Peenemünde
Encyclopedia
The Peenemünde Army Research Center was founded in 1937 as one of five military proving grounds under the Army Weapons Office (Heeres Waffenamt
).
On April 2, 1936, the Reich Air Ministry
paid 750,000 reichsmarks to the town of Wolgast
for the whole Northern peninsula of the Baltic island of Usedom
. The site had been suggested by Wernher von Braun
's mother as 'just the place for you and your friends'. By the middle of 1938, the Army facility had been separated from the Luftwaffe facility and was nearly complete, with personnel moved from Kummersdorf
. The Army Research Center (Peenemünde Ost) consisted of Werk Ost and Werk Süd, while Werk West (Peenemünde West) was the Luftwaffe Test Site .
was the HVP technical director (Dr Walter Thiel
was deputy director) and there were nine major departments:
The Measurements Group (Gerhard Reisig) was part of the BSM, and additional departments included the Production Planning Directorate (Detmar Stahlknecht), the Personnel Office (Richard Sundermeyer), and the Drawings Change Service.
(A-4) (see test launches), and the Wasserfall
(35 Peenemünde trial firings), Schmetterling
, Rheintochter
, Taifun
, and Enzian
missiles. The HVP also performed preliminary design work on very-long-range missiles for use against the United States
. That project was sometimes called the "V - 3", and its existence is well documented. The Peenemünde establishment also developed other techniques, such as the first closed-circuit television
system in the world, installed at Test Stand VII
to track the launching rockets.
Aerodynamic Institute
The supersonic wind tunnel at Peenemünde's "Aerodynamic Institute" eventually had nozzles for speeds up to the record speed of Mach 4.4
(in 1942 or 1943), as well as an innovative dessiccant system to reduce the condensation clouding caused by the use of liquid oxygen
, in 1940. Led by Rudolph Hermann who arrived in April 1937 from the University of Aachen
, the number of technical staff members reached two hundred in 1943, and it also included Hermann Kurzweg of the (University of Leipzig
) and Walter Haeussermann
.
Heimat-Artillerie-Park 11
Initially set up under the HVP as a rocket training battery (Number 444), Heimat-Artillerie-Park 11 Karlshagen/Pomerania (HAP 11) also contained the A-A Research Command North for the testing of anti-aircraft rockets. The chemist
Magnus von Braun
, the youngest brother of Wernher von Braun, was employed in the attempted development at Peenemünde of anti-aircraft rockets. These were never very successful as weapons during World War II. Their development as practical weapons took another decade of development in the United States and in the U.S.S.R.
ordered construction of an A-4 Production Plant at Peenemünde, and in January 1939, Walter Dornberger
created a subsection of Wa Pruf 11 for planning the Peenemünde Production Plant project, headed by G. Schubert, a senior Army civil servant. By midsummer 1943, the first trial runs of the assembly-line in the Production Works at Werke Süd were made,
but after the end of July 1943 when the enormous hangar Fertigungshalle 1 (F-1, Mass Production Plant No. 1) was just about to go into operation, Operation Hydra
bombed Peenemünde. On August 26, 1943, Albert Speer
called a meeting with Hans Kammler
, Dornberger, Gerhard Degenkolb, and Karl Otto Saur to negotiate the move of A-4 main production to an underground factory in the Harz
mountains. In early September, Peenemünde machinery and personnel for production (including Alban Sawatzki
, Arthur Rudolph
, and about ten engineers) were moved to the Mittelwerk
, which also received machinery and personnel from the two other planned A-4 assembly sites. On October 13, 1943, the Peenemünde prisoners from the small F-1 concentration camp boarded rail cars bound for Kohnstein
mountain.
, and in June 1943 British intelligence had received two such reports which identified the "rocket assembly hall', 'experimental pit', and 'launching tower'.
As the opening attack of the British Operation Crossbow
, the Operation Hydra air-raid
attacked the HVP's "Sleeping & Living Quarters" (to specifically target scientists), then the "Factory Workshops", and finally the "Experimental Station" on the night of August 17/18, 1943. The Polish janitors were given advance warning of the attack, but the workers could not leave due to SS security and the facility had no air raid shelters for the prisoners.
A year later on July 18, August 4, and August 25, the US Eighth Air Force
conducted three additional Peenemünde raids to counter suspected hydrogen peroxide production.
