The Nibelungenwerk (also known as the Nibelungenwerke or Ni-Werk) was the largest and most modern tank assembly factory in Nazi Germany, located near the Austrian town of

St. Valentin St. Valentin (also referred to as ''Sankt Valentin'') is the most westerly town in the district of Amstetten in Lower Austria in Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern pa ...

. As the only German tank production facility which had a well-structured production line, the Nibelungenwerk produced more than half of all of Nazi Germany's Panzer IV tanks.

History

The Nibelungenwerk was built as part of the

Four Year Plan The Four Year Plan was a series of economic measures initiated by Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany in 1936. Hitler placed Hermann Göring in charge of these measures, making him a Reich Plenipotentiary (Reichsbevollmächtigter) whose jurisdiction cut a ...

after the Anschluss as part of an armaments centre, along with the

Eisenwerke Oberdonau Eisenwerke Oberdonau (German for ''Steel Works of Upper Danube'') was a large steel and iron producing company, a holding of several steel works in southern Germany. Created after the Anschluss of Austria, it formed the part of the so-called '' Rei ...

. There had been plans dating back to 1939 to build an armaments plant in the Herzograd Forest near the Lower Austrian community of Sankt Valentin, which was conveniently located at a railway junction. The construction cost of 65 million Reichsmarks was paid by the Reichswerke Hermann Göring and the factory was from the outset very generously specified. Although the bulk of new construction projects for the armaments industry were frozen at the time, that did not affect the Nibelungenwerk as Hermann Göring, a representative for the four-year plan, favoured the project. The official opening took place in 1942, and eventual monthly production capacity was planned to be 320 tanks, although this was never achieved.

Expansion stages

The Nibelungenwerk was built in four stages: * The first stage was mostly focused on construction with a start-up workshop set up at

Steyr-Daimler-Puch Steyr-Daimler-Puch () was a large manufacturing conglomerate based in Steyr, Austria, which was broken up in stages between 1987 and 2001. The component parts and operations continued to exist under separate ownership and new names. History T ...

's main factory in

Steyr Steyr (; Central Bavarian: ''Steia'') is a statutory city, located in the Austrian federal state of Upper Austria. It is the administrative capital, though not part of Steyr-Land District. Steyr is Austria's 12th most populated town and the 3rd l ...

for tank spare parts in mid-1940.Winninger, p. 174 * The second stage included supply contracts for parts production were awarded beginning on 23 December 1940, including the production of 5,400 wheels for the Krupp-Gruson-Werke in

Magdeburg-Buckau Buckau is a quarter of the city of Magdeburg, capital of the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. It covers an area of 2.1803 km² and has a population of 6,217 (as of 31 December 2020).Panzer IV began, along with assembly of the Tiger I. * With the last expansion stage in 1943, production capacity was increased. Eventually, the factory consisted of a total of nine halls. Seven halls were 120 meters long and 60 meters wide and made of reinforced concrete. The other two halls were of steel construction and were 120 meters long and 120 meters wide. In order to maintain production even after bombing raids, the factory was supplied with electricity, compressed air, heat and water through an underground system. The factory was also connected to two railway lines, with each hall having its own siding.

Workforce

In the late autumn of 1941, the workforce stood at 4,800 people, mainly from Austria and Germany. During the course of the war, many Austrian and German workers were conscripted and replaced by foreign prisoners of war. In numerical order these were French, Italians, Greeks, Yugoslavs, Russians and, finally, 600 concentration camp inmates. The number of workers at the end of 1944 amounted to about 8,500 people. Due to the growing shortage of skilled workers and the time-consuming training and instruction of foreign workers, relatively large-scale concessions were made to the increasingly important foreign workers. Thus, in addition to the toleration of a

brothel A brothel, bordello, ranch, or whorehouse is a place where people engage in sexual activity with prostitutes. However, for legal or cultural reasons, establishments often describe themselves as massage parlors, bars, strip clubs, body rub par ...

in the camp settlement, the skilled workers were allowed holidays, which after the successful Allied

invasion of Normandy Operation Overlord was the codename for the Battle of Normandy, the Allied operation that launched the successful invasion of German-occupied Western Europe during World War II. The operation was launched on 6 June 1944 (D-Day) with the Norm ...

had the consequence that many Frenchmen did not return. In August 1944, an external camp of the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp complex was built on the site, in which 1,500 prisoners were accommodated and used for

forced labour Forced labour, or unfree labour, is any work relation, especially in modern or early modern history, in which people are employed against their will with the threat of destitution, detention, violence including death, or other forms of ex ...

Production

Of the total of 8,500 Panzer IVs produced, nearly 4,800 were produced in the Nibelungenwerk. After completion of the four expansion stages, the plant was the largest tank factory under Axis control. In addition to the Panzer IV, 576 self-propelled guns ( Sturmgeschütz IV and Jagdpanzer IV) were produced and the factory also converted the Porsche version of the Tiger I to the Elefant. The Nibelungenwerk was the only German tank factory which had a well-structured assembly line, with main and secondary lines. The production lines consisted of simple load-carriers, which were coupled with rods and moved forward with a cable. The production station times varied between four minutes, for the wheel suspension, to several hours, for the final assembly. As only a third of the required individual parts were manufactured in-house, the production line was dependent on undisturbed supply logistics, and on October 17, 1944, the plant was badly damaged in an air raid. As a result, almost all the production had to be outsourced. Nevertheless, of 3,125 Panzer IVs produced in 1944, 2,845 were produced in the Nibelungenwerk. At the end of 1944 production of the

Jagdtiger The ''Jagdtiger'' ("Hunting Tiger"; officially designated ''Panzerjäger Tiger Ausf. B'') is a German casemate-type heavy tank destroyer (''Jagdpanzer'') of World War II. It was built upon the slightly lengthened chassis of a Tiger II. Its ordna ...

began. The conversion of the production took place without any problems, since the cranes and other technical equipment were over-specified. In the last days of the war, 65 Panther tanks and Tigers were repaired. On May 8, 1945, American troops of the 259th Infantry Regiment of Major General Stanley Eric Reinhart's 65th Infantry Division occupied the city liberating the Nibelungenwerk's French and Soviet prisoners of war and Czech forced labourers. After the Red Army occupied the factory on May 9, 1945, production continued on a small scale, so that some Panzer IVs could be made available for the victory parade in Moscow.

The Nibelungenwerk after the war

The former supplier company

is today the most important steel factory in Austria and belongs to Voestalpine. After the State Treaty in 1955, the Republic of Austria took over the Nibelungenwerk. In 1957, the plant was incorporated into

and in 1974 the entire tractor assembly of the Steyr group was transferred to the site. Today, the former Nibelungenwerk and the associated grounds belong to the Canadian automotive supplier Magna International. The agricultural machinery manufacturer CNH Global has its European headquarters in St. Valentin and uses three former Nibelungenwerk halls for the production of tractor cabins. The former Nibelungenwerk's entrance building and canteen are still in use, and the hall located to the east is used by Magna International for the production of vehicle components. The former tank testing site is also owned by Magna International.

Notes

References

* * * * * {{Authority control Economy of Nazi Germany World War II tanks of Germany