2
25
96
-
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https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1281/19970/EValentineUMValentineJRM420821-0002.1.jpg
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Valentine, John
John Ross Mckenzie Valentine
J R M Valentine
Description
An account of the resource
674 Items. Collection concerns navigator Warrant Officer J R McKenzie Valentine (1251404 Royal Air Force). The collection contains over 600 letters between JRM Valentine and his wife Ursula. It also contains his log book, family/official documents, a book of violin music studies and other correspondence. Sub-collections contain family photographs, prisoner of war photographs and a scrapbook of newspaper cuttings of events from 1942 to 1945.
He joined 49 Squadron in April 1942 and flew 10 operations on Hampdens. The squadron converted to Manchester in May when he completed two further operations. His aircraft was shot down on the Thousand Bomber raid of 30/31 May 1942. Five crew, including him bailed out successfully and became prisoners of war. The pilot and one air gunner were killed when the aircraft rolled over and crashed.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Frances Zagni and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-09-06
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Valentine, JRM
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
August 21 1942
No. 16
Dearest Johnnie, [circled] 1 [/circled] I don't know whether you can answer this before I send off your next parcel, Sept 30th, but I wondered whether you'd like to have your Rolls razor sent, or an ordinary safety razor. Please let me know. Also [circled] 2 [/circled] Please mention in one of your postcards that you'd like your P.O.S.B. book returned to me. At present it is held by the central depository & I should feel happier to have it safe in the 'black boxie', & they won't give it up without your written authorisation. It may so easily go astray in a great place like that, I'm afraid. [circled] 3 [/circled]. Would you be interested in making a rug for the floor of our future home? I haven't gone into all details yet, but I believe I could send you the materials, and it is fairly simple to do, would keep you busy for a bit & would be grand for the future home, which so far has only one small Persian rug to clothe its floors. I'll be making enquiries this end & of course won't take up space in your precious parcels with mere canvas & rug wool until you are supplied with all necessities in the way of clothing. I have now dug up half the potatoes, quite a good crop tho' partly worm or slug eaten. Yesterday I picked 2lbs blackberries from our bush - have bottled them with applies. Our fire-watching
[page break]
[underlined] PRISONER OF WAR POST [/underlined]
[post mark]
Sergeant J.R.M. VALENTINE
PRISONER OF WAR NO.: 450
CAMP NAME & NO.: STALAG LUFT III
COUNTRY: GERMANY
FROM: (SENDER'S FULL NAME & ADDRESS)
Mrs J. R. M. Valentine
Lido, Tenterden Grove
Hendon,
London N.W.4.
[underlined] BOTTOM PANEL [/underlined]
duties are getting stricter, we now have to sit up dressed, raid or no. The heals had a mouse in their kitchen the other night & you've never heard such an uproar. At last I went in to help them & Papa eventually finished it off amid squeals & screams from Joy. Mrs N. wouldn't go into the room at all! We're going out to tea with Bish today at his digs. All my love dearest Ursula.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Letter to prisoner of war John Valentine from his wife Ursula
Description
An account of the resource
Asks whether he would like her to send razor and to mention that he would like his post office savings book to be returned to her as she need his written authority for this. Asks whether he would be prepared to make a rug if she sends him materials. Concludes with news of digging up potatoes, fire watching duties and mouse in a neighbour's house.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1942-08-21
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Margaret Carr
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Tow sided handwritten letter card
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
EValentineUMValentineJRM420821
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Poland
Poland--Żagań
England--London
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942-08-21
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Ursula Valentine
civil defence
firefighting
prisoner of war
Stalag Luft 3
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1281/19971/EValentineUMValentineJRM420823-0001.2.jpg
88d087d35d58e9d0c22e4b3b5bafb772
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1281/19971/EValentineUMValentineJRM420823-0002.2.jpg
13faaa1bb686dc8dee95135a75b0ef62
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Valentine, John
John Ross Mckenzie Valentine
J R M Valentine
Description
An account of the resource
674 Items. Collection concerns navigator Warrant Officer J R McKenzie Valentine (1251404 Royal Air Force). The collection contains over 600 letters between JRM Valentine and his wife Ursula. It also contains his log book, family/official documents, a book of violin music studies and other correspondence. Sub-collections contain family photographs, prisoner of war photographs and a scrapbook of newspaper cuttings of events from 1942 to 1945.
He joined 49 Squadron in April 1942 and flew 10 operations on Hampdens. The squadron converted to Manchester in May when he completed two further operations. His aircraft was shot down on the Thousand Bomber raid of 30/31 May 1942. Five crew, including him bailed out successfully and became prisoners of war. The pilot and one air gunner were killed when the aircraft rolled over and crashed.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Frances Zagni and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-09-06
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Valentine, JRM
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
To Sergeant J.R.M. Valentine,
British Prisoner of War No. 450
Stalag Luft III, Germany
From Mrs. J.R.M. Valentine,
Lido, Tenterden Grove,
Hendon, N.W. 4. London.
No. 17.
August 23rd 1942
Darling Johnnie,
It is now 10.30 p.m. and as I am on fire-watching duty until 2 a.m. it seems an ideal time to settle down to write to you. Mrs. Hazard has come to spend the night, as her husband is watching up in town, and she and Barbara have gone off to bed, so all is peace and quiet.
This afternoon Frances went out to tea, all on her own, to the Greenish’s. I took her round at 3 p.m. and fetched her away at 5 p.m., and they tell me she behaved well in the intervening two hours. Of course they were astonished, as everyone is, at her friendliness and compete lack of shyness among comparative strangers, she just takes life as it comes and seems to find it enjoyable. The other day I had the sweep in to do the dining-room fire, and welcomed him, as other visitors, with a beaming smile; the poor man was extremely gratified and said rather wistfully, “Not many kiddies smile at me like that, they mostly cry and run away!”
She has finished her treatment for diphtheria immunisation now and passed the test, so that is a comfort – not that there have been any cases that I know of, but it is nice to know that she is prepared against any epidemic. I am wondering about getting her immunised against whooping cough too, it can be done nowadays though I believe it is not always 100% effective. I think I shall enquire from Dr. Bethune.
On Friday we all three went to Perivale to tea with Bish. He has rooms in a rather ordinary, dingy but clean little house, and his landlady is friendly but too talkative, as is the custom with the tribe. Anyway he has a piano in his room, and seems very happy there. His vicar popped in while we were there, he is a hearty young man, hardly older than Bish, and I should think they make a pretty good pair in that parish. We had tea with Bish and then went to see his church, a modern affair with the main body of the church divided off from the choir and altar with double folding doors, so that it can be used as a hall for other activities. At the time it was being prepared for use with the local flower and vegetable show. Bish looks good in his cassock, much better than he does in an ordinary suit because one doesn’t notice how terribly thin he is.
Today we have been doing more photography. A friend of Barbara’s from the ambulance station came to have her portrait taken for her husband, who is in the Navy, and Ba took one of me, one of Frances and one of us together, at the same opportunity. A few days ago another girl came to be photographed who said, when she saw your picture in the dining room, that she thought she knew you. Her name is Norah Whitehead, and her husband Noel Whitehead, used to play rugger a lot in Herts, Eastern Countis [sic] and round about Barnet generally – I thought it might in that connection that your face was familiar. He used to work with Shell Mex, so I hardly thought you would have known him from that. They live at Radlett, but he is abroad with the army now. Do let me know if the name is familiar to you. The girl has a round face, blue eyes and dark curly hair, quite good looking and smart.
This evening I have been pruning the raspberries. I have
[page break]
[margin text] Received your P.C. No 11 This morning. Am doing all I can for food parcels.
2nd chess. P-K4.
Peter has failed Latin again and is giving it up this time and is going to take some diploma instead. [/margin text]
[page break]
always wanted to try to do it but lacked to courage to start. However this year it is obviously up to me, so I pitched into it and of course found it fairly simple once I got going. The canes that fruited this year are black, and next year’s are still green, so you can easily sort them out and cut away the old ones. It all looks much more orderly now, and tomorrow I must have a bonfire of the prunings.
I believe I forgot to mention that Grunfeld gave Frances his toy dog, a very good model of a spaniel, whom we have of course names Jane. Frances simply loves her soft toys now, her teddy, Jane and another scottie dog which Eileen and Peggy gave her, and she generally carries one or two of them round the house with her. Today I had got her all dressed up to out to tea, in that blue woolly frock that I was knitting for her at Rain Bozend (seems centuries ago!) when we started this photography and I had to make her look where I wanted by means of a piece of chocolate, which she simply loves now. Of course the wretched child had to dribble it all down the front of her frock, and had to be changed once more before she could go out! She generally gets a piece of chocolate after lunch each day, and thoroughly enjoys it, sucking it, dribbling it, taking it out of her mouth several times to see how it is getting on, before finally swallowing it. I only wish I could make chocolate last so long – that is one of your accomplishments, and one which will come in very handy just now! The sweet ration is being doubled next month, making a pound each a month, which is an enormous amount compared with the nothing-at-all that we got before. I only wish I could send some to you. I am busy just now bottling and preserving fruit as fast as I can, chiefly plums, greengages, and Blackberry and apple. I like to imagine that you will share some of it with us.
I had a letter from Vera a few days ago. She is up and about again now but stayed in the nursing home a bit longer in order to get the baby on to 4 hourly feeds before taking him away. He is still only small, 6 lb 10 oz, when she last wrote, but apparently looking more human. I have sent her Frances’s christening gown as there is no point in her buying a thing like that specially. The son is to be called Michael, as she and Norman had previously been decided.
The Neals came back from their holiday last weekend, and when I went in to hand over their keys etc, Mrs. Neal gave me an envelope with a present for Frances, saying they would have liked to have brought her something back, but there was nothing they could bring. The envelope contained 15/-, with which I promptly brought Frances a savings certificate. Wasn’t it sweet of Mrs. Neal? I was really touched. How I would love to take Frances to the sea! We must really make an effort next year, all being well, she would so love to spend hours digging and paddling on the beach. If Mother and Daddy are safely home by then, things will be much easier, because I shall be able to leave the house. I’m beginning to long to have them back. It is no good letting myself long for you, so I try to keep the thought out of my mind, but there is a reasonable prospect of their being back in April or May, and I feel that if I can last out this winter somehow, things will be easier then. It is striking midnight already, time passes quickly even in the night. I intend to spend the rest of my watch sewing Frances’s winter frock, if I can keep my wits about me for long enough. You know how hopelessly sleepy I get in the evenings! I think I’m getting better at that gradually.
[margin text] I wish I could send Frances to you in your next parcel! You have more time on your hands than I for running around after her & tidying up the messes she makes and she’d keep you all cheerful.
I bought Frances a new pair of blue shoes last week – size 6 They look enormous but 5’s are definitely too small for her. I’m afraid her feet are going to take after both yours and mine! [/margin text]
With all my love to you my dearest one. How I long for the day when you will come back. We must both keep cheerful and busy till then. Yours always, Ursula.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Letter to prisoner of war John Valentine from his wife Ursula
Description
An account of the resource
She writes whilst she is on fire watching duty. She says that their daughter Frances went to tea on her own and that she has finished her diptheria immunisation. She writes that she and some friends went to tea and that she has been practising photography. She mentions she has been bottling and preserving fruit and talks of daughter's activities as well as those of other friends. She ends her letter by hoping her husband will return, and they both must keep busy and cheerful till then.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1942-08-23
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Karl Williams
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two page typewritten letter with handwritten annotations
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
EValentineUMValentineJRM420823
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Poland
Poland--Żagań
England--London
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942-08-23
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Ursula Valentine
civil defence
firefighting
prisoner of war
Stalag Luft 3
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1281/19973/EValentineUMValentineJRM420831-0001.2.jpg
489f8ba10381a821fc5139ed5bd65158
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1281/19973/EValentineUMValentineJRM420831-0002.2.jpg
e98218bf9362dcc537f81d960de6ba0f
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Valentine, John
John Ross Mckenzie Valentine
J R M Valentine
Description
An account of the resource
674 Items. Collection concerns navigator Warrant Officer J R McKenzie Valentine (1251404 Royal Air Force). The collection contains over 600 letters between JRM Valentine and his wife Ursula. It also contains his log book, family/official documents, a book of violin music studies and other correspondence. Sub-collections contain family photographs, prisoner of war photographs and a scrapbook of newspaper cuttings of events from 1942 to 1945.