, the complete withdrawal of the development of guided missiles was approved by the Army and SS in October 1943. On August 26, 1943, at a meeting in Albert Speer
's office, Hans Kammler
suggested moving the A-4 Development Works to a proposed underground site in Austria
. After a site survey in September by Papa Riedel and Schubert, Kammler chose the code name Zement (cement) for it in December, and work to blast an underground cavern into a cliff at Lake Traunsee near Gmunden
commenced in January 1944. In early 1944, construction
work started for the test stands and launching pads in the Austrian Alps
(code name Salamander), with target areas planned for the Tatra Mountains
, the Arlberg
range, and the area of the Ortler
mountain. Other evacuation locations included:
For people being relocated from Peenemünde, the new organization was to be designated Entwicklungsgemeinschaft Mittelbau and Kammler's order to relocate to Thuringia
arrived by teleprinter on January 31, 1945. On February 3, 1945, at the last meeting at Peenemünde held regarding the relocation, the HVP consisted of A-4 development/ modification (1940 people), A-4b development (27), Wasserfall
and Taifun
development (1455), support and administration (760). The first train departed on February 17 with 525 people enroute to Thuringia (including Bleicherode
, Sangerhausen (district)
, and Bad Sachsa
) and the evacuation was complete in mid-March.
Another reaction to the aerial bomb
ing was the creation of a back-up research test range near Blizna, Poland. Carefully camouflaged, this secret facility was built by 2000 prisoners from the Pustkow concentration camp, who were killed after the completion of the project.
under General Konstantin Rokossovsky
captured the seaport of Swinemünde
and all of Usedom Island. Soviet infantrymen under the command of Major Anatole Vavilov
stormed the installations at Peenemünde and found then "75 percent wreckage". All of the research buildings and rocket test stands had been demolished.
More destruction of the technical facilities of Peenemünde took place between 1948 and 1961. Only the power station, the airport, and the railroad link to Zinnowitz
remained functional. The gas plant for the production of liquid oxygen
still lies in ruins at the entrance to Peenemünde. Very little remains of most of the other Nazi German facilities there.
The Peenemünde Historical and Technical Information Centre opened in 1992 in the shelter control room and the area of the former power station
and is an anchor point of ERIH, the European Route of Industrial Heritage
.
Waffenamt
Waffenamt was the German Army Weapons Agency. It was the centre for research and development of Germany and also during the Third Reich for weapons, ammunition and army equipment to the German Reichswehr and later Wehrmacht...
).
On April 2, 1936, the Reich Air Ministry
Reich Air Ministry
thumb|300px|The Ministry of Aviation, December 1938The Ministry of Aviation was a government department during the period of Nazi Germany...
paid 750,000 reichsmarks to the town of Wolgast
Wolgast
Wolgast is a town in the district of Vorpommern-Greifswald, in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. It is situated on the bank of the river Peenestrom, vis-a-vis the island of Usedom that can be accessed by road and railway via a bascule bridge...
for the whole Northern peninsula of the Baltic island of Usedom
Usedom
Usedom is a Baltic Sea island on the border between Germany and Poland. It is situated north of the Szczecin Lagoon estuary of the River Oder in Pomerania...
. The site had been suggested by Wernher von Braun
Wernher von Braun
Wernher Magnus Maximilian, Freiherr von Braun was a German rocket scientist, aerospace engineer, space architect, and one of the leading figures in the development of rocket technology in Nazi Germany during World War II and in the United States after that.A former member of the Nazi party,...
's mother as 'just the place for you and your friends'. By the middle of 1938, the Army facility had been separated from the Luftwaffe facility and was nearly complete, with personnel moved from Kummersdorf
Kummersdorf
Kummersdorf is the name of an estate near Luckenwalde at , around 25km south of Berlin, in the Brandenburg region of Germany. Until 1945 Kummersdorf hosted the weapon office of the German Army which ran a development centre for future weapons as well as an artillery range.In 1929 the Army Weapons...
. The Army Research Center (Peenemünde Ost) consisted of Werk Ost and Werk Süd, while Werk West (Peenemünde West) was the Luftwaffe Test Site .
HVP Organization
Wernher von BraunWernher von Braun
Wernher Magnus Maximilian, Freiherr von Braun was a German rocket scientist, aerospace engineer, space architect, and one of the leading figures in the development of rocket technology in Nazi Germany during World War II and in the United States after that.A former member of the Nazi party,...
was the HVP technical director (Dr Walter Thiel
Walter Thiel
Dr Walter Thiel was a German rocket scientist.He was the third civilian hired by Walter Dornberger for German research at Kummersdorf on November 1, 1932, , and in 1936, transferred to Dornberger's new rocket section...
was deputy director) and there were nine major departments:
- Technical Design Office (Walter J H "Papa" RiedelWalter RiedelWalter J H "Papa" Riedel was a German engineer who was the head of the Design Office of the Army Research Centre Peenemünde and the Chief Designer of the A4 ballistic rocket...
