In April 1945, the Allies gradually conquered Germany from the west. The Second World War ends in installments. On April 10, US troops reach Hanover, a largely destroyed city.
It's an end with an announcement. In April 1945, the Allies had long since gained the upper hand militarily and were moving into Germany from the west, crossing the Weser on April 4th. At that time, slogans to persevere could still be heard on the radio in Hanover. On April 9, US troops are just outside the city.
The Wehrmacht gives up
Of the once more than 470,000 inhabitants of Hanover, only 215,000 have remained - mostly women, children and the elderly. Mayor Egon Bönner is aware that the city cannot be defended. As the Allies drew ever closer, he drove to the central Gau command post on the night of April 9th. Bönner wants to persuade the commanders to give up. In fact, General Paul Wilhelm Loehning agrees. In his final appeal on April 10, he gave the soldiers who had taken up duty the choice to surrender or flee to the east.
One Last Stand
At the end of the Second World War, US troops invade many German cities (archive photo from Bensheim in southern Hesse).By this time, the US Army had reached the western outskirts with the 333rd and 334th Infantry Regiments under General William H. Simpson. This Tuesday morning, she advances to the Limmer district. At the lock, around 20 young soldiers stand in their way, but the last resistance quickly ends fatally for the Germans. Almost unhindered, the US troops continued their way into the city center and arrested Lord Mayor Bönner on the same day. Most of the other high-ranking representatives of the Nazi regime left long ago.
The Gauleiter rumbles and leaves
Hartmann Lauterbacher, head of the NSDAP Gaus Süd-Hanover-Braunschweig, also made his way in the direction of the Harz Mountains in good time. On April 4th he had rumbled in an appeal to the Hanoverians:"We are willing and determined to use all the means and opportunities available to us to protect our Lower Saxony soil, our women and the highest and most valuable asset, our children from the access of the Anglo-Americans and the Jews, Negroes, convicts and gangsters who followed them. ... Anyone who hoists a white flag and surrenders is dead." Then he disappeared.
Hardly an intact house
Almost no building in the center of Hanover remained undamaged.The Americans find a largely destroyed city. Hanover had repeatedly been the target of heavy bombing raids since the autumn of 1943. More than half of all apartments have been destroyed or badly damaged, only about five percent are completely intact. The suffering of the population is correspondingly great.
Brits appoint new Lord Mayor
Immediately after the US troops, the British army reached Hanover. With Major G.H. Lamb, the British are the future city commander, who will appoint a new mayor on April 11:the 66-year-old SPD politician Gustav Bratke. Under the supervision of the military, he is to organize the development of the city. Not an easy task, because the supply of food and everyday objects is more than bad.
Public order is broken
Public order in Hanover had already largely disappeared in the days before the capitulation. On the weekend of April 7th and 8th, thousands of Hanoverians plundered company and military warehouses. Even the National Socialists are divided:While some want to follow the line of the NSDAP leadership and leave "scorched earth" behind, others think of the time after the war and try to prevent further destruction. In this way, it is also possible to protect the massive town hall from being blown up by NSDAP supporters.
The city is changing
Shortly after the invasion, the cityscape changes:Nazi symbols disappear, streets like Adolf-Hitler-Strasse get their former names back. The "denazification" of the city administration turns out to be more difficult. Bratke rejects the Allies' plan to dismiss all NSDAP members. Such a thinned-out administration would hardly be able to work, he says. After all, around 1,250 of the 9,600 employees have to go.
For many, help comes too late
In the camps near Hanover, the Allies freed emaciated people.For many people, the liberation of Hanover comes too late. The SS and Gestapo had continued their inhuman handiwork in the final days of the war. On April 6, mostly Soviet prisoners from the Gestapo prison in Ahlem have to go to the Seelhorst cemetery. There the 155 men dig their own graves and are then shot. Hundreds of people in the Hanoverian subcamps of the Neuengamme concentration camp could not escape their tormentors either. The SS drives them to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp near Celle - a death march. In addition, around 50,000 prisoners of war live under miserable conditions in several camps in Hanover.
The war continues
In other parts of Germany and the world, World War II is still ongoing. The unconditional surrender of the Wehrmacht did not come into effect until May 8, 1945.
Hanover's former Gauleiter Hartmann Lauterbacher was later acquitted in two trials "for lack of evidence". Later, the former fanatical National Socialist even worked for the Federal Intelligence Service.