Dresden - Tuesday 13 February 1945

Product Description

At 9.51 pm on Tuesday 13 February 1945, Dresden's air-raid sirens sounded as they had done many times in the previous five years. For Dresdeners, such warnings were almost always false alarms, but this one was different. Ten minutes later the first marker flares were dropped by Mosquitos of 627 squadron. No searchlights probed the skies above the unprotected target city; the guns had mostly been moved East to counter the Russian advance. By the next morning, 796 RAF Lancasters and 311 USAAF Flying Fortresses had dropped more than 4,500 tons of high explosives and incendiary devices. At least 25,000 inhabitants had perished in the terrifying firestorm, and thirteen square miles of the city's historic centre, inclduing incalculable quantities of treasure and works of art, lay in ruins. It was Ash Wednesday 1945.