) - Aeroballistics and Mathematics Laboratory (Dr Hermann Steuding)
- Wind Tunnel (Dr Rudolph Hermann)
- Materials Laboratory (Dr Mäder)
- Flight, Guidance, and Telemetering Devices (German: BSM) (Dr Ernst SteinhoffErnst SteinhoffErnst August Wilhelm Steinhoff was a rocket scientist and member of the "von Braun rocket group", at Peenemünde . He was among the scientists to surrender and travel to the United States to provide rocketry expertise via Operation Paperclip. He came to the United States on the first boat,...
) - Development and Fabrication Laboratory (Arthur RudolphArthur RudolphArthur Louis Hugo Rudolph was a German rocket engineer and member of the Nazi party who played a key role in the development of the V-2 rocket. After World War II he was brought to the United States, subsequently becoming a pioneer of the United States space program. He worked for the U.S...
) - Test Laboratory (Klaus RiedelKlaus RiedelKlaus Riedel was a German rocket pioneer. He was involved in many early liquid-fuelled rocket experiments, and eventually worked on the V-2 missile programme at Peenemünde....
) - Future Projects Office (Ludwig RothLudwig RothLudwig Roth was the Aerospace engineer who was the head of the Peenemünde Future Projects Office which designed the Wasserfall and created advanced rockets designs such as the A9/A10 ICBM....
) - Purchasing Office (Mr Genthe)
The Measurements Group (Gerhard Reisig) was part of the BSM, and additional departments included the Production Planning Directorate (Detmar Stahlknecht), the Personnel Office (Richard Sundermeyer), and the Drawings Change Service.
Guided missile and rocket development at Peenemünde
Several German guided missiles and rockets of World War II were developed by the HVP, including the V-2 rocketV-2 rocket
The V-2 rocket , technical name Aggregat-4 , was a ballistic missile that was developed at the beginning of the Second World War in Germany, specifically targeted at London and later Antwerp. The liquid-propellant rocket was the world's first long-range combat-ballistic missile and first known...
(A-4) (see test launches), and the Wasserfall
Wasserfall
The Wasserfall Ferngelenkte Flakrakete , was a World War II guided surface-to-air missile developed at Peenemünde, Germany.-Technical characteristics:...
(35 Peenemünde trial firings), Schmetterling
Schmetterling
The Henschel Hs 117 Schmetterling was a German surface-to-air missile project developed during World War II. There was also an air-to-air version....
, Rheintochter
Rheintochter
Rheintochter was a German surface-to-air missile developed during World War II. Its name comes from the mythical Rheintöchter of Richard Wagner's opera series Der Ring des Nibelungen.- History :...
, Taifun
Taifun (rocket)
Taifun was a German World War II anti-aircraft unguided rocket system. Waves of Taifuns were to be launched en masse into US B-17 Flying Fortress formations hoping for a direct hit...
, and Enzian
Enzian
The Enzian was a German WWII surface-to-air anti-aircraft missile that was the first to use an infrared guidance system...
missiles. The HVP also performed preliminary design work on very-long-range missiles for use against the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. That project was sometimes called the "V - 3", and its existence is well documented. The Peenemünde establishment also developed other techniques, such as the first closed-circuit television
Closed-circuit television
Closed-circuit television is the use of video cameras to transmit a signal to a specific place, on a limited set of monitors....
system in the world, installed at Test Stand VII
Test Stand VII
Test Stand VII was the principal V-2 rocket testing facility at Peenemünde Airfield and was capable of static firing of rocket motors up to 200 tons thrust...
to track the launching rockets.
Aerodynamic Institute
The supersonic wind tunnel at Peenemünde's "Aerodynamic Institute" eventually had nozzles for speeds up to the record speed of Mach 4.4
Mach number
Mach number is the speed of an object moving through air, or any other fluid substance, divided by the speed of sound as it is in that substance for its particular physical conditions, including those of temperature and pressure...
