable damage to the historic building structure. Attacks on MAN, TEKADE, Nüral, Nürnberger Schraubenfabrik | 1835 casualties, [5] over 3000 injured, 100,000 shelterless; 4553 destroyed, 2047 severely damaged, 2993 moderately damaged buildings and 7000 with minor damages; 1 conflagration and 2 block fire, 1194 major, 851 medium and 1070 small fires |
January and February | RAF Mosquitos | Small interference attacks | ||
20 February 12:30 p.m. | 831 USAAF B-17 and 360 B-24 | Already on the approach, the B-24 had to turn around because of thunderstorms. Because of cloud cover over the target the bombs were thrown blind and distributed over the whole city; accumulations at railway facilities and in the southern part of town. | see below | |
21 February 10:40 a.m. | 1205 USAAF bombers | Targeted were the main station and marshaling yards, but Gostenhof and St. Johannis were also hit. | 1356 casualties and 70,000 shelterless | |
February/March | 2 interference attacks | |||
16 March 08:53 p.m. | 301 RAF Lancaster und 40 Mosquitos | Severe damages in the southern part of the city: Steinbühl and Galgenhof, St. Peter, Gostenhof; Muggenhof, Thon, Schnepfenreuth and Poppenreuth | 517 casualties | |
19 March | Störangriffe | |||
5 April | 254 USAAF B-17 | Targeted were the main station and marshaling yards, but mostly hit were southern residential areas | see below | |
5 April | 72 USAAF B-17 | Fürth and Unterschlauersbach air base | 197 casualties | |
8 April | 89 USAAF B-24 | Targeted was the Bachmann von Blumenthal & Co. air plane factory in Fürth | ||
5–10 April | Low-flying aircraft | Rail transports, anti-aircraft positions around Zollhaus, railroad repair plant in Gostenhof | ||
11 April, afternoon | 143 RAF bombers | Marshaling yards and surrounding residential areas | 74 casualties |
Nuremberg's old town was largely destroyed. The southern parts of the city, St. Johannis and other neighborhoods were also hard hit. After Cologne, Dortmund and Kassel, Nuremberg had the largest amount of rubble per inhabitant among the major German cities. [6] The population of Nuremberg had fallen from 420,349 in 1939 to 195,000 by the end of the war. Furthermore half of all dwellings had been destroyed, the rest often damaged.
In 1947, ideas for reconstruction were collected in an urban planning competition. The "Kuratorium für den Wiederaufbau Nürnbergs" (Board of Trustees for the Reconstruction of Nuremberg) advised the city administration on questions of reconstruction. A simplified reconstruction was agreed upon. [SL 2]
It was at this time that the organisation 'The Old Town Friends Nuremberg (German: Altstadtfreunde Nürnberg e. V.) was set up to advocate a faithful, accurate reconstruction of the old town. The association supports the preservation and restoration of the existing historical old town houses and other architectural monuments in Nuremberg that are worth preserving. [7]
By 1955 most of the reconstruction work had been completed or at least begun. From 1956 to 1960 the Nuremberg Town Hall (Wolffscher Bau, Rathaussaalbau) was rebuilt. Until 1957 the St. Sebaldus church was repaired. The largest restoration project was the city walls of Nuremberg with its 4 km long double wall and the moat. [8]
The Katharinenkloster Nuremberg, today called Katherinenruine, which was completely destroyed during the air raids in 1945, was not rebuilt but secured as a ruin in 1970/71. Since then it has served as a memorial to the war and as a venue for events. [9]
Even after the end of the Second World War, unexploded bombs were (and still are) found in Nuremberg. They are often discovered by chance during construction work, and are rarely searched for in a targeted manner. The explosive ordnance clearance service (Kampfmittelräumdienst) is responsible for defusing and securing the aircraft bombs. Large-scale evacuations may be necessary during these operations.
The bombing of Dresden was a joint British and American aerial bombing attack on the city of Dresden, the capital of the German state of Saxony, during World War II. In four raids between 13 and 15 February 1945, 772 heavy bombers of the Royal Air Force (RAF) and 527 of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) dropped more than 3,900 tons of high-explosive bombs and incendiary devices on the city. The bombing and the resulting firestorm destroyed more than 1,600 acres (6.5 km2) of the city centre. Up to 25,000 people were killed. Three more USAAF air raids followed, two occurring on 2 March aimed at the city's railway marshalling yard and one smaller raid on 17 April aimed at industrial areas.
Firebombing is a bombing technique designed to damage a target, generally an urban area, through the use of fire, caused by incendiary devices, rather than from the blast effect of large bombs. In popular usage, any act in which an incendiary device is used to initiate a fire is often described as a "firebombing".
The Allied bombing of Hamburg during World War II included numerous attacks on civilians and civic infrastructure. As a large city and industrial centre, Hamburg's shipyards, U-boat pens, and the Hamburg-Harburg area oil refineries were attacked throughout the war.
Berlin, the capital of Nazi Germany, was subject to 363 air raids during the Second World War. It was bombed by the RAF Bomber Command between 1940 and 1945, the United States Army Air Forces' Eighth Air Force between 1943 and 1945, and the French Air Force in 1940 and between 1944 and 1945 as part of the Allied campaign of strategic bombing of Germany. It was also attacked by aircraft of the Red Air Force in 1941 and particularly in 1945, as Soviet forces closed on the city. British bombers dropped 45,517 tons of bombs, while American aircraft dropped 22,090.3 tons. As the bombings continued, more and more people fled the city. By May 1945, 1.7 million people had fled.