He joined 49 Squadron in April 1942 and flew 10 operations on Hampdens. The squadron converted to Manchester in May when he completed two further operations. His aircraft was shot down on the Thousand Bomber raid of 30/31 May 1942. Five crew, including him bailed out successfully and became prisoners of war. The pilot and one air gunner were killed when the aircraft rolled over and crashed.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Frances Zagni and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-09-06
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Valentine, JRM
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Start of transcription
To Sergt J.R.M. Valentine
British Prisoner of War No. 450
No. 19
[ink stamp]
From Mrs. J. R. M. Valentine, Lido, Tenterden Grove,
Hendon, N. W. 4. London
August 31st, Monday 1942
My Darling Johnnie, I felt I ought to have received another letter from you this morning, but the postman stubbornly refused to hand one over. Instead he brought a parcel from your Mother containing the three pairs of socks she has knitted for you out of some wool I sent her, and I have sewn names on them and now they lie ready to be incorporated in your nest parcel, due to be sent off on September 30th. I have already assembled a massive pile of things I hope to send in this parcel, and I am afraid quite a lot are going to get left behind. However, I think it is wisest to put everything out as I think of it.- I keep them in the wardrobe in the back bedroom, and the things that are unlucky just have to wait for the next parcel.
Your Mother also sent a rag doll for Frances, which she bought at a local sale. It is very well made, has brilliant red hair and wears a snappy outfit, vest, knickers, jumper, skirt, hat and shoes in pale green wool. I am putting it aside for the moment, because Frances is still too young to appreciate the joy of dressing and undressing her dolls, and this one is well constructed for that purpose. So it will probably appear on the Christmas Tree, and meanwhile she is still fond of her teddy and two dogs, and is beginning to enjoy playing with some of the bricks and wooden toys which Jill, from next door has given her at various times. Jill often comes in to play with Frances, and although there is too much differences in their ages for them to play together properly , they play independently quite satisfactorily and seem to enjoy themselves. Frances gets quite as much pleasure out of putting things away as out of getting them out, and I am trying to teach her to help tidy up the various messes she makes. Yesterday she twice got hold of my box of pins and spilt them all, and each time dutifully picked up about 5% of them while I cleared up the rest. One bad trick of hers is to pop anything that happens to be handy into one orr other of the coal scuttles in the kitchen, so that when we come to make the fire we have to be careful to remove such items as the best silver spoons or the kitchen scissors before putting the coke on.
I have this evening been appointed Fire-fighting group leader’s secretary, an honorary and not very arduous post. Mr. Greenish came in to say that as things are getting more and more organised and involved in the customary forms and red tape, he would be grateful if I would occasionally take down his letters from dictation and type them for him, which of course I am glad to do – it will help to keep me in practice, for one thing. He has managed to get unofficial permission for watching now, we must sit up actually dressed and awake all night when fire watching now, we must be dressed but can sleep so long as we can turn out at a moment’s notice, which is much more reasonable. I am supposed to be on until 2 a.m. tonight. It is 11 p.m. now and I want to write to Mother afterwards too, so I don’t suppose I shall be ready for bed till pretty late.
These last few days I have been bust bottling fruit and making jam. I made a strange concoction yesterday out of orange and apple peels, cooked together, strained and made into jelly with strips of orange peel added to make it look like Golden Shred. It tastes good.
[random text in margin] Received warrant for £113.10 interest on my defence bonds today, which is better then the proverbial poke in the eye with a burnt stick! [/random text in margin]
[page break]
I had a letter from Olga B-P this morning, Jack has been grounded for a while with a perforated er drum, but is back on ops. Now, and she only hears irregularly from him. Vera Bowack wrote to say that the Red Cross now presume Norman to have been killed, so I am afraid it really is hopeless. I’m so sorry for her, but I hope she will marry again some day, she is young and attractive. She has gone back to Lady Cottage now, and is coping with her small son Michael on her own
Sue Eldred, Mrs. Sansom’s sister, came to supper again yesterday and brought me some soap and chocolate . the day before Clare, Catherine Mairs’s friend, suggested we should go swimming and Barbara said she would look after Frances, but when we got down to the swimming pool we found a long queue waiting to get in, so we called it off and came back. I have never known of a queue there before, but it was exceptionally warm weather.
There was a particularly maddening, know-all article of Joad’s in the NS&N this week on religion, a subject on which he can hardly claim to have first-hand knowledge. He lays it down that there are two alternative ways for the church to canalise the re-awakening religious feeling now becoming evident; either to enter the political field, back up regardless of their belief or unbelief; or to raise its standard higher, insist on its dogma, tighten up its discipline, and generally become more mystical and other-worldly. Personally I don’t agree that these two mutually exclusive. It would obviously be fatal for the Church to renounce its fundamental beliefs and say it didn’t matter whether you believe in them or not – it would be nothing but a sham charitable institution if it did – but I don’t see why it should not insist entirely on its creed and super natural authority, and yet come out strongly in defence of a social programme which is the logical interpretation of its ethical teachings. Do you?
I am rather doubtful about the wisdom of my going house hunting on my own. Just supposing I should come across a suitable house, I couldn’t move in, as I explained in my last letter, till my parents are home, which seems likely to be about the same time you get back (blissful day!) and supposing I were able to find tenants for it in the meantime it would probably involve us in a good bit of money for repairs and maintenance, because their rent would presumably go towards paying off the building society, or whoever puts up the cash. Of course it would be a great advantage to have a real house so that I could start getting furnishings for it. Shall I really plunge into the whole business and put it into the hands of a house agent, or do you think it will involve us in unreasonable risks? if I got a house but couldn’t get tenants for it, how on earth should I be able to pay off the mortgage then? Please think the matter over in detail and tell me what you think – I won’t start on it until I hear more precisely from you.
The local Red Cross have arranged a meeting of next-of-kin of prisoners-of-war from their district to take place tomorrow week, so I think I shall trot along and see if there is anyone else in your camp from Hendon, besides your room-mate. I believe the next-of-kin wear labels bearing the name of their prisoner’s camp, so that they can get together
I am positive that Frances really does recognise you from the photograph standing in the dining-room. Nearly every time she is put up in her high chair she points at the photo and smiles and says Dad-dad, and then I get it down and let her touch your face, and we agree that you are the nicest man we know. I rather hope you will have got rid of your beard before she sees you, so that she can recognise you and give you a real welcome. I love you so much, Johnnie my darling. God bless you & bring you back home safely! I am yours for always - Ursula
End of transcription
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Letter to prisoner of war John Valentine from his wife Ursula
Description
An account of the resource
Writes about sending him socks and other items as well as about the activities of daughter Frances. Mentions she has been appointed fire-fighting group leader and been asked to do some secretarial work. Continues writing of fruit bottling, jam making and catches up with news of friends. Mentions problems of house hunting on her own that there is a Red Cross meeting of prisoner next of kin coming up. Concludes with statement that daughter Frances seems to recognise him in photograph.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1942-08-31
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Jan Morgan
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two page typewritten letter with handwritten annotation
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
EValentineUMValentineJRM420831
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Poland
Poland--Żagań
England--London
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942-08-31
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Ursula Valentine
faith
firefighting
prisoner of war
Red Cross
Stalag Luft 3
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mr Herbert R., Kassel, Moltkestraße 8 and makes the following statement:
I am from Essen. We moved to Kassel on 1 August 1942 to escape the terror bombing.
After the alarm came, we, my wife Else and daughter Christel and my sister-in-law Emilie Mühlenbacher and her brother Werner, went to the air raid cellar in our block of flats in 8 Moltkestraße. The powerful explosions shook the houses. Our street too was hit by an explosive bomb and in addition to that, it was raining innumerable incendiaries on our houses. The rear building was already on fire. The fire had been working its way already down from the roof timbering to the third floor. Fumes, smoke and dust where coming into our air raid shelter. The house opposite, Moltkestraße 7, was not on fire yet. The whole row of houses opposite still seemed safe. There was, however, a huge bomb crater between nos. 7 and 11. Our ARP warden said: “We have to get out of here, otherwise we’ll all die!” I collected my family and we agreed that we would quickly run to the house opposite. I wanted to go and save our suitcases. But my wife said: “Please, let it go and only save us, me and the child!” – At this point the man breaks down in tears, overwhelmed by the memory. – Before we ran across, I soaked coats and blankets and so we ran across to the stairwell of no. 7. When we turned around, my sister-in-law and the little boy weren’t there. They were afraid to run through the fire which was burning foot-high on the street. I said to my wife: “Stay here; I go and get the others.” In that moment a sergeant came along who said: “If it gets worse, I’ll take your wife and the eight-month old child with me in the cellar.” So I ran back to get the other two. As we get back to no. 7, there’s no sign of my wife and my child. The sergeant had probably taken them with him in the cellar. Here everything was in chaos. The women were channelled through the breakthrough, so as to get from the Detmolder Hof [a pub] to the Lutherplatz. I ran through two breakthroughs, shouting the names of the missing, but did not get an answer. So I ran back and thought: Maybe they’re still at the back. But I could not find them. I now hoped that they’d been fortunate enough to get to the Lutherplatz and wanted to run there through the street.
Because of the firestorm, I had had to wrap a blanket around my head. I couldn’t see anything and as I was running, something got between my legs. It was the overhead wire of the tram. I was on Königstraße. Because of the heat and the smoke I felt faint. I fell. Then I felt something wet with my hand. It was a clear puddle, in the middle of the street. Water was welling up into the street, probably because of a broken mains. I wetted my mouth and rolled in the water. I had a bath like a canary. That woke me up a bit. But I had burnt my hands and feet. Then a few soldiers came running along, saying I couldn’t keep lying there because the houses would collapse. And already burning debris came falling down. So they ran away. I crawled further down the street and reached a hydrant. I lay under the water jet. More soldiers came, also a Dutchman who has done many good things, and they thought I’d get pneumonia if I stayed there and they carried me in a tunnel which was on the neighbouring plot. There was an almighty throng, many injured. I had a look at my watch. It had stopped at 11.20, probably because water had got in when I was rolling in the puddle. A soldier said it was twenty to one. Now we were waiting for the morning. A nurse bandaged my hands and feet and men from the auxiliary service brought me to the rescue centre at Henschel and Son. In the afternoon, I was taken by a truck to the Möncheberg hospital. On Sunday, I was able to open my eyes again. Then I travelled to Essen. I hoped to hear from my family there. But they were and remain missing.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Herbert, R
Description
An account of the resource
Mr Herbert's account of the events at Moltkestraße 7 and 8, Untere Königstraße.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-02-03
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Essen
Germany--Kassel
Germany--Ruhr (Region)
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 1
BKasselVdObmv10001
Contributor
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Harry Ziegler
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
fear
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Maria V., Wilhelmstraße 2 ½, 1st floor and makes the following statement:
By about half eight, we had alarm and then the shooting started. I was always the first in the cellar which amused the other tenants because of my fearfulness. Soon, the rear building was burning, after an hour or so. My husband and my son tried to save the building but came back after ten minutes. My husband had burnt his hands. He sank on a chair and said: “I can’t go on.” Then the men tried to open the breakthrough to Klingebeils’. Their house must have collapsed. From there we just had smoke come through and a voice said to me: Bend down, bend down!” I bent over, always further down, where there was still some good air. Then I passed out. When I woke up again, I guess that I had been lying there for hours, I could see that everything behind me was on fire. I was lying in the breakthrough to Klingebeils. My feet were getting hot. I can’t remember where I got out whether through the Stadtparkgarten or through Wilhelmstraße.