(in 1942 or 1943), as well as an innovative dessiccant system to reduce the condensation clouding caused by the use of liquid oxygen
Liquid oxygen
Liquid oxygen — abbreviated LOx, LOX or Lox in the aerospace, submarine and gas industries — is one of the physical forms of elemental oxygen.-Physical properties:...
, in 1940. Led by Rudolph Hermann who arrived in April 1937 from the University of Aachen
RWTH Aachen
RWTH Aachen University is a research university located in Aachen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany with roughly 33,000 students enrolled in 101 study programs....
, the number of technical staff members reached two hundred in 1943, and it also included Hermann Kurzweg of the (University of Leipzig
University of Leipzig
The University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...
) and Walter Haeussermann
Walter Haeussermann
Walter Haeussermann was a German-American aerospace engineer and member of the "von Braun rocket group", both at Peenemünde and later at Marshall Space Flight Center, where he was the director of the guidance and control laboratory...
.
Heimat-Artillerie-Park 11
Initially set up under the HVP as a rocket training battery (Number 444), Heimat-Artillerie-Park 11 Karlshagen/Pomerania (HAP 11) also contained the A-A Research Command North for the testing of anti-aircraft rockets. The chemist
Chemist
A chemist is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties such as density and acidity. Chemists carefully describe the properties they study in terms of quantities, with detail on the level of molecules and their component atoms...
Magnus von Braun
Magnus von Braun
Magnus "Mac" Freiherr von Braun was a German chemical engineer, Luftwaffe aviator, and rocket scientist at Peenemünde, the Mittelwerk, and after emigrating to the United States via Operation Paperclip, at Fort Bliss...
, the youngest brother of Wernher von Braun, was employed in the attempted development at Peenemünde of anti-aircraft rockets. These were never very successful as weapons during World War II. Their development as practical weapons took another decade of development in the United States and in the U.S.S.R.
Peenemünde V-2 Production Plant
In November 1938, Walther von BrauchitschWalther von Brauchitsch
Heinrich Alfred Hermann Walther von Brauchitsch was a German field marshal and the Oberbefehlshaber des Heeres in the early years of World War II.-Biography:...
ordered construction of an A-4 Production Plant at Peenemünde, and in January 1939, Walter Dornberger
Walter Dornberger
Major-General Dr Walter Robert Dornberger was a German Army artillery officer whose career spanned World Wars I and II. He was a leader of Germany's V-2 rocket program and other projects at the Peenemünde Army Research Center....
created a subsection of Wa Pruf 11 for planning the Peenemünde Production Plant project, headed by G. Schubert, a senior Army civil servant. By midsummer 1943, the first trial runs of the assembly-line in the Production Works at Werke Süd were made,
but after the end of July 1943 when the enormous hangar Fertigungshalle 1 (F-1, Mass Production Plant No. 1) was just about to go into operation, Operation Hydra
Bombing of Peenemünde in World War II
Operation Hydra was a Royal Air Force attack on the Peenemünde Army Research Center on the night of 17/18 August 1943. It began the Operation Crossbow strategic bombing campaign against Nazi Germany's V-weapon programme...
bombed Peenemünde. On August 26, 1943, Albert Speer
Albert Speer
Albert Speer, born Berthold Konrad Hermann Albert Speer, was a German architect who was, for a part of World War II, Minister of Armaments and War Production for the Third Reich. Speer was Adolf Hitler's chief architect before assuming ministerial office...
called a meeting with Hans Kammler
Hans Kammler
General Dr Ing. Hans Friedrich Karl Franz Kammler was a civil engineer and high-ranking officer of the SS. He oversaw SS construction projects, and towards the end of World War II was put in charge of the V-2 missile programme.He is most commonly referred to as Heinz Kammler or Hans...
, Dornberger, Gerhard Degenkolb, and Karl Otto Saur to negotiate the move of A-4 main production to an underground factory in the Harz
Harz
The Harz is the highest mountain range in northern Germany and its rugged terrain extends across parts of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia. The name Harz derives from the Middle High German word Hardt or Hart , latinized as Hercynia. The legendary Brocken is the highest summit in the Harz...
mountains. In early September, Peenemünde machinery and personnel for production (including Alban Sawatzki
Mittelwerk
Central Works was a World War II factory that used Mittelbau-Dora forced labor in 2 main tunnels in the Kohnstein. The underground facility produced V-2 rockets, V-1 flying bombs, and other Nazi weapons.-Mittelwerk GmbH:...
