Tuesday 23 September 2008

Glinde

We know that 14AOD went to Glinde after V.E. Day. There was previously a German ordnance depot at Glinde and it would be logical for the British army to take over the facilities there for its own purposes. A search of the web turns up a lot of information about US Air Force bombing missions over Germany.

http://libraryautomation.com/nymas/usaaf7.html
453rd Bombardment Group - 460th Bombardment Group
453rd Bombardment Group
Constituted as 453rd Bombardment Group (Heavy) on 14 May 1943. Activated on 1 Jun 1943. Trained with B-14's. Moved to England, Dec 1943-Jan 1944, and assigned to Eighth AF. Began combat on 5 Feb 1944 with an attack against an airfield at Tours. Throughout combat, served chiefly as a strategic bombardment organization. Targets included a fuel depot at Dulmen, marshalling yards at Paderborn, aircraft assembly plants at Gotha, railroad centers at Hamm, an ordnance depot at Glinde, oil refineries at Gelsenkirchen, chemical works at Leverkusen, an airfield at Neumunster, a canal at Minden, and a railroad viaduct at Altenbeken.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Old_Buckenham

http://tinpan.fortunecity.com/aprilskies/264/missions.html
This is specific about the date.
MISSIONS FLOWN BY THE 453rd
MISSION NUMBER DATE TARGET
156 10/06/44 Glinde, Germany – Ordnance Depot
(The date is in American format i.e. October 6th)

http://paul.rutgers.edu/~mcgrew/wwii/usaf/html/Oct.44.html
This confirms the date and also tells us the number of B-24s involved, but the reference to a "munitions dumb" (dump?) at Glind appears inaccurate. All other sources refer to it as an ordnance depot.
USAAF Chronology:COMBAT CHRONOLOGY OF THE US ARMY AIR FORCES
OCTOBER 1944
FRIDAY, 6 OCTOBER 1944
EUROPEAN THEATER OF OPERATIONS (ETO)
STRATEGIC OPERATIONS (Eighth Air Force): 2 missions are flown. Mission 667: 1,271 bombers and 784 fighter are dispatched to hitindustrial targets in N Germany; with one exception, all attacks are visual;19 bombers and 4 fighters are lost:
3. 406 B-24s are dispatched to hit Harburg/Rhenania oil refinery (121) withPFF methods, munitions dumb at Hamburg/Glinde (89) and aircraft factories atHamburg/Klockner (79) and Wenzendorf (46); targets of opportunity are StadeAirfield (29), the Hamburg area (8), Nordhoz Airfield (2), Bremervorde (1)and Ottersberg (1); 1 B-24 is lost and 127 damaged; 1 airman is KIA, 2 WIAand 10 MIA. Escort is provided by 156 of 168 P-47s; they claim 1-0-0 aircraftin the air; 6 P-47s are damaged.

http://www.lonesentry.com/manuals/tme30/ch6sec2.html
This is taken from U.S. War Department Technical Manual, TM-E 30-451: Handbook on German Military Forces published in March 1945 and details the system of supply within Germany. It tells us specifically that Hamburg-Glinde was an army equipment depot, and such depots did not furnish ammunition.

Google searches also bring up something about Advanced Base Ordnance Depot (Glinde) Hamburg on the Forces Reunited website, but I cannot get in to their system without registering.

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