Everywhere on the Friedrichsplatz were dead bodies. I searched for the others everywhere, I thought, maybe somebody will come past here. But no one came. Then I went to the train station because I could no longer bear the sight of all these dead people. There I asked someone where I could find something to drink because my mouth was burning. It was already daylight. I’d guess that it was about ten. The city centre did not burn any more, only in Kölnische Straße a few houses were still in flames. Then I went to the town hall where I was given a coffee. I thought to return to where I came from, Lippstadt, but I was told that it would be better if I looked for the missing first. I therefore went back to Wilhelmstraße. There, I met my brother-in-law, the furrier Hugo Meßling, he had been in the Stadtpark where he had been on duty as an air raid warden. That’s how he was saved. All the others had been killed. My husband too. I did not want to hear anything of the sort, I was the only one saved, as through a miracle. Because that inner voice had been saying ‘bend over, bend over, bend over’ and because I had to vomit twice. But my husband and family have all been killed, except Herr Meßling. I did not want to know and believe that.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Maria, V
Description
An account of the resource
Maria V's account of the events at Wilhelmstraße 2 ½
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-02-18
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 3
BKasselVdObmv10003
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Karoline K., Obere Karlstraße 17, now Harleshausen, Pideritzstraße 7, and makes the following statement:
In the evening of the air raid, there were only a few cinema-goers left in the pub. Mainly soldiers who were having a drink after the screening which had finished by half seven. They, together with other guests, came with us to the cellar but they went to the public one whereas we went to the private one for the people living in the house. We were originally in our business, in the dairy, across from them. The air raid had taken us by surprise, just as we were coming home. My daughter had been washing her feet and therefore ran without stockings to the cellar. My husband didn’t want to go at first. He said: “There won’t be anything.” Because we had had a number of false alarms. When the shooting started, however, he shouted from above: “I’m coming, Mother!” That calmed me down. As he entered, his hat was blown of his head; it was not before time.
So the whole house community was together. And then came the heavy hits. It didn’t take long and Mrs Dötenbier appeared and asked if she could stay with us. She had come through the breakthrough. But we had smoke and phosphorous coming into the cellar and so we had to flee to the public shelter. We held wet cloths to our mouths. My husband did not follow us through the breakthrough at that time as he was still trying to put the fire out. It must have been about 11 when I went with Mr Schwan. We weren’t aware that it had stopped. We thought the raid was still going on. We had to operate the ventilators to get air. The French POWs had already started pumping at eleven. I saw little Ruth Niemann and I gave her a pill as she has trouble with her heart. I comforted her because her mum wasn’t there.
No one let us out of the cellar, about half eleven, Mr Zedler and Mr Schneider let no one leave the cellar. There were also soldiers and policemen. We were told the men had to operate the ventilation pumps below and the women the ones above so that we would get oxygen. I thought I’d burst. It was too hard. My daughter also could no longer operate the pump. Mrs Vogt died of a heart attack through the work. They would not let her or her children leave. These weren’t oxygen pumps but fresh air pumps and we only pumped smoke in. The women were exhausted. In my view, we should have lain down and kept still. My husband had a heart condition but our daughter was healthy. About a quarter to one, my husband asked what the time was. My daughter had sat down, my husband was lying on the floor. They were so quiet. I thought: Is that death? Then I became tired and thought I don’t know how much longer I can bear this.
After that I must have gone to sleep. But it was a peaceful going to sleep, just as when you get home from a walk, and it was cold outside and then you get into your flat, where it’s comfortably warm and you go to sleep. My husband said at the end: “I don’t understand why no one comes to rescue us.” We were told that the gate had not been on fire so that we would have been able to get out. From the Friedrichs-platz, Mr and Mrs Schwan too had been driven by soldiers to the Bürgersäle. They also died with the exception of Mrs Schwan. A Mr Steinmetz from Karlstraße managed to get his children out and also wanted his wife to come but she did not have the courage to leave and stayed there. That was roundabout 11. One woman said: “I take responsibility for my own life!” So they let her go. The two air raid wardens who prevented us from leaving had good intentions but they too suffocated with the others. I don’t remember much after that. By one o'clock I was unconscious.
Herr Siebert – he works for Auto-Cöster – told me that the old Mr Cöster had stripped off and had a screaming fit after he’d told him the course of his life.
I woke up two days later in the Jäger barracks, Frankfurter Straße. I don’t know how I got there.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Karoline, K
Description
An account of the resource
Karoline K's account of the events at Obere Karlstraße 17 (Bürgersäle).
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-02-23
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 4
BKasselVdObmv10004
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: The Landgraf-Karl-Straße had also suffered a shower of incendiaries albeit a thinner one. According to the town official the following happened here:
An incendiary dropped through the roof of a house into a bath tub which had been filled with water which was intended to be used to extinguish fire. The bomb broke through the bottom of the tub and was extinguished by the water which was pouring down. Then the water ran down the stairs where a canister with phosphorous was starting a blaze. The water extinguished that too all by itself.
A similar story is being told about a larder. An incendiary had dropped in it. Through the heat, a lead pipe started to melt and the water which poured from the pipe extinguished the fire and the bomb.
A third piece is told by the occupational health nurse Miss Emmy Zoberbier who works for the public health office. Where she lives, Königstor 53, an incendiary dropped through the roof during an air raid two years ago. It did not do any damage. A few days after the raid, Mrs Schlunk goes up to the attic to tidy up her stall there. As she enters, she thinks: Who put the stove on? I haven’t had the heating on up here for years. The stove had burst. As she examines the stove, she finds a burnt-out incendiary bomb and its ashes where they should be: in the ash box.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Emmy Zoberbier and anonymous respondents
Description
An account of the resource
Three accounts of the events at Landgraf-Karl-Straße.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-02-24
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 5
BKasselVdObmv10005
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mr Anton J., Kassel-Kirchditmold, Opferhof 3 and makes the following statement:
On the evening in question I was visiting Mr Iffert in his flat. Present were also his wife, his father, his son, his sister-in-law, Mrs Hausmann, and the apprentice Mohr. The two assistants had left the house a little earlier. We were having tea. When the alarm came, I was standing outside, on Freiheiter Durchbruch. I made tracks. As Mr Iffert confirmed later, his family went down to the air raid cellar whereas he had to join his volunteer unit. This was a bit further up on the same street. When the incendiaries created the first fires, Mr Iffert helped with rescue and fire-fighting. When the bombs stopped dropping, he found time to attend to his family. The relevant block leader informed him that his relatives were no longer in the house but had to flee through a breakthrough into the neighbouring Scheldtsche house. The whole street had been on fire. Explosives had been dropped everywhere too. Mr Iffert then started to search but he was in the dark because there was no electricity and he did not have a torch either. His search was unsuccessful. He made his way through all the cellar breakthroughs but did not find anything. He now believed that his relatives had saved themselves and returned to the rescue and fire-fighting operation in the Wildemanns-gasse and the Platz der SA.
He only discovered a trace of his relatives a few days later, in the staircase of the public air raid shelter Hinter der Waage 1. Here, he found his father whom he could identify without any problems. He had two gold pieces with him and a fob chain which he knew well. From this, he drew the conclusion that his other relatives had to be also in the air raid shelter. This assumption proved to be correct. When we sifted the ashes and remnants of bones which had been found in the cellar, a process in which I was involved – we put up a big sieve and poured everything through it – he found his wife’s key ring, his father’ and his sister-in-law’s wedding bands and his wife’s half-charred wedding band. They came to this air raid shelter through the breakthroughs. In that cellar we found 21 wedding bands, 2 dog-tags of soldiers, the baldric of a work command leader, several bags, wrist watches, signet rings, medals, brooches and other things. We passed them on to the detective force.
Iffert’s air raid cellar was so well preserved that nothing would have happened to them there. It had not overheated. People had lost their heads, however, and ran through all the breakthroughs. It was the result of poor leadership.
I was on duty outside during the raid. I was in a cellar in Wolfsangerstraße. The house had already been wrecked on 3 October. The rest was destroyed during that night. I think it was no 61.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Anton, J
Description
An account of the resource
Anton J's account of the events at Kassel-Kirchditmold, Opferhof 3.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-02-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 6
BKasselVdObmv10006
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
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Translated from the original in German: Present is Mr Heinrich Peter Sch., formerly of Hohenzollern-straße 56, and makes the following statement:
I came at about 8 from the Wilhelmshöhe train station and managed to get with the tram as far as the Red Cross [hospital]. Then the alarm went and we had to continue on foot. I walked through Kaiserstraße at a leisurely pace and got home by about half past eight. Part of the people living in the house were in the cellar, the other part in the offices of my business. I was debating with my housekeeper whether I should go and get my two dogs from the flat and wanted to put on my firefighter’s uniform to go to my deployment site when the anti-aircraft guns started to fire. So I went quickly to get my two dachshunds and helped to carry down the air raid luggage which was on the ground floor and then we waited for what was going to happen. It took a few minutes and then we had incendiaries close to the house and on the pavement. I put a bucket over them and extinguished them this way. I also ran several times up to the attic as I had to assume that the houses would be hit by incendiaries too but so far, everything was fine. I was once briefly in the cellar when we had a hit close by. I can’t even say where. I only went to the cellar to calm down the women – most of the people in the house were women. I managed to do that.
Then I saw from the courtyard, that light green smoke was coming from my cousin’s bedroom window on the third floor. I shouted down to the cellar that my cousin should come up and I showed him that and then we both ran to fight the fire. The bedroom was full of smoke, the incendiary bomb was lying on top of a wardrobe. We tore down the curtains and it was relatively easy to extinguish the bomb. My cousin was too particular and wanted to clear the dirt but I said we had better look in the attic as that bomb had probably not been the only one. I found another three, two of which I extinguished with sand and water. The last one I grabbed and threw through the window down on the street as I had run out of sand and water. By doing so I could see Hohenzollern-straße and had a shock. The whole street, as far as I could see it, up to Annastraße and Ständeplatz, was covered with incendiary bombs. I was reminded of the torch parades of the SA, only that these things burnt green rather than red. I assumed that things would look the same on the court-side of the house. I had the right vantage point on the third floor. But to my delight, the print shop had not yet been hit. So I ran back to my cousin who was still working there and told him: “So far, it’s gone well. I hope our luck holds. Get a move on to get finished; I’m going to extinguish a few bombs in front of the house.” I put out some more bombs with a bucket downstairs and had a little inward fit of rage. The whole street was deserted and I thought if only one person from every house helped cover that big source of light – because for that mob up there our brightly lit street was a wonderful target and I expected that further incendiaries would follow.