, Arthur Rudolph
Arthur Rudolph
Arthur Louis Hugo Rudolph was a German rocket engineer and member of the Nazi party who played a key role in the development of the V-2 rocket. After World War II he was brought to the United States, subsequently becoming a pioneer of the United States space program. He worked for the U.S...
, and about ten engineers) were moved to the Mittelwerk
Mittelwerk
Central Works was a World War II factory that used Mittelbau-Dora forced labor in 2 main tunnels in the Kohnstein. The underground facility produced V-2 rockets, V-1 flying bombs, and other Nazi weapons.-Mittelwerk GmbH:...
, which also received machinery and personnel from the two other planned A-4 assembly sites. On October 13, 1943, the Peenemünde prisoners from the small F-1 concentration camp boarded rail cars bound for Kohnstein
Kohnstein
The Kohnstein is a mountain, 2 kilometres southwest of the village of Niedersachswerfen and 3 kilometres northwest of the center of the city of Nordhausen...
mountain.
Operation Crossbow
Two Polish slave janitors of Peenemünde's Camp Trassenheide in early 1943 provided maps, sketches and reports to Polish Home Army IntelligenceArmia Krajowa
The Armia Krajowa , or Home Army, was the dominant Polish resistance movement in World War II German-occupied Poland. It was formed in February 1942 from the Związek Walki Zbrojnej . Over the next two years, it absorbed most other Polish underground forces...
, and in June 1943 British intelligence had received two such reports which identified the "rocket assembly hall', 'experimental pit', and 'launching tower'.
Operation Crossbow
Crossbow was the code name of the World War II campaign of Anglo-American "operations against all phases of the German long-range weapons programme—operations against research and development of the weapons, their manufacture, transportation and their launching sites, and against missiles in flight"...
, the Operation Hydra air-raid
Airstrike
An air strike is an attack on a specific objective by military aircraft during an offensive mission. Air strikes are commonly delivered from aircraft such as fighters, bombers, ground attack aircraft, attack helicopters, and others...
attacked the HVP's "Sleeping & Living Quarters" (to specifically target scientists), then the "Factory Workshops", and finally the "Experimental Station" on the night of August 17/18, 1943. The Polish janitors were given advance warning of the attack, but the workers could not leave due to SS security and the facility had no air raid shelters for the prisoners.
A year later on July 18, August 4, and August 25, the US Eighth Air Force
Eighth Air Force
The Eighth Air Force is a numbered air force of the United States Air Force Global Strike Command . It is headquartered at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana....
conducted three additional Peenemünde raids to counter suspected hydrogen peroxide production.
Evacuation
As with the move of the V-2 Production Works to the MittelwerkMittelwerk
Central Works was a World War II factory that used Mittelbau-Dora forced labor in 2 main tunnels in the Kohnstein. The underground facility produced V-2 rockets, V-1 flying bombs, and other Nazi weapons.-Mittelwerk GmbH:...
, the complete withdrawal of the development of guided missiles was approved by the Army and SS in October 1943. On August 26, 1943, at a meeting in Albert Speer
Albert Speer
Albert Speer, born Berthold Konrad Hermann Albert Speer, was a German architect who was, for a part of World War II, Minister of Armaments and War Production for the Third Reich. Speer was Adolf Hitler's chief architect before assuming ministerial office...
's office, Hans Kammler
Hans Kammler
General Dr Ing. Hans Friedrich Karl Franz Kammler was a civil engineer and high-ranking officer of the SS. He oversaw SS construction projects, and towards the end of World War II was put in charge of the V-2 missile programme.He is most commonly referred to as Heinz Kammler or Hans...
suggested moving the A-4 Development Works to a proposed underground site in Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
. After a site survey in September by Papa Riedel and Schubert, Kammler chose the code name Zement (cement) for it in December, and work to blast an underground cavern into a cliff at Lake Traunsee near Gmunden
Gmunden
Gmunden is a town in Upper Austria, Austria in the district of Gmunden. It has 13,202 inhabitants . It is much frequented as a health and summer resort, and has a variety of goat, lake, brine, vegetable and pine-cone baths, a hydropathic establishment, inhalation chambers, whey cure, etc...
commenced in January 1944. In early 1944, construction
Construction
In the fields of architecture and civil engineering, construction is a process that consists of the building or assembling of infrastructure. Far from being a single activity, large scale construction is a feat of human multitasking...
work started for the test stands and launching pads in the Austrian Alps
Alps
The Alps is one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria and Slovenia in the east through Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany to France in the west....
