3 Rudolf Schurig, quoted in Rudolf Wolter, Erinnerung an Gomorrha(Hamburg, 2003), p. 125.

4 Hiltgunt Zassenhaus, quoted in Volker Hage (ed.), Hamburg 1943: Literarische Zeugnisse Zum Feuersturm(Frankfurt am Main, 2003), p. 165.

5 See Hamburg damage report, UK National Archives, AIR 40/426; Hans Brunswig, Feuersturm über Hamburg(Stuttgart, 2003), pp. 198–9, 202–6; Martin Middlebrook, The Battle of Hamburg(London, 1980), pp. 153 and 155–9. See also eyewitness reports by, among others, Ilse Grassmann, Mathilde Wolff-Mönckeberg; and Erwin Garvens, Heinrich Reincke, Franz Termer and Vilma Mönckeberg-Kollmar, in Renate Hauschild-Thiessen, Die Hamburger Katastrophe vom Sommer 1943 in Augenzeugenberichten(Hamburg, 1993).

6 Hamburg Police Report, pp. 32–3, UK National Archives, AIR 20/7287.

7 Hiltgunt Zassenhaus, in Hage (ed.), Hamburg 1943, p. 162.

8 Ibid., pp. 161–2.

9 Franz Termer, in Hauschild-Thiessen, Die Hamburger Katastrophepp. 51–2.

10 ‘Klöntreff “Eimsbüttel im Feuersturm”’, unpublished transcript of local-history group conversation, Galerie Morgenland/Geschichtwerkstatt, Sprecherin 2, p. 12.

11 Indeed, Goebbels himself had insisted that taxes on cinema and theatre tickets would not be raised for this very reason. See Joseph Goebbels, The Goebbels Diaries, trans. and ed. Louis P. Lochner (London, 1948), 20 March 1943, p. 241.

12 Many eyewitness reports from the time attest to how much the loss of these buildings distressed people. See, for example, the testimonies by Franz Termer and Vilma Mönckeberg-Kollmar, in Hauschild-Thiessen, Die Hamburger Katastrophe, pp. 50–51 and 54.

13 Official report, ‘Bericht über die Katastrophennacht am 25.7.43 im Tierpark Carl Hagenbeck’, sent to the author by Klaus Gille, Hagenbeck Tierpark.

14 Middlebrook claims the animals were killed by American bombs (see Battle of Hamburg, p. 201), but he misinterprets the account in the Hamburg Police Report: when it says they died in the ‘second attack’, it means the second largeattack – i.e., the British night raid of 27/28 July.

15 For witnesses to the destruction of these churches, see Ilse Grassmann, Ausgebombt: Ein Hausfrauen Kriegstagebuch von Ilse Grassmann(Hamburg, 2003), p. 22; and Otto Johns and Heinrich Reincke, in Hauschild-Thiessen, Die Hamburger Katastrophe, pp. 28 and 39.

16 Hauptpastor Simon Schöffel in Hauschild-Thiessen, Die Hamburger Katastrophe, p. 23.

17 Hiltgunt Zassenhaus, in Hage (ed.), Hamburg 1943, p. 166; Erwin Garvens, in Hauschild-Thiessen, Die Hamburger Katastrophe, p. 37.

18 Erwin Garvens, in Hauschild-Thiessen, Die Hamburger Katastrophe, p. 37.

19 In the chaos that followed the first night of attacks, all the city’s newspapers had been forced to merge into one: the Hamburger Zeitung. However, since there was only enough paper to print this on a single sheet, it was really only an emergency organ for getting essential messages to the people about where they could find rations and water, who could leave the city, and so on.

20 Renate Hauschild-Thiessen, Unternehmen Gomorrha(Hamburg, 1993), p. 25.

21 Fredy Borck, in Kerstin Hof (ed), Rothenburgsort 27/28 Juli 1943, p. 10.

22 ‘Die Papierblättchen sind harmlos’, Hamburger Zeitung, 26 July 1943.

23 ‘Gegen sinnlose Gerüchte’, ibid., 27 July 1943.

24 For this, and the rest of the disaster plan, see the Hamburg Police Report, pp. 70–86 and Appendix 7.

25 Wilhelm Küper, in Hauschild-Thiessen, Die Hamburger Katastrophe, p. 30.

26 Erwin Garvens, in ibid., pp. 36–7.

27 See Hamburg Police Report, p. 4; and Hamburger Zeitung, 26 July 1943.

28 See ‘Sonderzuteilung an die Bevölkerung’, and ‘Warmes Essen durch Groβküchen’, Hamburger Zeitung, 25 and 26 July 1943.

