The German city of

Hildesheim Hildesheim (; nds, Hilmessen, Hilmssen; la, Hildesia) is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany with 101,693 inhabitants. It is in the district of Hildesheim, about southeast of Hanover on the banks of the Innerste River, a small tributary of the Lei ...

, c. 30 kilometres south of

Hanover Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the 13th-largest city in Germany as well as the fourth-largest city in Northern Germany ...

, was the target of eight

Allied An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...

air raids in 1944 and 1945 and suffered considerable bomb damage.

Hildesheim during World War II

In 1939 Hildesheim had about 72,000 inhabitants. For most of the war Hildesheim was regarded as a minor target by British Bomber Command mainly because the military potential of the industry in and around Hildesheim was underestimated and classified as 'minor plants in major industries, or major plants in minor industries'. However, a branch of the Vereinigte Deutsche Metallwerke (United German Metalworks) named VDM-Halbzeugwerke in the town produced aircraft parts for

constant speed propeller In aeronautics, a variable-pitch propeller is a type of propeller (airscrew) with blades that can be rotated around their long axis to change the blade pitch. A controllable-pitch propeller is one where the pitch is controlled manually by the ...

landing gear Landing gear is the undercarriage of an aircraft or spacecraft that is used for takeoff or landing. For aircraft it is generally needed for both. It was also formerly called ''alighting gear'' by some manufacturers, such as the Glenn L. Martin ...

and aircraft engines, others were producing

fuze In military munitions, a fuze (sometimes fuse) is the part of the device that initiates function. In some applications, such as torpedoes, a fuze may be identified by function as the exploder. The relative complexity of even the earliest fuze d ...

s and tank parts (Senking-Factory),

torpedo A modern torpedo is an underwater ranged weapon launched above or below the water surface, self-propelled towards a target, and with an explosive warhead designed to detonate either on contact with or in proximity to the target. Historically, su ...

es (Ahlborn AG) and rubber products such as lifejackets and inflatable dinghies (Wetzell Gummiwerke). In the Hildesheim forest southwest of the city a subsidiary of

Robert Bosch GmbH Robert Bosch GmbH (; ), commonly known as Bosch and stylized as BOSCH, is a German multinational engineering and technology company headquartered in Gerlingen, Germany. The company was founded by Robert Bosch in Stuttgart in 1886. Bosch is 9 ...

with the

code name A code name, call sign or cryptonym is a code word or name used, sometimes clandestinely, to refer to another name, word, project, or person. Code names are often used for military purposes, or in espionage. They may also be used in industrial c ...

"ELFI" (Elektro- und Feinmechanische Industrie, Electrical and Precision Engineering Industry; from 1942 to 1952: Trillke-Factory) manufactured starters,

generator Generator may refer to: * Signal generator, electronic devices that generate repeating or non-repeating electronic signals * Electric generator, a device that converts mechanical energy to electrical energy. * Generator (circuit theory), an eleme ...

s and other components for lorry/truck and tank engines. There was also a

goods station A goods station (also known as a goods yard or goods depot) or freight station is, in the widest sense, a railway station where, either exclusively or predominantly, goods (or freight), such as merchandise, parcels, and manufactured items, are lo ...

/ marshalling (classification) yard in Hildesheim.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O

July 29, 1944

During the first air raid on Hildesheim the sugar refinery received heavy damage and the marshalling yard was slightly damaged. 34 people were killed. The city itself remained undamaged.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O

August 12, 1944

Twenty explosive and 80 incendiary bombs were dropped on Hildesheim at night.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O The sugar refinery was damaged again and the Vereinigte Deutsche Metallwerke (United German Metalworks) were slightly damaged. A few bombs hit ''Südstadt'', a residential area in the Southern part of the city where one house was destroyed and five heavily damaged. Several bombs hit the camp where the POWs were sleeping and 10 of them were killed.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O

November 26, 1944

Between 11 a.m. and 1.30 p.m. a few bombs were dropped on the forests in the west of Hildesheim and on the city itself. Hildesheim was probably an alternate target. Nobody was killed, but a few houses were damaged in the city center, which was hit for the first time. One house was destroyed in ''Steinbergviertel'', a residential area in the Southwestern part of Hildesheim.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O

February 13, 1945

An aerial mine was dropped on a tennis court at night. Nobody was killed, but hundreds of roofs were damaged in the city center and in the Southern and Southwestern residential areas.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O

February 22, 1945 (Operation Clarion)

As part of the Allied Operation Clarion (destruction of German traffic centres in smaller cities) the marshalling yard in Hildesheim was targeted in the afternoon of February 22, 1945. Due to good weather and clear sight the marshalling yard was heavily damaged, the city itself received considerable damage: 102 houses were destroyed, and 106 houses and two churches ( St. Bernward's Church and St. Lamberti Church) suffered severe damage. 998 houses and four churches, among them the

Cathedral A cathedral is a church that contains the '' cathedra'' () of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral" are usually specific to those Christian denomination ...

and Saint Michael's Church which were declared

World Heritage Site A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for h ...

in 1985, were slightly damaged.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O About 250 people were killed.