(code name Salamander), with target areas planned for the Tatra Mountains
Tatra Mountains
The Tatra Mountains, Tatras or Tatra , are a mountain range which forms a natural border between Slovakia and Poland, and are the highest mountain range in the Carpathian Mountains...
, the Arlberg
Arlberg
Arlberg is a mountain range or massif between Vorarlberg and Tyrol in Austria.The highest peak is the "Valluga" at . The name Arlberg derives from the tradition of the "Arlenburg," who are said to have once established themselves on the Tyrolean side of the Arlberg passes . Another story derives...
range, and the area of the Ortler
Ortler
Ortler is, at above sea level, the highest mountain in the Eastern Alps outside the Bernina Range. It is the main peak of the Ortler Range. It is the highest point of the Southern Limestone Alps, of the Italian province of South Tyrol, of Tyrol overall, and, until 1919, of the Austrian-Hungarian...
mountain. Other evacuation locations included:
- Hans Lindenmayr's valve laboratory near Friedland moved to a castle near the village of LeutenbergLeutenbergLeutenberg is a town in the district of Saalfeld-Rudolstadt, in Thuringia, Germany. It is situated in the Thuringian Forest, 18 km southeast of Saalfeld.-References:...
, 10 km (6 mi) south of Saalfeld near the Bavarian border. - the materials testing laboratory moved to an air base at AnklamAnklamAnklam is a town in the Western Pomerania region of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. It is situated on the banks of the Peene river, just 8 km from its mouth in the Kleines Haff, the western part of the Stettin Lagoon. Anklam has a population of 14,603 and was the capital of the former...
- the wind tunnels moved to KochelKochelKochel am See is a municipality in the district of Bad Tolz-Wolfratshausen in Bavaria on the shores of Kochelsee.Apart from the idyllic scenery, it is known for The Smith of Kochel "Schmied von Kochel," who according to legend, lead a Bavarian farmer rebellion against Austro-Hungarian occupiers at...
(then after the war, to White Oak, MarylandWhite Oak, MarylandWhite Oak is a census-designated place and an unincorporated area in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States.-Geography:As an unincorporated area, White Oak's boundaries are not officially defined...
) - Engine testing and calibration to LehestenLehestenLehesten is a town in the Thuringian Forest, 20 km southeast of Saalfeld.-WWII V-2 facility:After an August 1944 explosion at the Redl-Zipf V-2 liquid oxygen plant at Schlier stopped production, the third V-2 liquid oxygen plant was built at a slate quarry at Lehesten at the...
For people being relocated from Peenemünde, the new organization was to be designated Entwicklungsgemeinschaft Mittelbau and Kammler's order to relocate to Thuringia
Thuringia
The Free State of Thuringia is a state of Germany, located in the central part of the country.It has an area of and 2.29 million inhabitants, making it the sixth smallest by area and the fifth smallest by population of Germany's sixteen states....
arrived by teleprinter on January 31, 1945. On February 3, 1945, at the last meeting at Peenemünde held regarding the relocation, the HVP consisted of A-4 development/ modification (1940 people), A-4b development (27), Wasserfall
Wasserfall
The Wasserfall Ferngelenkte Flakrakete , was a World War II guided surface-to-air missile developed at Peenemünde, Germany.-Technical characteristics:...
and Taifun
Taifun (rocket)
Taifun was a German World War II anti-aircraft unguided rocket system. Waves of Taifuns were to be launched en masse into US B-17 Flying Fortress formations hoping for a direct hit...
development (1455), support and administration (760). The first train departed on February 17 with 525 people enroute to Thuringia (including Bleicherode
Bleicherode
Bleicherode is a town in the district of Nordhausen, in Thuringia, Germany. It is situated on the river Wipper, 17 km southwest of Nordhausen. On 1 December 2007, the former municipality Obergebra was incorporated by Bleicherode. Every Thursday, there is a market held in the town.One of...
, Sangerhausen (district)
Sangerhausen (district)
Sangerhausen was a district in the south of Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Neighboring districts were Quedlinburg, Mansfelder Land, Merseburg-Querfurt, and the districts Kyffhäuserkreis and Nordhausen in Thuringia...
, and Bad Sachsa
Bad Sachsa
Bad Sachsa is a town in the district of Osterode, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated in the southern Harz, approx. 15 km south of Braunlage, and 25 km southeast of Osterode am Harz. It is well known for being the town where Berthold Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and his four...
) and the evacuation was complete in mid-March.