And that’s why I was worried about my cousin who was still up there in the house. I thought if they now hit the house, he’ll be blown to all four winds. When he still did not appear, I ran up the stairs, shouting his name more and more loudly but I could not make myself heard over the infernal noise. I found him finally on the third floor and upbraided him for not coming down instead of using his fire swatter. So we both ran down the stairs. And now comes the tragic bit: as we are about the level of the second floor, there was a scary blow, I squeezed myself into the wall and we both lurched and fell down the stairs without understanding what had happened. The smoke, dirt and grime we had in our respiratory passages were excruciating, in our mouths, noses and lungs. I only recovered my sense as I reached the entrance to the cellar. I called: “Henner, are you here?” You couldn’t see anything of course. Everything was dark. It seemed that we were unscathed. I immediately ran down to the cellar stairs to go and see how the women were doing in the air raid cellar. I tripped over a chunk of masonry, it was dark everywhere, when I remembered my torch. And as I want to get into the room, I had a terrible shock. The light of the torch reached maybe half a foot. Everything was full of dust. And to my horror, I see that the room is full of the fragments of the cellar vaults. The ceiling had been penetrated. I said to my cousin: “They’re all dead.” Then I shouted individual names in order to find out whether anyone was still alive under the rubble. And I could hear, when the outside noise wasn’t too strong, a low whimpering noise. My cousin said immediately that we had to fetch help from the neighbouring houses and I said to myself, the stairwell we also be impassable because it is above the cellar. We also could not get to the breakthroughs; that way was blocked. The only remaining escape was across the courtyard and over the garden walls.
When I had climbed up the wall to the next courtyard far enough so that I could look over it, I saw that number 54 was ablaze from the ground floor up and that the entrances to the cellar were blocked by burning beams. It was unlikely that we would find help there. Then I thought: maybe we can do it on our own. Maybe a hollow space had been formed when the vault collapsed and I can get to the people underneath. Therefore we quickly made our way back to the cellar. At the entrance to the cellar I shouted again the names and listened very closely. I also shouted the names of my dogs but all I could here was whimpering, fainter than the first time. We urgently needed help. My cousin came and shouted: “Go and get help!” So back on the wall to number 54. After I jumped off in the courtyard next door, I must have stayed on the ground dazed for a bit but I woke up again, through the roar and crackle of the fire. I felt a leaden tiredness and exhaustion and it took me a few moments to get up again. I had probably inhaled smoke and gas. As I was upright, I lurched and staggered like a drunk. Now the paling to Westendstraße 5 blocked my way. I threw myself against it a couple of times with my full weight and it finally gave way. On the short way to Westendstraße, I had to lie down a few times because of exhaustion. The courtyards were full of smoke. But luckily I kept my wits about me and every time I fell I told myself: “Keep your mouth close to the ground, breathe deeply.” That helped. At the entrance to the cellar, I finally saw another human being, a young air force helper! A marvellous chap! He dragged me into the cellar where someone washed my face and gave me something to drink. I vomited much grime and dirt and I felt better. In exemplary readiness to help, Benno Mainzer and two neighbours volunteered to follow me. We could no longer travel via the courtyards. Through the cellars, then! We got as far as a few metres to the breakthrough to our house - but there we came to a stop. White, acrid wood smoke came in through the windows into the cellars and filled them and made it impossible to breathe. We had to turn back. So we went back to Westendstraße 5. That cellar was also filling with smoke and fumes, it had to be evacuated. I quickly helped to guide people into the open and then I tried to get through Westendstraße to Hohenzollernstraße. At the junction, I saw what had happened. Our house (number 58) and the one next to it (number 60) had disappeared and the same went for the house opposite. Heaps of bricks from both sides had trapped a van in the middle of the street and it was burning out. Behind me, a man came out of the cellar of the Martini-Eck. I shouted at him: “How many people are left in your cellar?” Answer: “I’m the last one!” I shouted: “I need help! In our house people are trapped under the rubble!” He advised me to get help from the railway bunker in Bismarck-straße.
This was a terrible journey. Luckily, the firestorm made its way up Westendstraße, I therefore had it in my back. Park-straße was impassable. Therefore: Kölnische Straße. Down Bismarckstraße, against the firestorm to the entrance of the bunker – that finished me off. I had to go to the emergency room first because of my eyes, a mate from my fire brigade unit led me there. After I had been patched up, I searched for the guardroom. And there, I had a terrible disappointment! I was told that it was no longer possible to get onto the street, to help people. I tried several times that night on my own, occasionally with the help of neighbours who had also found their way to the bunker, and at two or three in the morning, we managed to get as far as the junction of Hohenzollern- and Westendstraße but it was impossible to get closer.
Concerning the time, I think that we were hit about a quarter past nine and that the raid lasted until about a quarter to ten. Round about that time, i.e. the end of the air raid proper, I must have reached the bunker.
The morning after the disaster, towards eight, a rescue unit of the SHD arrived. We could first recover my cousin’s body, sitting at the bottom of the stairs. People then also found his wife’s body. When I asked what would happen with the dead bodies, I was told that they were seized by the police who would see to everything. “You have no authority to make any arrangements!”
In the afternoon, I took my car, which luckily had been spared, and drove to friends in the countryside in Reichenau near Hess. Lichtenau as I was literally on the street. I drove every day to Kassel to help retrieve bodies and to discharge all my other duties. That was particularly difficult as all documents had been destroyed.
A few days after the disaster I realised that I had an increasing pain in my anus. First, I thought it was piles. When I was in Fulda at Christmas time, visiting my sister, it became unbearable. Prof Dr Hertel diagnosed a tear in my gut. I was operated upon on 11 January.
On the first floor of our house lived the families Schade and Noll. Luckily, none of them were there that night of terror. I lived on the second floor with my housekeeper, Miss Katharina Wölk, and also a Miss Margarethe Walter who were both among the victims. On the third floor [lived] my cousin, who died as did his wife and their domestic Miss Bachmann (Anneliese). Their child, Michael, was in a kindergarten in Sooden-Allendorf.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Heinrich Peter, Sch
Description
An account of the resource
Mr Heinrich's account of the events at Hohenzollern-straße 56.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-02-28
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
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Record 7
BKasselVdObmv10007
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Contributor
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Harry Ziegler
Creator
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Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
animal
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
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Translated from the original in German: Present is the teacher Mr Karl L., Wickenrode, and makes the following statement:
I arrived at Kassel train station around half four with the express train from Lorraine. I had all my luggage with me, particularly all my research notes on the ethnology of Lorraine. I went directly to my niece, in the Chamber of Crafts, and left several suitcases there. I could not take them all with me to Wickenrode. On the other hand, I did not feel that they’d be safe with left luggage. In my rucksack, I had sixty cartridges and my three-barrelled shotgun with telescopic sight which I intended to take with me on the bus. The rest, including the bottles of Cognac and my research notes, I wanted to leave in Kassel for the time being. I was ill that day and arrived in Kassel with a temperature. I went down to the theatre. There, I had a glass of beer. The landlord came to my table and said, gesturing with his head towards the theatre: “As long as that thing’s there, they won’t leave us alone.” I told him that I had all my luggage at the station and in town to which the landlord remarked: “Better to take with you what you can carry.” I therefore went back and retrieved two more pieces of luggage. When I arrived at the bus, which always leaves from Friedrichsplatz, it was already jam-packed. The next one would take us. It was about a quarter past seven. As the bus leaves, I said in jest: “Look out! We’ll have lots of excitement!” They people on the bus shouted back: “Don’t make jokes like that!” Just as the bus had left, the sirens started to wail. The Friedrichsplatz was empty in no time. And then the bombs started to drop. The new office prefabs burned immediately. They caught fire first. I ran into a house in Frankfurter Straße. I did not go into the cellar but stayed under the stairs. Soon the house was on fire above me. Someone shouted: “Don’t go out! Don’t go out!” I went anyway, however, and that was what saved me. I think all the people in the cellar burned to death.
People were running past me to the Weinberg. The whole street was ablaze. So I turned right. I wanted to flee to the Aue. I asked those who were running past me: “Where are you going?” “To the shelter in the Weinberg!” Incendiaries were pelting down. I came to the first entrance: jam-packed. We were told: “Only women are allowed in.” To the next entrance then. The second shelter was also full. To the third entrance. I had just entered the tunnel when the second wave of bombers arrived. It was terrible.
Later, we ran out. Everything around us was on fire. Then the refugees came from all parts of the city, more and more of them. They came from the old town, from Wilhelmstraße, Hohenzollernstraße, even from Holländische Platz. From all corners people came. They talked about heavy bombs, innumerable incendiaries and showers of white phosphorous. Then the Rondellchen, the little round temple next to the art gallery, started to burn. Now the order came: “All men out for emergency service!” We ran to the houses on Frankfurter Straße to firefight and rescue. We managed to salvage quite a lot. A Mr Hausmann saved a lot of typewriters. And then the fire brigade came. The last waves of raiders gave the upper new town the rest. Kassel was a single sea of flames, from the upper to the lower parts. On the pavement, from the Weinberg to the Friedrichsplatz, we found fifty or sixty incendiaries.
The following morning revealed a terrible picture. The whole city was trampled, torn and shattered. Then the big bomb in the Aue exploded. A woman was killed by a splinter through her heart. People screamed. I ran down to Brüder-straße in order to get across the Fulda Bridge. I was stopped. At the same moment, a dud exploded at Marstaller Platz where the Restaurant Wilhelm is. When I walked through Kaufunger Straße, people were still or already trying to put out fires. Massive houses were still collapsing. Then came trucks bringing food stuffs into the city. People behaved splendidly.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Wickenrode, Karl L
Description
An account of the resource
Mr Karl L Wickenrode's account of the events at Frankfurter Straße, Weinbergbunker, Marstall and Kaufunger Straße.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-01
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
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Record 8
BKasselVdObmv10008
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
displaced person
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Hannah K., née Sch., born 19 December 1913, from Sanderhausen and makes the following statement:
We were burnt down in the terror attack of 23 October. We moved in with my mother-in-law in the Pinne [a pub]. When the alarm came, we immediately went down. This time, they were all down early. We were not in the big public shelter but the little one for people living in the house. Then the raid started and my mother-in-law and my husband were standing together in another part of the cellar opposite. I was frightened and ran into the big shelter with my child (Manfred, born 3 February 1940). And it was like that: When the smoke started to come in, I saw that people held cloths in front of their mouths. I took the boy’s underpants off so that he could hold them damp against his mouth. Then we ran back into the cellar where we had been first. My husband had been looking for me and calling me and he was supposed to help open the breakthroughs. And I was fairly lively and suddenly we were out of water. The boy became sleepy. I thought we’ll suffocate. A woman from the big shelter whom I didn’t know, gave me something sweet and I said: “Give the boy something too,” and I think the boy flinched and fell back. I was not with it anymore and thought my boy was with me and then ran somewhere else. For days I thought I had the boy with me. And then people shouted we should kneel and I did and then the light went out and I fell over. I did not feel any pain, I was only sleepy. My husband fell over a heap of sand in the corridor. The only carried him out at half ten because dead bodies were lying on him. It had been thought that he too was dead.
I woke up about eight in the morning. I fell asleep a long time after the raid. Possibly about one. The others were already all lying there and were all asleep. When I woke up I noticed the fresh air. A woman was lying on top of me and had a leg over me or it was even two women, and I said to the people to give me a hand but the women were themselves unconscious. I shouted for help but no one came. But then rescue units came. I picked myself up. I kept shouting “Manfred!” and then a child shouted “Mummy!” and I’m certain it was him. Around me were lots of dead children. Mine was not among them. Then it went dark. The rescuers came and carried me out. I shouted: my child is still in there. It’s possible that he was lying there and I didn’t see him. I was brought to the Renthof. I thought they would bring my boy too, they also brought many people but not my child. I was so dazed and weak, I could not look after my child. I think it is possible that the unknown woman who gave me something against fainting, took the child because she thought I didn’t want him anymore. More children were saved than adults, probably because they had less smoke down there. I should have stayed with my husband, then this would not have happened. The following morning (Saturday) I found my husband. He was at the Renthof. There were so many dead people and he looked at them all. Then we ran to the Pinne where they carried out the dead. There were so many, they could not bring them all out at the same time. We then travelled to Rengershausen and the next day back to Kassel although we should have gone to Fulda but we did not have the peace to do so. And then we looked at more dead people from the Pinne, only at the Pinne. But we did not find our boy. The rescue units told us that they had brought out dead and living children. They did not know anything about our boy. It was said that that they had all been laid out at the cemetery, all the dead, but I did not know that they were there.
