151 First Manned Rocket Launch, After the Battle, AFTER THE BATTLE
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//-->FIRST MANNEDROCKET LAUNCH5 19770306154097No. 151£4.25Number 151NUMBER 151© CopyrightAfter the Battle2011Editor: Karel MargryEditor-in-Chief: Winston G. RamseyPublished byBattle of Britain International Ltd.,The Mews, Hobbs Cross House,Hobbs Cross, Old Harlow,Essex CM17 0NN, EnglandTelephone: 01279 41 8833Fax: 01279 41 9386E-mail: hq@afterthebattle.comWebsite:www.afterthebattle.comPrinted in Great Britain byWarners Group Publications PLC,Bourne, Lincolnshire PE10 9PH.After the Battleis published on the 15thof February, May, August and November.LONDON STOCKIST for theAfter the Battlerange:Motorbooks, 13/15 Cecil Court, London WC2N 4ANTelephone: 020 7836 5376. Fax: 020 7497 2539United Kingdom Newsagent Distribution:Warners Group Publications PLC,Bourne, Lincolnshire PE10 9PHAustralian Subscriptions and Back Issues:Renniks Publications Pty LimitedUnit 3, 37-39 Green Street, Banksmeadow NSW 2019Telephone: 61 2 9695 7055. Fax: 61 2 9695 7355E-mail: info@renniks.com. Website:www.renniks.comCanadian Distribution and Subscriptions:Vanwell Publishing Ltd.,622 Welland Avenue, St. Catharines, OntarioTelephone: (905) 937 3100. Fax: (905) 937 1760Toll Free: 1-800-661-6136E-mail: sales@vanwell.comNew Zealand Distribution:Dal McGuirk’s “MILITARY ARCHIVE”, PO Box 24486,Royal Oak, Auckland 1345, New ZealandTelephone: 021 627 870. Fax: 9-6252817E-mail: milrchiv@mist.co.nzUnited States Distribution and Subscriptions:RZM Imports Inc, 184 North Ave., Stamford, CT 06901Telephone: 1-203-324-5100. Fax: 1-203-324-5106E-mail: info@rzm.com Website:www.rzm.comItalian Distribution:Tuttostoria, PO Box 395, 1-43100 ParmaTelephone: ++390521 29 27 33. Fax: ++390521 29 03 87E-mail: info@tuttostoria.it Website:www.tuttostoria.itDutch Language Edition:SI Publicaties/Quo Vadis, Postbus 188,6860 AD OosterbeekTelephone: 026-4462834. E-mail: si@sipublicaties.nlThe Truppenübungsplatz Heuberg training ground at Stetten am kalten Markt was firstestablished in 1910. During the First World War it was also used as a POW camp and by1917 there were 5,000 soldiers undergoing training there alongside 15,000 prisoners ofwar. After the war part became a children’s home and hospital, and for nine months in1933 it was a concentration camp before being taken over the following year by theArmy. During the Second World War it was used as the mobilisation camp for armyunits like the 4. Gebirgsjäger-Division in late 1940, and later in 1944-45 for units like theIndische Freiwilligen-Legion, the Infanterie-Division ‘Italia’, and the Russian 650. Infan-terie-Division. The French Army took over the base in 1945, being joined from 1957 byunits of the new Bundeswehr. The French presence ended in 1997 when the 3èmeRégiment de Dragons departed. In 1980 Hauptfeldwebel Manfred Hensel, the telecom-munication officer at Heuberg, publishedChronik des Truppenübungsplatzes und derGarnison Heuberg,a thoroughly researched history of the camp and its garrisons.KIRCHHEIMCONTENTSFIRST MANNED ROCKET LAUNCH2IT HAPPENED HEREThe Birchington Mine22PRESERVATIONThe US ‘Rosie the Riveter’ Memorial 28REMEMBRANCEGerman War Graves in Britain32UNITED KINGDOMHM Prison Pentonville duringWorld War II37READERS’ INVESTIGATIONThe Empire Air Training Scheme inCanada40Front Cover:The major exhibit of theHeuberg Military Museum at Stetten amkalten Markt is this full-size replica of theNatter prototype M23 ready for launch withLothar Sieber, the test pilot, and ErichBachem, the inventor of the rocketinterceptor.Back Cover:The German War Cemetery atCannock Chase, Staffordshire. (Gail Parker)Acknowledgements:For their invaluablehelp with the Natter story, the Editor wouldlike to thank Manfred Hensel, SonjaGieschen and Hans Grimm. He also thanksthe Bundeswehr, Thorsten Bretschneider,the late Thomas J. Dietz of the National AirandSpaceMuseum(SmithsonianInstitution), Hans Holzer of the DeutschesMuseum, Frau Carmen Krug of Hymer AG,Hans-Werner Neulen, Christian Payer,Jürgen Sieber and Franz Straubinger.Photo Credits:ECPAD — Mediathèque de laDéfense, Fort d’Ivry; USNA — US NationalArchives.STETTENBAD WALDSEE22M. HENSELFIRST MANNED ROCKET LAUNCHBy Jean Paul PalludAfter Operation ‘Millennium’, the first1,000-bomber raid by RAF Bomber Com-mand which targeted Cologne on the night ofMay 30/31, 1942, the Allied bombing offen-sive on Germany grew in strength and effec-tiveness. A five-month-long operation whichbegan in March 1943 against the Ruhr indus-trial area was followed at the end of July byOperation ‘Gomorrah’, a major offensiveagainst Hamburg, Germany’s second largestcity (seeAfter the BattleNo. 