Another reaction to the aerial bomb
Aerial bomb
An aerial bomb is a type of explosive weapon intended to travel through the air with predictable trajectories, usually designed to be dropped from an aircraft...
ing was the creation of a back-up research test range near Blizna, Poland. Carefully camouflaged, this secret facility was built by 2000 prisoners from the Pustkow concentration camp, who were killed after the completion of the project.
Post-war
The last V-2 launch at Peenemünde happened in February 1945, and on May 5, 1945, the soldiers of the Soviet 2nd Belorussian Front2nd Belorussian Front
The 2nd Belorussian Front was a military formation of Army group size of the Soviet Army during the Second World War...
under General Konstantin Rokossovsky
Konstantin Rokossovsky
Konstantin Rokossovskiy was a Polish-origin Soviet career officer who was a Marshal of the Soviet Union, as well as Marshal of Poland and Polish Defence Minister, who was famously known for his service in the Eastern Front, where he received high esteem for his outstanding military skill...
captured the seaport of Swinemünde
Swinoujscie
Świnoujście is a city and seaport on the Baltic Sea and Szczecin Lagoon, located in the extreme north-west of Poland. It is situated mainly on the islands of Uznam and Wolin, but also occupies smaller islands, of which the largest is Karsibór island, once part of Usedom, now separated by a Piast...
and all of Usedom Island. Soviet infantrymen under the command of Major Anatole Vavilov
Vavilov
Vavilov is a Russian surname and may refer to:* Nikolai Vavilov , a Russian geneticist* Sergey Ivanovich Vavilov , a Russian physicist* Vladimir Sergeyevich Vavilov , Russian footballer...
stormed the installations at Peenemünde and found then "75 percent wreckage". All of the research buildings and rocket test stands had been demolished.
More destruction of the technical facilities of Peenemünde took place between 1948 and 1961. Only the power station, the airport, and the railroad link to Zinnowitz
Zinnowitz
Zinnowitz is a spa town in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern on the northern German island of Usedom on the Baltic Sea. The town has rail connections to Wolgast and Ahlbeck.-History:...
remained functional. The gas plant for the production of liquid oxygen
Liquid oxygen
Liquid oxygen — abbreviated LOx, LOX or Lox in the aerospace, submarine and gas industries — is one of the physical forms of elemental oxygen.-Physical properties:...
still lies in ruins at the entrance to Peenemünde. Very little remains of most of the other Nazi German facilities there.
The Peenemünde Historical and Technical Information Centre opened in 1992 in the shelter control room and the area of the former power station
Power station
A power station is an industrial facility for the generation of electric energy....
and is an anchor point of ERIH, the European Route of Industrial Heritage
European Route of Industrial Heritage
The European Route of Industrial Heritage is a network of the most important industrial heritage sites in Europe. The aim of the project is to create interest for the common European Heritage of the Industrialisation and its remains...
.
In popular culture
- Peenemünde is a setting in the novels FatherlandFatherland (novel)Fatherland is a bestselling 1992 thriller by the English writer and journalist Robert Harris. It takes the form of a high concept alternative history set in a world in which Nazi Germany won World War II.The novel was an immediate bestseller in Britain...
, Gravity's RainbowGravity's RainbowGravity's Rainbow is a postmodern novel written by Thomas Pynchon and first published on February 28, 1973.The narrative is set primarily in Europe at the end of World War II and centers on the design, production and dispatch of V-2 rockets by the German military, and, in particular, the quest...
, Moonraker, The Rhinemann ExchangeThe Rhinemann ExchangeThe Rhinemann Exchange is a novel of suspense by Robert Ludlum, set in the middle of the Second World War. In 1977, it was made into a television miniseries starring Stephen Collins.-Plot summary:...
, The Way the Crow FliesThe Way the Crow FliesThe Way the Crow Flies is a novel by Canadian writer Ann-Marie MacDonald. It was first published by Knopf Canada in 2003.The plot of the novel revolves around a fictionalized version of the Steven Truscott case and is set for the most part at a real Royal Canadian Air Force station: RCAF Station...
, SpaceSpace (novel)Space is a novel by James A. Michener published in 1982. It is a fictionalized history of the United States space program, with a particular emphasis on manned spaceflight.Michener writes in a semi-documentary style...
, and Vengeance 10Joe PoyerJoseph John Poyer is a thriller novelist from the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s who has shifted his attention to military-related, non-fiction books under his own publishing company, North Cape Publications.- Novels :Operation Malacca...