Description of my boy: dark blond hair, eyes grey-blue, of average size, round face, jabbered the whole day, couldn’t say his name. When he could not remember his name, he always said: “I am a boy!” He was dressed in a light blue jumper, I draped my brown cardigan around him, blue shoes and knee-socks.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Hannah, K
Description
An account of the resource
Mrs Hannah, K's account of the events at Wildemannsgasse 19 (“Pinne”).
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-03
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 12
BKasselVdObmv10012
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
fear
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is the sculptor Heinz Wiegel (Lance Corporal) and makes the following statement:
I must start by explaining that our house had already been hit by incendiaries during the air raid of the night of 27 August 1941. The neighbouring house towards Murhard-straße and the corner house opposite towards Murhard-straße were burnt out. Our upper floor had to be rebuilt. The construction waste from the renovation stayed there. It made it easier to put out two incendiaries later. We also had iron doors up there. Our house was hit by five incendiaries and two smaller canisters with phosphorous. One burnt down to the second floor, it had probably entered through a window on the third floor. A ceramic bowl stood on our table, it had sand in it and because of that I could throw the filth out.
On the evening in question were sitting in the living room. My father was also there. The wireless stopped. I said to my wife: there will be an alarm. She took the suitcases and my father went on his way home to Große Rosenstraße 21. That’s where he died. We, my wife and daughter, ran to the cellar. Women and children were already there and a paymaster. Then incendiaries fell in quick succession and then a blockbuster at Luisenplatz. Then the lights went out and an explosive dropped on Murhardstraße and the tooth gap [an empty plot]. I could hear and smell that something wasn’t right. I ran through all the flats and tore the nets from the windows because the shower of sparks had already started. It came in from the burning houses around us. I went up to the attic. On the fourth floor, where Mrs Nitsche lived, I put the fire out together with Mrs N. Her toilet was on fire. I put the incendiary out. The air raid warden Schlotzhauer fought the fire on the third floor. A Mr Möller, and my wife too, brought water and then I went up to the attic. A couple of light canisters had fallen into a corner of the roof. I put them out with water. Then a fire was burning through from the ceiling of the third floor. An old chest was standing there and I got up on that chest and chucked water from half-filled buckets on the fire. I also went into the little room next to it. I brought the ceiling down with a broom handle because in the corner the fire from the house next door was coming through. I don’t know how long that took. I remember though that I was wishing for number 7 to burn down.
The church burned like a flaming torch. The old barracks too. The shower of sparks was intense. We saved the house in the fight against the fire. I had smoke poisoning. The Hitler Youth put a fire guard into our house. My wife took me to the Red Cross as I had lost my sight but it was restored there. The following day we travelled to the Blue Lake because I couldn’t bear the air [in Kassel]. Our house started burning again but soldiers put the fires out.
On reverse of the page:
My father died that night. I have been told the following by eyewitnesses: My father must have arrived in Große Rosenstraße at the start of the raid. The incendiaries in the house were put out with my brother-in-law’s help. One canister [dropped] in the shop, another at the front door, everything was on fire. At that point several people from the house threw their buckets away and took off. In the house next door [Text becomes incoherent and then stops.]
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Wiegel, Heinz
Heinz Wiegel
Description
An account of the resource
Heinz Wiegel's account of the events at Luisenstraße 9 and Große Rosenstraße 21.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-05
Contributor
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Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 13
BKasselVdObmv10013
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Käthe Sch., née Sch., born 5 January 1906, and makes the following statement:
Before eight in the evening, the wireless stopped. That’s when we put our coats on. We had tickets for the bunker of the railway. With me were my daughter (19 years old) and my grandchild, my parents and my 15-year old son. My siblings (the Gutheil family) had already gone ahead. The alarm started towards eight o’clock. Then my parents and I ran to the bunker. My son, as dispatch runner, had to stay there. By about half nine we were told that our house and the whole street were on fire. At about ten my son turned up completely black in the face. He had been helping with putting out fires in our house and then had been buried. (Cf. the report of the son which makes no mention of this.) But the men managed to get out. Some women had stayed back. Towards eleven, we noticed smoke coming into the bunker. The children started to cry and our eyes started to water. But there was no water for us because it became so scarce that we were not allowed to take any. Then we sat there. The bunker takes 800 people and 1200 were there. It was a terrible ordeal and our tongues burnt with thirst.
At six, I got out to have a look around and got as far as Westendstraße. Where Hohenzollernstraße is, I turned back. You couldn’t get through. Everything was on fire. Sparks were flying. It was terribly windy. So I went back. We sat there until half seven. It was morning. We were told we had to get out. The air was all used up and we would suffocate. And so we left, ran through the flames up Bismarckstraße and through Kölnische Straße to the town hall. On the way, we saw many bombed-out people, sitting on chairs along the street or on the curb. And they had their bundles. I did not hear much wailing and moaning. Here, less was on fire. In the town hall were given milk to drink and were taken to the Wittich barracks. From there we moved to Gemünden and der Wohra where we are living in a flat of our own.
The son, Harry T., born 17 November 1928, makes the following statement:
When the others had left the house, I stayed in the flat at first. Then I stood by the front door of the house. Then the ack ack started firing. Then fire broke out on Hohenzollern-straße. The air raid warden, Mrs Almeroth, got us out for firefighting because our attic started burning. While we were putting out fires, an explosive bomb dropped in a corner of the yard. The hose caught fire while we were firefighting. When we couldn’t go on anymore as the fire was too fierce and we had run out of water, we went down to the entrance hall. On the ground floor, the flat of the Hungerland family was on fire. They carried their furniture into the entrance hall. But it was destroyed by fire anyway. That flat was directly above the air raid cellar and because there was danger that the house would collapse, the air raid warden said people should go to the shelter in Bismarckstraße. It was sometime between 10 and half past. And as there was nothing left to salvage – our flat had also been destroyed already – I went up Westendstraße, through Parkstraße to the shelter on Bismarckstraße. In Westendstraße some people were still on the street. I had to pay attention that I did not get hit by something, stones or masonry or wooden beams. All the people from our wing of the house went to the Bismarckbunker. Herr Ferdinand Theune was killed. He tried to get back into the house to fetch his dog because it was barking so. Then the house collapsed. I don’t know what happened to his wife and his many children. I went back there in the morning, at about six, but by that time the house was just a pile of rubble.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Käthe Sch
Description
An account of the resource
Mrs Käthe Sch's account of the events at Luisenstraße 2, Old Barracks (north wing), Railway Bunker, Bismarckstraße. Included is a statement by her son, Harry.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-07
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 15
BKasselVdObmv10015
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
anti-aircraft fire
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mr Johannes Leimbach [born 24 October 1885], formerly of Zeughausstraße, and makes the following statement:
When the alarm came, my daughter with her child and another woman from the house, Mrs Dora Jacobs, went to the Pinne [a pub]. I stayed alone in the cellar. I waited and put out two incendiaries in the attic and I went up and down back to the cellar and I shouted to those in the cellar next door: “Your house is on fire, you have to put out the fire. But they claimed that they had no water. They preferred to save themselves. I carried down other things: children’s clothes, pram and other things. When the fires had spread so far that you couldn’t get through anymore, I thought: “Now you have to save your life.” I ran with the pram and the bedding across the Weiße Hof and we were instructed to make our way to the embankment at the school. I parked the pram there. Before, however, the enormous storm had torn away one of the bundles. During the night, I tried to get to the Pinne. Impossible. When it got a little lighter, I made my way through Königstraße, Bremerstraße, Artilleriestraße down to the Pinne.
A man shouted: “Come, we want to get into the Pinne, one entrance is accessible.” Another five men joined us and then we lifted a shaft cover. The house had collapsed completely with the exception of half the front and a wall on the left. A man came running from the rubble at the back. “Come over here, we can reach an entrance here.” We went there and went twenty steps down. We shone a torch and that’s when we saw it. The dead bodies were lying there. Then we called for people we knew: “Mrs Simmen” and I shook her and she said: “Yes?” And I said: “Don’t you recognize me?” “Oh,” she says, “Mr Leimbach, where is my daughter Ilse?” and she gestures with her hand. We carried Mrs Simmen out. She said: “My legs! My Legs!” We carried her. The emergency service and a car took her away. Then we brought out another four or five people. Then soldiers and the emergency services arrived. I was looking for my daughter. I couldn’t find her. The soldiers said; “They’re all dead. You can just drag them out like that. We have to start from the front.” I then went to Sandershausen where my daughter’s renting two rooms. Then I went back to the Pinne but my daughter had not yet been found.
On Sunday, she was lying there, dead. With her was an unknown child. They’d thought it was hers. She had black hair and was about two years old. She was not buried with my daughter. According to the picture, it can’t have been Mrs K.’s daughter (see record 12). She had long black hair. Then we looked for the boy; he was about nine months old. He was lying there, he looked so natural; we buried him with his mother. The police registered the personal details and labelled the dead. I returned there on several occasions but did not find any further relatives. We brought my daughter in her coffin to Sandershausen where her flat was. Miss Anne-liese Ortlepp who boarded with us, has also been saved. She is now in the psychiatric hospital in Gießen. She can still not walk. This is everything I can say what I saw and went through.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Leimbach, Johannes
Johannes Leimbach
Description
An account of the resource
Johannes Leimbach's account of the events at Zeughausstraße 10, Wildemannsgasse 19 'Pinne'.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-10
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
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Record 16
BKasselVdObmv10016
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present are the children, Franz N., born 10 February 1930, and Elisabeth N., born 5 February 1932, and make the following statement:
We lived in Schäfergasse 30. When the alarm came, we went directly to the Pinne [a pub]. We weren’t allowed to use the shelter in Fliegengasse where we usually went because we didn’t have tickets. My sister can’t remember anything but I can recall quite a lot. At first, I had a book and read. The air raid warden Mohr said to me: “That’s good, my boy, it would be useful if they were all like you.” Then a bomb dropped on the house and there was an enormous amount of smoke and dust. The back entrance was buried. Then some men came in and asked whether we had gas masks. They wanted the masks to put out the fire at the back, not for people. Fires had started at the emergency exits. In the space where the men were fighting the fire, there was a crash as if something had collapsed. And because the lights were out, the men asked whether we had a spare torch. They were given one.