During the latter stages of World War II, Pforzheim, a town in southwestern Germany, was bombed several times. The largest raid, one of the most devastating area bombardments of the war, was carried out by the Royal Air Force (RAF) on the evening of February 23, 1945. Some 17,600 people, or 31.4% of the town's population, were killed. About 83% of the town's buildings were destroyed, two-thirds of the complete area of Pforzheim and between 80% and 100% of the inner city.
The city of Würzburg was attacked as part of the strategic bombing campaign in World War II by the Allies against Nazi Germany. Although lacking major armaments industries and hosting around 40 hospitals at the time, Würzburg was targeted as a traffic hub and as part of the attempt by Bomber Command to break the spirit of the German people. The major raid occurred on March 16, 1945, when Royal Air Force bombers dropped incendiary bombs that set fire to much of the city, killing an estimated 5,000 people and almost completely obliterating the historic town. Almost 90% of the buildings were destroyed by a raid that lasted less than 20 minutes.
During World War II, Braunschweig was attacked by Allied aircraft in 42 bombing raids. On the night of 14/15 October 1944, the attack by No. 5 Group Royal Air Force (RAF) marked the high point of the destruction of Henry the Lion's city during the war. The air raid was part of Operation Hurricane, which was designed to demonstrate the capabilities of the Allied bombing campaign. The attack caused a massive conflagration, that might have developed into a firestorm, and resulted in Braunschweig burning continuously for two and a half days from 15 to 17 October. More than 90 percent of the medieval city centre was destroyed, changing the city's appearance to the present day.
The Area Bombing Directive was a directive from the wartime British Government's Air Ministry to the Royal Air Force, which ordered RAF Bomber Command to destroy Germany's industrial workforce and the morale of the German population, through bombing German cities and their civilian inhabitants.
Darmstadt was bombed a number of times during World War II. The most devastating air raid on Darmstadt occurred on the night of 11/12 September 1944 when No. 5 Group of the Royal Air Force (RAF) bombed the city. 66,000 of the 110,000 inhabitants of Darmstadt at the time became homeless. Darmstadt lost between 12,500 and 13,500 inhabitants during World War II. The calligraphic memorial Darmstädter Brandnamen lists about 4,000 names. Darmstadt had several major industrial targets including Merck and Rohm and Haas chemical works as well as military communications networks.
The Battle of Berlin was a bombing campaign against Berlin by RAF Bomber Command along with raids on other German cities to keep German defences dispersed. Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris, Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief (AOC-in-C) Bomber Command, believed that "We can wreck Berlin from end to end if the USAAF come in with us. It will cost us between 400 and 500 aircraft. It will cost Germany the war".
The German city of Mannheim in the state of Baden-Württemberg saw bombing during World War II from December 1940 until the end of the war. Mannheim saw over 150 air raids.
The German city of Hildesheim, c. 30 kilometres south of Hanover, was the target of eight Allied air raids in 1944 and 1945 and suffered considerable bomb damage.
During World War II, the city of Lübeck was the first German city to be attacked in substantial numbers by the Royal Air Force. The attack on the night of 28 March 1942 created a firestorm that caused severe damage to the historic centre, with bombs destroying three of the main churches and large parts of the built-up area. It led to the retaliatory "Baedeker" raids on historic British cities.
During World War II, the German city of Heilbronn was bombed numerous times by the British Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Forces. The largest air-raid occurred on December 4, 1944, but Heilbronn was targeted several times before and after until the end of World War II. Altogether, an estimated 7,000 inhabitants of the city lost their lives during bombings.
The city walls are the medieval defensive mechanism surrounding the old city of Nuremberg, Germany. Construction started in the 12th century and ended officially in the 16th century. They measured 5 kilometers around the old town. The Nuremberg Castle together with the city wall is meant to be one of Europe's most considerable medieval defensive systems.
Operation Tigerfish was the military code name in World War II for the air raid on Freiburg in the evening of 27 November 1944 by the Royal Air Force with about 2,800 dead.
The German city of Freiburg was bombed erroneously on 10 May 1940 by the Luftwaffe, killing 57 inhabitants.
The aerial bombings of Hanover are a series of eighty-eight air raids by Royal Air Force (RAF) Bomber Command and the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) on the German city of Hanover during World War II. Collectively these air raids killed 6,782 persons, predominantly civilian residents. Around 1,000 aerial mines, 34,000 high explosive bombs, 900,000 incendiary bombs and 50,000 fire bombs were dropped. The most destructive and deadly air raid on Hanover was conducted by the RAF on the night beginning 8 October 1943, killing 1,245 persons, and is an example of carpet bombing of suburban and residential civilian targets laid out in the Area Bombing Directive of 14 February 1942.
The bombing of Munich took place mainly in the later stages of World War II. Munich was, and is, a significant German city, as much culturally as industrially. Augsburg, thirty-seven miles to the west, was a main centre of diesel engine production, and was also heavily bombed during the war. Although some considerable distance from the United Kingdom, Munich is not a difficult city to find from the air, mainly due to its size, and possibly its proximity to the Austrian Alps to the south-east as a visual reference point. Munich was protected (initially) by its distance from the United Kingdom. After a small air raid in November 1940 the city got little attention from bombers until 1944.
The Pellerhaus monument is an archive and library building on Egidienplatz in Nuremberg's old city centre. It extends over the area of the historic Pellerhaus and the historic Imhoff house to the east of it, which was rebuilt after the war in the contemporary design of the late 1950s.