. - In the novels of the Colonization SeriesColonization (series)Colonization is a trilogy of books written by Harry Turtledove. It is a continuation of the situation set up in the Worldwar four-book series, projecting the situation between humanity and the Race nearly twenty years forward into the mid-1960s.The Race has settled and plans to colonize nearly...
, Peenemünde survived World War II and later became a major space explorationSpace explorationSpace exploration is the use of space technology to explore outer space. Physical exploration of space is conducted both by human spaceflights and by robotic spacecraft....
launch center. - The Nazi occupation of Poland and the Allied bombing of Peenemünde are depicted in the British feature film Battle of the V-1Battle of the V-1Battle of the V-1 is a British war film from 1958, starring Michael Rennie, Patricia Medina, Milly Vitale, David Knight and Christopher Lee...
(1958) (called Missiles From Hell in the United States and some other countries), which starred the actor Michael RennieMichael RennieMichael Rennie was an English film, television, and stage actor, perhaps best known for his starring role as the space visitor Klaatu in the 1951 classic science fiction film The Day the Earth Stood Still. However, he appeared in over 50 other films since 1936, many with Jean Simmons and other...
. - In the second book of the Danger BoyDanger BoyDanger Boy, created and written by Mark London Williams, is a young adult time travel series. Beginning in 2019, the series follows the time spanning adventures of twelve year old Eli Sands, the eponymous protagonist, and his companions: Clyne, a good-natured dinosaur from another planet who...
series of time travelTime travelTime travel is the concept of moving between different points in time in a manner analogous to moving between different points in space. Time travel could hypothetically involve moving backward in time to a moment earlier than the starting point, or forward to the future of that point without the...
tales, written by Mark London WilliamsMark London WilliamsMark London Williams is an American author, playwright, journalist, and creator of the young adult time travel series Danger Boy.-Biography:As a journalist, Williams has written for Variety, Los Angeles Times online, Los Angeles Business Journal, Moving Pictures Magazine and others. He was...
, Dragon Sword, Peenemünde becomes a key setting in this and in the further novels. - In the movie The CockpitThe Cockpit (film)is a World War II anthology film based on Leiji Matsumoto's Battlefield manga. The animated shorts are written and directed by Yoshiaki Kawajiri, Takashi Imanishi and Ryousuke Takahashi....
, Peenemünde becomes a test site for atomic bombs. - In the film The HindenburgThe Hindenburg (film)The Hindenburg is a 1975 American film based on the disaster of the German airship Hindenburg. The film stars George C. Scott. It was produced and directed by Robert Wise, and was written by Nelson Gidding, Richard Levinson and William Link based on the book of the same name by Michael M. Mooney .A.A...
(1975), the German countess played by Anne BancroftAnne BancroftAnne Bancroft was an American actress associated with the Method acting school, which she had studied under Lee Strasberg....
leaves Germany because her estate in Peenemünde has been confiscated by the Nazi Germans. - In the comic bookComic bookA comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
, Ministry of SpaceMinistry of SpaceMinistry of Space is a three-part alternate history mini-series written by Warren Ellis, published by Image Comics, starting in 2001. The book's art is by Chris Weston, and depicts retro technology in a believably 'British' style....
, by Warren EllisWarren EllisWarren Girard Ellis is an English author of comics, novels, and television, who is well-known for sociocultural commentary, both through his online presence and through his writing, which covers transhumanist themes...
, Peenemünde gets captured by the British Army. - In the game Battlefield 1942: Secret Weapons of WWIIBattlefield 1942: Secret Weapons of WWIIBattlefield 1942: Secret Weapons of WWII is the second of two expansions to the World War II first-person shooter computer game Battlefield 1942. It is developed by Digital Illusions CE and published by Electronic Arts for Microsoft Windows September 4, 2003 in North America and September 5, 2003...
, Peenemünde is a playable level. - In the game Secret Weapons Over NormandySecret Weapons Over NormandySecret Weapons Over Normandy or is a World War II-based arcade flight simulation video game released on November 18, 2003. Published by LucasArts and developed by Totally Games, the game is composed of 15 objective-based missions set in 1940s European, North African, and the Pacific theatres of war...
, Peenemünde is a playable level in the main campaign. - In the novelization of the film Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, written by Peter George, an explanation is given that the title character, "Dr. Strangelove", had been wounded, and these wounds had left him with only one hand, and wheelchair-bound, because of the bombings of Peenemünde while he worked there for Nazi Germany.