Before that many people had come in from Wildemanns-gasse through the emergency exits. People started shouting: “Mr Mohr, please help me, I don’t have any water for my child! My child will suffocate.” And so on. Then I fell asleep. And when I woke up again, I was lying underneath the bench and had bumped my head against something. A woman was still shouting: “Mr Mohr, I cannot take it anymore, please help me!” Someone replied: “I’ll be there in a minute; I don’t have time right now!” Already before that some people wanted to leave and he supposedly said: “I am not allowed to let anyone out, I have to do my duty.” (Pub landlord Karl Mohr of Töpfenmarkt 13) Allegedly, he did however save himself and his family. For himself, he had the courage to run through the fire. After a long time soldiers came in. They put the dead at the front to one side and rescued first those who had lost consciousness. Then they brought me and my sister to the Hessenkampfbahn [a stadium]. As I was carried out I could see how a soldier lifted my mum. I felt her heart beating at that time. Since then, we have no knowledge of our mother. My father is stationed in the north of Norway. From the Hessenkampfbahn a car took us to the town hall where we should have been deposited but we weren’t. The town hall was completely overcrowded. We were taken to the Wittich barracks where they bandaged my legs as I had bruises. After three days I could walk again. We went through the city to look for our mum but we did not find her. We met an uncle who took us with him to Minden in Westphalia. We never heard from our mum again.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Franz N and Elisabeth N
Description
An account of the resource
Franz N and Elisabeth N's account of the events at Wildemannsgasse 19, Pinne.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-10
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 18
BKasselVdObmv10018
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
childhood in wartime
civil defence
firefighting
home front
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Miss Emmy O., formerly of Ziegengasse 13, and reports:
About half seven we had shift change at the air raid warning service at the post office. At that point we already had hostile activity. From the direction, we realised that Kassel was the target. And as the first bombs dropped, the building next door was hit. Our staffroom was in that building. It was connected to us through a door on the ground floor (Königsstraße [63], the building where the shoe shop Tack was). Then dreadful smoke and fumes; the lights went out. We had to work by lamplight. The smoke became so unbearable, however, we could not see anything, but we had to continue our work and the phone worked until the end. The post office above us was also on fire which we realised because we could hear the beams falling onto the ceiling above us. And through the explosions, the whole floor vibrated. It was like being on a train. We worked until about ten. Then the order was given to evacuate the office. We were led to the canteen. Because all exits were blocked, the canteen operator led us through burning corridors and finally I realised that I had cobbles underneath my feet.
That’s how I knew that we were on Königsplatz. Everything was on fire there, the sparks flew around our hair. We stood there for half an hour. The officers thought we’d be lost if we stayed here and we wanted to make our way up Königstraße but then the houses collapsed and we had to turn back. On the second attempt, when we were wearing gas masks, we got as far as Friedrichsplatz. I spent the night on the Schöne Aussicht because we could not get back to our digs in Park Schönfeld and also not to Wilhelmshöher Allee. We therefore had to stay on Friedrichsplatz. Some of the girls went to the state museum and spent the night there in the warning centre. I stayed on Schöne Aussicht and looked for my relatives. Then a car came from the Lüttich barracks which took us to the barracks. But I came back and searched for my parents every day but have not found anything about my parents.
A Mrs Schär got out of our house. She wrote to me: After the raid my father and brother went to the attic to check. At that point the house was not yet on fire. Then they went up again when the fire started. They could not get it under control. Mrs Schär tried to escape through the breakthroughs but after the first two, the third cellar had collapsed. They could not continue that way. So she ran with her daughter and her brother-in-law out of the house and the others should have followed them but did not come. Maybe they tried later and it was too late. My mother had been in the hall. Nothing could be found of her. They found my father. I carried the stones away; soldiers brought him out. It was terribly hot and the following day they only retrieved charred bodies. Nothing has been found of my brother and my mother.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Emmy O
Description
An account of the resource
Emmy O's account of the events at Königsplatz (post office), Ziegengasse 13.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-10
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 19
BKasselVdObmv10019
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mr Alfred P., formerly of Gartenstraße 26, and makes the following statement:
The alarm went and there was hardly enough time to eat a bowl of soup. Because I’d just come home from work. So I grabbed together what I had on me. My mother brought everything down to the cellar. Because I was in Gartenstraße at my sister’s as I always had to eat there. My mother was also there; she lived in Zentgrafenstraße. (Mother Hedwig P., sisters Anna P. and Helene H.) During the raid I wanted to see a couple of times what was going on but was always thrown back by air pressure. When the flames started and everything was on fire, I went back up and brought the bedding and anything else I could grab into the cellar. Houses no 7 and 9 were already on fire and also many houses on Schäfergasse downwards. The horse butcher Herrmann from our house also brought a lot of things into the cellar. And then he said: “This one doesn’t even live in this house and helps to salvage things but you are afraid to go up. You have to take your hat off to him.” Then I went to have another look in the street, my mother and sister too. I said to my mother: “Just wait here a moment, I want to go back down and tell people there that they should get out.” And when I got into the cellar and told them, most of them said I’d gone mad, the cellar was safe and nothing could happen to them there. I said: “No, that’s a living grave. If we get to keep our things in here, we’ll be lucky,” I said.
And when I came back up, my mother had disappeared and my sister too. I shouted after them and heard my sister shout “Alfred” back once but I could not see them through the fire and the smoke. I thought, they’d already run across. But they had not stayed where I told them, I wanted to take them with me the way I wanted to go. I made my way towards the horse market, where Koch, the glazier, is. I jumped through a small column of fire because the Huth’s house opposite had already mostly collapsed. Still sounds of crashing and fire raining down, I don’t know what time it was. Then I went round the corner of the Tabella house which was already gone, here I was protected. A bunch of little children screamed, they were lying on a pile of sand. So I said to the children: “Come on, get up, I can’t carry you all, you’ll have to come after me.” But none of them came, no one of them reacted to what I’d said. So I went up Pferdemarkt and had to get across burning beams. It was the house of the clothes shop, next to Tabella, opposite the Hellmuth bakery. That’s where I realised that I had burnt my legs. I was still carrying my bike on my back because I thought I could drive down Königstraße. But you couldn’t do that. As I came to the corner where the department store was, I chucked it away, the frame had become so hot that I could not hold on to it. Then I went down Königstraße further because I could not get through Moltkestraße. I always looked for open spaces but could not get to Lutherplatz. So I ran to Jägerstraße. A burnt-out car was standing in the middle of the street; that was lucky for me. I crouched behind it for a moment. At that moment a column of fire shot out from Jägerstraße and I would not have managed to get through it if the car had not been there. (If we’d had water, we could have saved many a house.) Then the firestorm abated for a moment and I thought it’s time to get up and get on, further down. Just as I’d started, it started raining fire again. I’d only run a few paces, and I thought you can’t go back, you’ll have to run the short distance through it. I had everything burnt, my head, the hair had all gone, my hands, I could feel it on my legs and what I’d been wearing had turned into rags. Then I ran to Bremer Straße (Synagogue). There, I stood at a wall and tried to catch my breath. At that moment I also lost my sight. Someone came with a tin hat on their head and shouted: “Off the street, clear the street.” I could just about see him. I shouted back: “Come here if you want something!” So he came over to me, took me and I was carried down to the fire trenches in the Jew garden. That’s when the pain started and I started to whimper a bit. Someone gave me water from an old tin can; I had a burning thirst. They said to me: “Be careful that you don’t cut your lips on the tin!” Another woman put ointment on my hands. From there I was taken to the cellar of the Henschel admin building. A doctor dressed my burns provisionally. He also cut off the burnt skin. Then I was taken to another room where I was to sit on a bench but I immediately fell over. I heard only moaning and groaning. Then a truck came and took us to the district hospital. It must have been daylight as the sun hurt my eyes but I could not see it. In the bunker I had to walk as there were no stretchers. I was guided and put on a bed and then they took the rags off me. I stayed there until 6 October. [Would have to have been November.] Then I was on a transport bus to Eschwege. I don’t know much about that time because I started raving. I jumped out of the bed and did not want to lie down. But I don’t remember any of this. On 14 February I was discharged from Eschwege.
There was also someone called Gräser from Kasernen-straße 4 in that hospital. He ran the same way as I. His burns were much worse. He had three fingers amputated. There was no adult with the children at Pferdemarkt. They must have been about twenty children. At Pferdemarkt another child (from the Behrens’ house with the flowershop) must have run through the flames, to his grandad at Lindenberg, to Konrad Knipschild (with the nickname Sweet William) in Ochshäuser Straße. The parents of the boy died in the fire. The boy is about 10 years old and unharmed.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Alfred P
Description
An account of the resource
Mr Alfred P's account of the events at Schäfergasse 5 and Gartenstraße 26.
Publisher
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IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-10
Contributor
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Harry Ziegler
Rights
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This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
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Record 21
BKasselVdObmv10021
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Margarete F., born 3 March 1895, formerly of Schäfergasse 39, now of Menzelstraße 4, c/o Möller and makes the following statement:
When the alarm came, we went to the cellar – right? – and it came blow upon blow, there were no breaks, and so everything around us was hit, everywhere. Ours was not hit directly but it caught fire. Only one incendiary dropped into the small rear building but we put it out. The people in the cellar were very orderly and quiet. The youngest was nine years old and we all got out. The street looked really nice (sarcasm); we’d gone up a few times, everything was on fire. All around us, all houses. Our house also caught fire but only later, through the flying sparks. We stayed in our cellar during the whole raid. The people from the neighbouring houses also came to our cellar, they were standing up to the second floor; the whole house was full. When our house also started to burn, the block leader, Mr Euler, said: “We have to get out, all of us!” And because people did not have anything with them, we used the hose to soak them so that they could get through the fire. They did not even have blankets with them. And then, all the people got out, towards the embankment and they all got through, some even to the shelter at Henschel’s. We then worked to get the women out on the street who had fled to us with little children. And my landlord, Köhler, the baker, and his wife and niece and a nurse and I, us five, we left last.
We left the house as it was, it just started burning. And as we got out, we had a difficult job because the tarmac was on fire, we got stuck, phosphorous splashes everywhere, but we kept our wits about us; we fought through. We had taken wet blankets. The suitcases we couldn’t take because the cellar too was on fire. Then we had to climb over burning beams and also over many people who had burnt to death who were lying there. One woman had had a heart attack. Is was about half eleven.
Then we went across the embankment to the school. It looked terrible. There were lots of people there. They were however fairly sensible and quiet. That’s where we stayed until half six the following morning. Then we went out but fled back in because a dud exploded. And from there, when it eased up a bit with the duds, we walked through the rubble to Obervellmar. We couldn’t see anything and had lost all our belongings. In the school, we received emergency treatment. We were given eye drops, rations and received our papers as bomb victims. My husband died five years ago. Our only son died in a military hospital in Vienna. And now I’m on my own. Of course, all this happened with great commotion, what I’m telling here calmly. It was hell down there where we were. There were also two children in the cellar, we took them with us, three and five years old, two boys, probably Mrs Peter’s from Schäfergasse 18? We took them with us, the other people in front of us, and I don’t know where they went. I don’t know where their mother was, she wasn’t with us. She had six children. I’ve heard that she’s been saved. A girl was at the hospital at that time. She was only a few weeks old.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Margarete F
Description
An account of the resource
Margarete F's account of the events at Schäfergasse 39.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-11
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 23
BKasselVdObmv10023
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Miss Clara A., born 25 February 1901, of Heckers-häuser Straße 10, and makes the following statement:
When we heard the alarm, we grabbed our suitcases and went down to the cellar. The bombs dropped one after another, we heard them come down and explode, down at the cemetery and the open field. Luckily, we only had canisters with phosphorous in front of house and behind it. The men went up, there was a fire. They put the flames out and every ten minutes, they went back up and put them out again. On the upper floor a bed was on fire and on the second floor the floor boards but they had been there in good time so that the fire did not spread. And then came the people from further up the street and brought their beds and suitcases because everything was on fire there. The stables of the garden centre were on fire, cattle and horses perished there. And then slowly people came into our street from the whole district around the train station in the lower town and they sought refuges with us. They were all very quiet, they were mainly older people, dazed by the horror. We prepared seats in the cellar and brought bread down. We couldn’t make coffee as we did not have any water. Even the foreigners from the barracks in Holländische Straße fled to us. They were Italians. They did not stay for long. They also made the rounds with us through the house. Nothing was stolen from us. There were also some people with heart diseases and other illnesses, we had to control ourselves. When it became lighter, we noticed that everything was black with people. On the cemetery too we could see people sitting on their furniture, they’d built something there and sought refuge among the dead, for two days there was an encampment of the bombed-out from Mombachstraße. No one died there, they’d all made their way to cemetery in time. Apart from that I don’t know anything important. We were really lucky.
