We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 July 2011
The municipal archive of the city of Kassel holds a small file that consists of different versions of a long poem. The piece is alternatively called ‘Thus Died My Home Town’ (So starb meine Heimatstadt), ‘Thus Died My Home Town of Kassel’, or simply ‘Thus Died Kassel’. The various titles refer to a particularly devastating air attack by the Royal Air Force against the North Hessian city in World War II. On 22 October 1943, 1,800 tons of high explosives and incendiaries were dropped on Kassel, producing a catastrophic conflagration that destroyed 60 per cent of the built environment. Somewhere between 6,000 and 8,000 people were killed, while 150,000 residents out of a total population of 220,000 were made homeless. According to a British post-war estimate, the attack also resulted in the production loss for the German war economy of 150 heavy tanks, 400–500 locomotives and 300 heavy guns.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.
