Nuremberg

2 January 1945 — Nuremberg

Date
2 January 1945
Target
Nuremberg, Germany
Force dispatched
521 aircraft

Narrative

This was the raid that destroyed old Nuremberg. A force of 514 Lancasters and seven Mosquitoes attacked on the night of 2 January 1945, dropping some 1,825 tons of high explosive and several hundred tons of incendiaries in a concentrated, accurately marked attack. The medieval city centre — the timber-framed houses, the churches, the castle precinct that had stood for five centuries — was almost completely burned out, and around 1,835 people were killed, with something like a hundred thousand left homeless. After years in which Nuremberg’s distance had blunted attack after attack, the marking and weight now available finally overwhelmed the city in a single night. For a place the regime had made the symbolic capital of National Socialism, the obliteration of its ancient heart was among the most complete destructions of any German old town in the war.

Squadrons: No. 100 Squadron

Order of battle

1 aircraft. Each crew links to the men who flew it; each airman to their own record.

AircraftTypeSquadronPilotCrewOutcome
PB518
HW-P		 Avro Lancaster No. 100 Squadron P M Bunn 7 aircrew → Failed to return

The fallen

46 airmen in this archive died on 2 January 1945 or the day that followed. For a raid of this kind these are overwhelmingly the night's losses, though a death-date match is not by itself proof an individual flew this operation.

See all 46 who died on 2 January →

Source: Wikipedia — Bombing of Nuremberg in World War II →