My sister and her husband, Dora and Fritz Weißing, visited us that evening. They left about a quarter to eight. They had to change to no 3 tram on Hedwigstraße. Then the alarm came. They had to go into the cellar of Hedwigstraße 12. And in the breakthrough to Tack, in Untere Königstraße [65], that’s were their bodies were found. During the first week I searched everywhere for them. Another tenant from the house recognised them and stated that he had talked to them. He ran with his wife and child through the flames and stayed on Lutherplatz. The four boys of my sister are soldiers, the two little ones are still at home. I live there now and look after the children, the 17-year old and the daughter of 24 (Bettenhausen, Eschenweg 10).
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Clara A
Description
An account of the resource
Miss Clara A's account of the events at Heckershäuser Straße 10 and Main Cemetery.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-11
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 24
BKasselVdObmv10024
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is the station sergeant Karl E., formerly of Moltkestraße 8, and makes the following statement:
The afternoon of 22 October I happened to be off-duty. If there was an alarm or a visible raid, we had to come to the station house. When the alarm started, I went immediately, took in the situation and got as far as Mauerstraße. Then I could see the Christmas trees in the sky. My wife had stayed at home. I thought I could make it to the station house but only got as far as Schillerstraße 7. Then the first bombs started dropping. Half a minute had passed. I took cover there. There was a dreadful commotion in the house. Then I went through the breakthrough to no 9 but opposite is the butcher’s Jacob, no 14. Heavy incendiaries had dropped on that and the house was ablaze. I calmed down the people there as best as I could. The shocks were massive. The people were so frightened, they nearly tore my tunic off. I said as soon as the raid is over and the firestorm starts, we’ll have to look for escape routes, as I had been trained in these matters.
Then I got as far as Schillerstraße 29 or 31, the Trieschmann bakery, the house was still in fairly good condition. I went into the yard there, where the flames came in from the houses on the sides. We started firefighting anyway and I helped, the house is still there. I got a wound on my arm, the tunic was full of blood. From there a searched for a way out. I met a captain from the artillery who did not know his way around. We wanted to get up Schillerstraße but Schwaab’s lumberyard was ablaze. There was no getting through on that street. So he came back and I thought that Orleansstraße was our only escape route, although my eyesight was getting worse through the smoke. From there I stopped in the house to the right of Wenderoth and took some civilians with me. Here the rubble was already several feet high. A woman was in a house who could not walk, I had her collected later by a car from the station. Then I told people to hurry but not to run so that they would not fall because there were so many lumps of fire. Those who fell hardly got up again. So we went to the train station in the lower town. I then reported to my police station. Our commanding officer, first lieutenant Koch, sent me to the terminal of tramline 1 at Holländische Straße. We were to show the way to a regiment of firefighters. But the chief of the fire brigade was already there and took command. I returned to my station towards six in the morning after I had tried unsuccessfully to reach my wife in Moltkestraße. The following morning half of the house had collapsed but the people living there could not be found. The cellars were on fire because in our house, we had about 500 hundredweight of coal bunkered there. An incendiary had dropped through a hole into a pile of briquettes and because of that, everything was set on fire. Of the people in the house we only found unrecognisable parts of bodies. My wife is missing without a trace.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Karl E
Description
An account of the resource
Police Sergeant Karl E's account of the events at Police Station no 4 (Reuterstraße 12) and Moltke-straße 8.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-13
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 25
BKasselVdObmv10025
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
fear
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
target indicator
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Anna A., formerly of Hohenzollernstraße 28, now of Söhrestraße 15, and makes the following statement:
When the alarm came, we went immediately down to the cellar. We took our suitcases and blankets with us. And then it kicked off immediately, blasts everywhere. We were always lying on the ground, we fell over from the terrible air pressure and Yeee – we were on the ground. The men always wanted to go up and have a look but that was not possible. Those [phosphorous] canisters were dropping. We too had several canisters in the house, they came in from the sides. We could hear shouting from the neighbouring building where the restaurant Zeppelin was: “Fire!” We wanted to help but the smoke made it impossible and then we knocked through the breakthroughs. Then they came through to our cellar and wanted to get through to Kronprinzenstraße but they all came flooding back because everything was blocked, so they said. And so we went through the Zeppelin and through the restaurant where everything was on fire. The emergency crews did not leave us alone: “Get out, out, out!” In the street, we only saw fire, both sides were ablaze. We had already soaked our blankets in the cellar and wrapped them around us. Then we ran to the Viktoria shelter in front of the train station. It was about half nine. Everything was overcrowded in there.
After an hour, the air became so bad, we went out again, up the whole of Kölnische Straße, to the little fir forest but then we were warned that it was full of duds, so we ran through the fire, down Dörnbergstraße and sat down on a bench on Hindenburgplatz. My husband and I were on our own. My daughter had gone to shelter at the train station and my boy was on duty that night, in Bahnhofstraße. They are both alive. Thank goodness! We sat there with Mrs Schunk and her eight-year old boy, both from our house. A security guy came and said to us: “Dear people, leave; there’s a dud which can go off any minute.” So we went on, down Diakonissenstraße, when the dud went off; we felt the air pressure from it. There were a large number of storm troopers; they said we should go down Herkulesstraße to the secondary modern school. That’s where we went and waited till morning. The dud had exploded about midnight. Then we were given some food. We then walked to Harleshausen where we have friends. We stayed there for two days and then went to Lohfelden to my daughter’s flat. We fetched our suitcases two days later from the cellar; my daughter had salvaged our bedding during the raid. These things had survived in the cellar. Our daughter had bad smoke poisoning and had already been given injections for it in the shelter at the train station. My husband is very upset by the raid. He is already damaged from the First World War and now he had to go through this.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Anna A
Description
An account of the resource
Anna A's account of the events at Hohenzollernstraße nos. 26 and 28, Hindenburg-platz.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-13
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 28
BKasselVdObmv10028
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Ottilie Klöne, born 22 October 1893, i.e. the day of the terror attack, formerly of Pferdemarkt 9 (glazier’s workshop), now of Steinhöferstraße 8, and makes the following statement:
We just wanted to sit down for dinner when the siren sounded. We took our luggage, which was at the ready, and our coats, which were on the coatrack, with us in the cellar. Water and sand seemed to be there in sufficient quantity already and we thought that it wouldn’t get that serious. That was until the first bombs dropped, the impacts of which we could feel even in the cellar which was 12 feet underground. Above the air raid cellar there was a manhole, which led to the garage, and which was intended as an emergency exit. The air pressure made the manhole cover fly open and then close again. We always ducked down and thought, now it’ll come down. Then we heard the boxes with glass topple over and we decided to move further forward in the cellar towards the street. All the people living in the house were in the cellar, our female apprentice with a female friend, and a soldier who used to work for us. They had come back from the street as they believed themselves to be safer with us.
People were rather quiet, talked about all manner of things, until it got worse of course. As there was no break in the shooting and the bombs kept dropping, they became anxious. In the meantime some of the residents had been in the attic and noticed that some incendiaries had fallen through so that the flat on the third floor was on fire. The men tried to put the fire out as far as water was available because the water mains had failed already. When they looked out of the window, they realised that the whole of the old town was a sea of flames. They came back to the cellar and warned us that we should get ready to leave the cellar because they could not put out the fire which was coming down further. We put all the blankets and cloths into the water tubs, wrapped the blankets around us, put the cloths to our noses and mouths and took our gas masks. In the meantime the electric light was getting weaker. Now people came from other cellars up from the Pferdemarkt and from Schäfergasse and asked us what to do. They came through the breakthroughs. And looked for escape routes. We told them that the best opportunity was where we were because we could run diagonally across to Kasernenstraße and from there to Martinsplatz.
Most of them paid no attention and continued crawling through the cellars. In the meantime, the electric light had gone completely and it was high time to leave the cellar. We had torches and paraffin lamps which were still burning. Now everyone was frightened, the raid had finished, it was about half nine. Nevertheless, they stayed calm. My daughter and her friend went first, they urged us forward: “Get a move on, we don’t want to suffocate.” They had me give them their papers from my coat. I also gave them a shopping bag with our cutlery and bread and butter. They were supposed to run to Martinsplatz or Lutherplatz where they could find enough air. From the entrance hallway, we saw them running to Kasernenstraße under their wet blankets. And that was the last I saw of them (up, towards Martinsplatz). I was still helping with various things in the cellar and could not follow immediately, and I brought my mother up and then we also made our way. In the meantime the upper floors of the houses were on fire, it was a crazy heat, but it was still fairly safe to get through. On the corner was a heap of sand but I did not see any children there. When I realised in Kasernenstraße that my mother was no longer following me, I wanted to turn back at first but then a gable fell down and I ran on. I knew that all the other residents were behind her. As my mother’s cassette was later found outside Moltkestraße 1, I assume that she wanted to get to her sister, Mrs Wild, in Moltkestraße 5. She had been concerned about her all night. We can’t ascertain whether she managed to get there because no one from that house is still alive. (Mother: Mrs Auguste Rauhut, née Koch) The firestorm drove me to Martin’s Church and I had to stay there as it was impossible to go on. Gradually five other residents arrived, my husband the last of them, and he said that the others had not wanted to come along. It was a family with four children and they had only come back from Treysa two days previously. (Fam. Pfetzig with four children). There is no trace of them. Until then, they had been evacuated. The other residents died too, two of them and the soldier have been identified in the cellar. My daughter and her friend are missing. We believe that they were trying to reach the Wesertor district where their friend Erika Lichte lived. (Franzgraben 22) There was no panic in the cellar, we even managed to calm down the children again and again. We had to stay for the three hours in Martin’s Church until it burnt down over our heads. The organ was on fire and the choir, the roof, the big bell had fallen down. There were 200 to 300 people in the church so that it was evacuated without a panic although a number of doors had been blocked already by falling beams. Then we stood at the Philipp’s monument and then the army guided us through Philippsstraße, Königstraße to Friedrichsplatz. We could not see anything and barely open our eyes because they were full of smoke. We were stumbling forward through wires and rubble. At Friedrichsplatz we could breathe more easily for the first time. After several attempts to get through to the Weinberg and to Wilhelmshöher Allee, which were unsuccessful because of the heat and the blaze, we remained in a gate of the theatre until morning. From there we saw the Courts of Justice burn down and the riding stables. The following morning we went through Königstraße past the charred bodies to Pferdemarkt. Then we saw the ruins.
Now I’m alone with my husband; she was our only child. We re-opened the shop in Freiheiter Durchbruch 12, the only house which is still standing there.
The trucks on Friedrichsplatz which transported people drove along Schöne Aussicht. People charged them to get onto them and the drivers would shout out the destination, for example Zwehren or that general direction or towards Nordshausen, Fritzlar, Gudensberg.
In the street where we lived, Pferdemarkt, there are possibly 40 people still alive. Next to our house, in no 11, eleven children died; it is said that 33 skulls were found. Here too we warned that people had to get out, with their children, but the residents stayed in the cellar with their children. Of the tradespeople from one end of the Pferdemarkt to the other, all are gone.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Ottilie Klöne
Description
An account of the resource
Ottilie Klöne's account of the events at Pferdemarkt 9.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-04-14
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
Identifier
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Record 30
BKasselVdObmv10030
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
incendiary device
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Johanna Burghardt, born 26 March 1892, formerly of Oberste Gasse 10, now of Kunoldstraße 5 and makes the following statement:
As soon as the alarm came, we went down in the cellar and that’s where we stayed until someone came and told us that we should get out. It was probably someone from the civilian emergency service. You can’t hear much in our cellar. We noticed that blockbusters came down and that there was a blaze but on the whole, the air remained good in the cellar. All the residents were in the cellar. The young women with children left earlier than we older married couples and that’s why they died, all of them. The others went through a breakthrough towards the end of our blind alley and towards Steinweg. I can’t tell you what became of them. Several gentlemen claimed to have seen them lying there at the end of the alley where the print shop of the orphanage is.