29 Hamburg Police Report, p. 70.

15    Concentrated Bombing

1 Giulio Douhet, The Command of the Air, trans. Dino Ferrari (London, 1943), p. 22.

2 See 139 Squadron Operational Record Book, UK National Archives, AIR 27/960. Such nuisance raids were extremely effective. Earlier in the year Joseph Goebbels had complained that ‘ten nuisance planes drove fifteen to eighteen million people out of bed’: Joseph Goebbels, The Goebbels Diaries, trans. and ed. P. Lochner (London, 1948), 16 May 1943, p. 301. On this occasion, some German firefighters and rescue workers were convinced that the nuisance raid was specifically aimed at preventing their work. The fact that so many fire-fighters were still concentrated in the west of the city on the following night contributed to the catastrophe.

3 Bomber Command Intelligence Narrative of Operations No. 651, UK National Archives, AIR 24/257.

4 For that night’s plan, see D Form, 27 July, UK National Archives, AIR 24/257.

5 See Martin Middlebrook, The Battle of Hamburg(London, 1980), pp. 235 and 242. While some bombers might indeed have strayed over this city, it was by no means part of the plan: the actual route took the bomber stream some sixteen miles or so to the west of Lübeck. See the RAF Operational Summary, UK National Archives, AIR 24/257.

6 On 24 July 724 planes dropped 1349.6 tons of high explosive, and 932 tons of incendiaries on Hamburg. On 27 July 721 planes dropped 1104.4 tons of high explosive, and 1174 tons of incendiaries. In the second attack, therefore, approximately the same number of planes dropped 245 tons less of high explosive, and 242 tons more of incendiaries. See Operational Summaries, UK National Archives, AIR 24/257.

7 See Middlebrook, Battle of Hamburg, p. 235.

8 UK National Archives, AIR 24/257.

9 Group Captains H. I. Edwards VC, from Binbrook; S. C. Elworthy, from Waddington; H. L. Patch, from Coningsby: A. D. Ross, from Middleton St George; and A. H. Willets, from Oakington.

10 See UK National Archives, AIR 27/687, which mentions General Anderson’s trip to Essen, but not his flight to Hamburg. However, Middlebrook, who corresponded with Anderson, is adamant that he did indeed fly to Hamburg on this raid; see Battle of Hamburg, p. 236.

11 The rendezvous point that night was at 54.30N 07.00E.

12 Herrmann himself later implied that it was his disregard for the dangers of flying into their own flak that gave the Wilde Sautactics their name; see Hajo Herrmann, Bewegtes Leben(Stuttgart, 1984), p. 256.

13 For the early history of Herrmann’s ‘Wild Boars’, including the attack on Hamburg, see ibid., chapters 10 and 11, pp. 247–307.

14 Ibid., p. 273.

15 See Middlebrook, Battle of Hamburg, p. 248 and Gordon Musgrove, Operation Gomorrah(London, 1981), p. 73. According to the RAF Operational Record Book for the Pathfinder Force, the original plan was for red TIs to be used if, and only if, crews were 100 per cent sure that they had identified the correct aiming point. However, the final report seems to indicate that red TIs were never used. See UK National Archives, AIR 25/156, AIR 14/3410.

16 Other historians give very different figures for the number of aeroplanes that bombed Hamburg on this night. Max Hastings says 722, Robin Neillands 735, Martin Middlebrook 729, the American historian Earl R. Beck 722, the German historian Uwe Bahnsen 739. While this might look to the layman like errors of research, it is quite common to find different figures in different official documents. For example, the US Strategic Bombing Survey gives the number that bombed as 739, citing the RAF Operational Summary as its source. However, the RAF summary (issued eight days after the attack) gives 736. To further complicate matters, the appendices of the RAF Operations Summary claim that only 721 aircraft bombed the primarytarget – presumably indicating that fifteen aircraft dropped their bombs on targets other than Hamburg, see Bomber Command Intelligence Narrative of Operations No. 651, UK National Archives, AIR 24/257. There are occasionally different figures in other sources, and it is easy to get bogged down in such minor details. Here, therefore, as elsewhere, I have assumed that the final official intelligence report issued by the force that carried out the attack is most likely to be accurate, and have given their figure accordingly, UK National Archives, AIR 14/3410. All figures quoted in this chapter are from the same source, unless otherwise specified.