Mittelwerk
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Central Works (Mittelwerk in German) was the underground WWII factory in the Kohnstein mountain near Nordhausen, Germany operated by the government Central Works Ltd. (Mittelwork GmbH in German) company. Additional wartime V-2 plans for an Eastern Works near Vienna-Friedrichshafen and a Southern Works near Riga were never fulfilled.[1] In July of 1944, Hans Kammler ordered the North Works (Nordwerke) to use cross-tunnels 1-20 for a Junkers jet and piston engine factory, leaving cross-tunnels 21-46 for Mittelwerk GmbH. Later in October/November 1944, assembly of the V-1 began in the South end of tunnel A.[2]
In November of 1943 the "Mittelwerk" company was founded and orders for the assembly-line production of the rockets started being filled.
Wernher von Braun was the head of the German V2 rocket program during WWII. The V2 rocket factory was the Mittelwerk, a site visited personally by von Braun. Labor for the factory was provided by the inmates of nearby Camp Dora. It is estimated that 20,000 inmates were worked to death at the Mittlewerk; 6,000 bodies were found on the ground when American troops liberated the camp late in the War.
The V-2 rocket caused more victims in its production than in its employment.
[edit] Notes
- ^ David Irving "The Mare's Nest". William Kimber and Co: London, 1964. (pgs 136,144)
- ^ Béon, Yves translated by Yves Béon and Richard L. Fague (1997), Planet Dora: A Memoir of the Holocaust and the Birth of the Space Age. Westview Press, Div. of Harper Collins. ISBN 0-8133-3272-9 (hc) (pg XIX)
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