We ran with two Dutchmen and four women towards Königsplatz whereas my husband went through a breakthrough with several others; they got out directly on Friedrichsplatz. That’s why the older people survived. We went past the garrison church, always keeping to the middle of the street. Around us was a sea of fire, we couldn’t see anything else and people who stood there, lost, and who did not know where to go. We also saw children, of about eight years of age, who had their mother with them. On Königsplatz we got into a tramcar which was very crowded where we kept the windows shut so that the sparks from the fire couldn’t come in. And after about twenty minutes, another gentleman from the civilian emergency service came and said we had to get out as the tramcar had begun to smoulder from below. It was an unbearable heat there.
And then the emergency service man guided us to Friedrichsplatz. Near the cinema, houses began to collapse and on the right and when we came to Friedrichsplatz, the stalls at the front for the fair started to burn and we had to get out of ours as it began to smell of burning. So we made our way towards to the middle of the square where the office barracks had burnt down and from there to the theatre. There we sat all night. By and by, we met people from our house, I also found my husband again, and then cars came and women and children were taken away. The car drove us along Schöne Aussicht, down Weinberg, along Frankfurter Straße to Wittich Barracks. There, we were received in an exemplary manner, we got something to eat and drink, they were very nice the soldiers. Some people had also swollen eyes, they received treatment. We stayed there until Sunday afternoon when people were taken to various towns and villages. We were taken to Oberlistingen. They accommodated us well and several of our residents are still there and I came back to Kassel because I am employed.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Johanna Burghardt
Description
An account of the resource
Johanna Burghardt's account of the events at Oberste Gasse 10.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-14
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
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eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 31
BKasselVdObmv10031
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front
shelter
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Mrs Magdalene W., formerly of Untere Königstraße 101, now of Eschenstruth 9 near Noll, and makes the following statement:
Well, there was the alarm and we went into the cellar. We still had time but the shooting started almost immediately and as we came down in the cellar, Mrs Koch said the Christmas trees had already been set and there was a searchlight. “I think it’ll get hairy.” Shortly after, the bombs were dropping and someone said: “Mrs W., the courtyard is on fire” (because I lived in the rear building on my own). Then it got worse, more and more bombs were dropping and we got smoke in the cellar and we felt as if we were suffocating, so we knocked through the breakthrough to no 103 and went into their cellar. We stayed there for a while but it got worse with the smoke so that we went back into our shelter where it was still better than next door. Because there sparks were coming in through the windows. Then a young girl from our house (Inge Poppenhäger) said: “Come on, Mrs. W., we get out.” We went as far as the entrance hall and I saw that whole of Königstraße was on fire. It was still early, about 9 o’clock. I could only see sparks, everything was burning and there was a storm. Then the girl ran away but I did not follow her because I thought: I can’t get through the fire.
So I went back to the cellar. I met Mr Körber who came down the stairs and took his suitcase and said: “Mrs W., come on, we have to get out; the house will collapse soon.” I said: “Where?” To which he replied: “Follow me; to Bähr’s house.” That’s no 86. As we got there, we were told: “Everyone get out! The house will collapse any moment.” So where to now? Air raid warden Michel said: “Everyone follow me, I go first.” So we ran to the army ordnance depot, opposite Bremer Straße. The shelter was full, there was a little room at the entrance which was full of officers and captains and it had a telephone and one captain said on the phone: “We need help, I have so many hundred people in the shelter who are close to suffocating.” But no relief came and he sent the soldiers away and said: “Have a look as to where we can bring these people, we have to help them.” Shortly after a soldier came back and said: “Captain, I found something, fire trenches, where nothing can collapse.” That was where the synagogue used to be. So he said to the soldiers: “Take the women, the men will have to help themselves.” And so they brought us to the fire trenches across the street.
We stayed there the whole night until morning when it dawned. It’s impossible to tell what took place there, as the badly burnt were brought, for example from Moltkestraße 7, they moaned and groaned all night through. It was a staff sergeant and his wife. The staff sergeant kept shouting: “Shoot us, we’re going blind!” The skin hung off his arm bone. A daughter of the midwife Reimann, who was sitting next to me, was called, a child shouted: “I am so much burnt.” But you couldn’t recognise anyone because there was no light. Towards morning, about 4 or 5 o’clock, the seriously injured were bandaged, I think nurses and orderlies came and took the injured away. And the other woman from Moltkestraße was not so badly burnt and was asked to walk but she came back and said: “I can’t walk through the flames yet, I’ll stay here a little longer.” So I sat down beside her and asked: “You are from Moltketraße 7?” And she said: “Yes.” So I said: “My daughter also lives in Moltkestraße, in no 8.” And she said: “What’s her name?” I said: “Uetz,” and then: “I assume that they’re all dead already.” And she said: “That’s possible.” So we stayed in the trenches until dawn and then left. And I went to the Holländische Platz, where my flat used to be, everything there had burnt down. And there I waited for my daughter, not quite as I had imagined it, and I waited and waited but she did not come. So I went up Wolfshager Straße, through Gießbergstraße and thought to get to Moltkestraße from there but when I reached Jägerstraße, I could see what was going on, everything was full of rubble. You had to climb over stones and rubble. Of course I did not get into Moltkestraße and went on to the post office, through Mauerstraße. And then to Königsplatz, down Königstraße and in Königstraße I saw a dead child. At first I thought: Who chucked a doll there, a black one? But when I got closer, I saw that it was a charred child. “Oh, that could be our Wolfgang.” But a gentleman said: “No, that’s a girl.”
And then I went down to Holländische Platz. Water was on the streets, wires, stone, dirt and rubble. You could not walk on Moltkestraße, high piles of stone had been thrown together. I couldn’t see out of my eyes anymore. I was black from head to toe. I didn’t know what to do, so I thought: Let’s see that you get to the Söhrebahn, in Vollmarshausen, where my daughter lives. So I walked along Leipziger Straße. A man helped me carry my suitcase. I had not handed it over at the depot although we had been told to leave our luggage there. But I always held on to it tight and managed to take it with me. Now I walked along streets, you could no longer recognise Bremer Straße or Müllergasse. We walked through Artilleriestraße to Altmarkt and then along Leipziger Straße (and up Fischgasse for a bit). In Leipziger Straße it was also dreadful, it was impossible to walk because the dirt and wire and rubble and water. From there I went to the Söhre train station which had been completely destroyed but the trains were still running. And that is how I got out of Kassel.
My son-in-law, Karl Uetz, was lying on the street, it seems he tried to save a man. In the process my son-in-law fell into the bomb crater in the street. Mr Schröder is supposed to have dragged him out. Friends claim that they had still seen him with heavy burns. He was lying there with the dead in the street and on Tuesday on the cemetery. A ring is all that’s left of my daughter Lene. They found a note booklet of Wolfgang’s in the state museum. They were all buried on the main cemetery.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Magdalene W
Description
An account of the resource
Magdalene W's account of the events at Untere Königstraße 101.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-14
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 32
BKasselVdObmv10032
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
final resting place
firefighting
home front
shelter
target indicator
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
Description
An account of the resource
100 items. Translations of statements held by Stadtarchiv Kassel recorded by the Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel about the bombing of Kassel 22/23 October 1943.
The collection was catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-06-26
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
Translated from the original in German: Present is Karl Heinz K., born 24 August 1930, formerly of Müllergasse 2, and makes the following statement:
When the alarm came, I was in the school on night watch. As the alarm sounded we went on the street and watched the searchlights. When these had isolated a plane, the ack-ack started to shoot and we went into the cellar. Just before the bombs started dropping, I and my friend Homburg fetched a bottle of cocoa. Slowly people from the neighbourhood started to assemble in the cellar. They always came to the cellar during an alarm. They went to the compartments to which they had been assigned. When the first bombs started dropping, the teacher Dietmar made the rounds. When he came to the cellar, he told us that there were already fires in the neighbourhood. It didn’t take long and people arrived whose houses had been damaged. They told us that it was a massive raid.
When we heard bombs dropping on the school, we wanted to go and fight the fire. We did this for a while but the fire could not be contained. The teacher ordered me to run to the next police station and to get a message to them. I got as far as Orleansstraße and could not go on. I ran back. The paper mill opposite was on fire and there was a powerful storm. When I came back to cellar, the lights had gone out and the caretaker had lit the paraffin lamps. In the meantime, a hundred or two hundred people had congregated. Then a navy officer arrived and said: “The people have to get out of the cellar because it won’t be long until the building collapses and then many will die.” When a lot of people had gone outside, we left through the emergency exit towards Schillerstraße.
We went diagonally across, where we sought shelter in a cobbler’s shop. The school was already ablaze down to the raised ground floor. The ack-ack had stopped shooting. But we heard as the train with ammunitions exploded in the train station of the lower town. We left because this house too started to burn and went to the train station in the lower town. We tried to get down Wolfhager Straße because we wanted to see how things were at home. My friend lived at Klosterplatz. We could not get through, however, because houses were falling down.
So we tried to get there through Mombachstraße. We managed to do that. When we reached Holländische Straße, I said: “Let’s go that way so that we get onto the rampart.” This was okay until Schauburg (the cinema). From there on, the houses were on fire. We put our tin hats and gas masks on and walked towards Holländische Platz. We reached it well enough and went through Bernardistraße and intended to go through Kastenalsgasse to Pferdemarkt, And from there to Müllergasse. But we could not get through the fire and so we went to Secondary Modern no 5. In the cellar there, we lay down on cement bags. We were wearing our Nazi Youth uniforms and tried to sleep. But the crackling and thudding of the beams did not let us settle. We tried to get through towards morning. On the way, I met other residents from our house who were still alive: Mrs Ulrich and her brother-in-law. They told me that she had not seen my parents since she left the cellar.
At about ten, I went through Artilleriestraße where I met a friend of my father’s, who was looking for his wife and child (Mr Heinemann of Müllergasse 4). I went with him through all the cellars – my friend had already left – and we were looking for my parents and siblings but did not find anything. When we returned to the rampart, a bomb with a timer went off. Many were hit by the lumps which that threw through the air. One woman got one on the head and died immediately. So I went with Mr Heinemann to his parents-in-law. We stayed the night there (Gensungen). The next day, we went back to Kassel. Outside of our house I met my uncle (Mr Heinrich K.). We went with him to the house of his sister-in-law in Breitenbach near Kassel. The following day, as we were again in Kassel, we went back to our house. We went in the cellar there and carried a few things out. The salvage crews had already brought five bodies out. The baker Kasten from Pferdemarkt was one of them and his wife and some other people living at Pferdemarkt 29. When I went to the ramparts, I found my gran. She had come from Orpetal, on the Monday. I went home with her and live there now. Nothing has been found of my relatives.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Karl Heinz K
Description
An account of the resource
Karl Heinz K's account of the events at Müllergasse 2.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-14
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Harry Ziegler
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Record 33
BKasselVdObmv10033
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Germany
Germany--Kassel
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1943-10-22
1943-10-23
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Vermisstensuchstelle des Oberbürgermeisters der Stadt Kassel
bombing
bombing of Kassel (22/23 October 1943)
civil defence
firefighting
home front