March 3, 1945

On March 3, 1945, Hildesheim was an alternate target when the city of

Braunschweig Braunschweig () or Brunswick ( , from Low German ''Brunswiek'' , Braunschweig dialect: ''Bronswiek'') is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany, north of the Harz Mountains at the farthest navigable point of the river Oker, which connects it to the Nor ...

was bombed. A total of 583 explosive bombs were dropped on ''Oststadt'', a residential area in the Eastern part of the city. 51 houses were destroyed and 58 suffered severe damage. 22 houses were slightly damaged and 52 people were killed.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O

March 14, 1945

On March 14, 1945, elements of the 1st Air Division bombed several targets in the area around Hanover. Among these were the Vereinigte Deutsche Metallwerke (VDM) and again the marshalling yard in Hildesheim. While the marshalling yard was hit hard again and disabled for several days, the bombers missed VDM and instead bombed the Senking metal works, destroying the factory. About 150 people were killed, including 60 POWs. In the city itself, 18 houses were destroyed and 20 suffered severe damage. 109 houses were slightly damaged.Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O

March 22, 1945

On March 22, 1945, Hildesheim was the key target of the Allied Bomber Command. British and Canadian bomber aircraft were ordered "to destroy built up area with associated industries and railway facilities." At 2 a.m. about 250 bomber aircraft started the attack. In the following 15 minutes, they dropped a total of 438.8 tons of high explosive and 624 tons of incendiary bombs. Almost 74% of the buildings in Hildesheim were destroyed or damaged during the attack, including nearly the entire historical city centre. 26.8% of the houses remained undamaged. The

, Saint Michael's Church and St. Lamberti were destroyed, among others. The centre, which had retained its medieval character until then, was almost levelled. Although the famous historic center had little military significance, two months before the end of the war in Europe it was chosen to be destroyed in order to shatter the will to defend as part of the

area bombing directive 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 bom ...

. Around 1,500 civilians were killed in the March attacks. About 500 of them could not be identified.

After the war

HildesheimInnenstadtOststadtLuftaufnahme1945

As people were suffering, 34,000 people or 46% of the city's population had remained homeless. Reconstruction started on 12 June 1945 when the first ruins were demolished, and the first houses were rebuilt on 26 June 1945. By February 1947 350 houses had been rebuilt.Menno Aden: ''Hildesheim lebt'', p. 199. Hildesheim 1994. As in many cities, preference was given to quickly build housing, and concrete structures took the place of the destroyed buildings. The churches, two of them now UNESCO World Heritage Sites, were all rebuilt in the original style after the war. The reconstruction of the Cathedral took ten years (1950-1960). Saint Michael's Church, another World Heritage Site, was rebuilt from 1946 to 1960. During the war, the valuable world heritage had been hidden in the basement of the city wall. In the 1980s a reconstruction of the historic centre began. Some of the unattractive concrete buildings around the historic market place were torn down and replaced by replicas of the Butchers' Guild Hall and the other original buildings. In the fall of 2007, a decision was made to reconstruct the "Umgestülpter Zuckerhut" ("

Upended Sugarloaf The Upended Sugarloaf (in German: ''Der umgestülpte Zuckerhut'') is a half-timbered house in the city of Hildesheim in the federal state of Lower Saxony in Germany. History and architecture The Upended Sugarloaf is a historic building ...

"), an iconic half-timbered house famous for its unusual shape. It was completed in October 2010.

Footnotes

References

*Hermann Meyer-Hartmann, ''Zielpunkt 52092N 09571O: Der Raum Hildesheim im Luftkrieg 1939-1945''. Hildesheim: Bernward Verlag, 1985, . {{WWII city bombing

20th century in Lower Saxony 1944 in Germany 1945 in Germany

Firebombings

Germany–United Kingdom military relations March 1945 events