70). Hamburgwas attacked for eight days and seven nights,huge firestorms killing 40,000-50,000 civil-ians. Over 60 per cent of Hamburg’s livingaccommodation was destroyed or madeuninhabitable and in the immediate wakeover two-thirds of the population fled thecity. These attacks by both the RAF andUSAAF struck a major blow at Germanmorale and severely shook the Nazi leader-ship, leading Hitler to be concerned that sim-ilar ‘terror’ raids on other cities could forceGermany out of the war.Although Luftwaffe fighter squadronswere doing their best to inflict casualties, andon some raids caused serious losses, theywere still unable to counter the force of theAllied offensive. Thus a radical solution wasdesperately needed.Back in September 1942, the LuftwaffeFlak commander, Generalmajor Walther vonAxthelm, had already asked for anti-aircraftmissiles and his request had been developedby several manufacturers for some months.Both the Henschel Hs 117 ‘Schmetterling’ andthe Rheinmetall-Borsig ‘Rheintochter’ weretest-flown in 1943, and the EMW ‘Wasserfall’and Messerschmitt ‘Enzian’ systems were alsoOn March 1, 1945, Lothar Sieber was the first man ever to take off vertically from theground under rocket power. Launched from the Heuberg military training area, proto-type M23 of the Bachem Ba 349 ‘Natter’ crashed after 55 seconds, killing the pilot.This scenario, depicting Sieber discussing final take-off instructions with ErichBachem, the inventor, just prior to the launch, has been recreated in full-size at theTruppenübungsplatz Heuberg museum.3ATBUSNAThe Natter measured 6.06 metres long and had a wingspan of3.65 metres, the take-off weight being 2,200 kilos (this datareferring to the A1 model). The wings were plain rectangularwooden slabs without ailerons or flaps. The cruciform tail con-sisted of four adjustable fins to control the pitch, yaw, and roll.The armament in the nose comprised a battery of unguidedrockets (the alternative armament of 24 R4M rockets is shownhere). The two fuel tanks were aft of the rear cockpit bulkhead,one above the wing spar accommodating 365 litres of T-Stoff,the other below containing 165 litres of C-Stoff. The WalterHWK 109-509 main engine generated a maximum thrust of1,700 kilos but it could be throttled back to 300 kilos. Bolted tothe rear fuselage were four jettisonable Schmidding 109-533rocket boosters, two per side, which provided a combinedthrust of 4,800 kilos for ten seconds. At lift-off, with all fivemotors ignited, the thrust generated was 6,500 kilos and theresulting acceleration about 2g. After ten seconds of verticalflight, the exhausted boosters were released automatically andfell away. At that point the interceptor had reached an altitudeof 1,200 metres and a speed of 880 km/h. The auto-pilot thenengaged to alter the flight path to an angle of 60 degreesabove the horizontal and the machine rocketed to an altitudeof 12,000 metres in a remarkable 60 seconds. Combat time atthis altitude with the motor throttled back to 300 kilos, wouldhave been less than two minutes. (This post-war sketch wasdrawn by Theodor Lässig. Note the boosters are not shown.)4The Bachem-Werk’s identity card belonging to Hans Zübert,the test pilot who flew prototype M8 of the Natter in February1945. A Heinkel He 111 towed him to an altitude of 5,500meters from where he tested the flying characteristics of themachine in a free flight before baling out.M. HENSELT. LÄSSIGM. HENSELA graduate from the Technische Hoch-schule of Stuttgart, from 1933 Dipl.Ing.Erich Bachem was the Technical Directorat the Gerhard-Fieseler-Werke, and from1938 Chief of the Development Depart-ment. He left Fieseler in 1941 to establishhis own company at Waldsee, 40 kilome-tres north of Lake Constance, his partnerand co-founder being Willy Fiedler, afriend from their university days.Right:Bachem-Werk personnel in October 1944.From L-R: Eugen Walter, Friedhelm Christ,Gebhardt Zorell, Henri Frans Bethbeder,Paul Wilbrett (standing), Fahrnbauer,Erich Bachem, Hans Steybe, Willy Fiedlerand Fritz Blessing. Bethbeder was aDutchman who had also studied inStuttgart and was now head of the Natterproject at the Bachem-Werk. Fielder, whofrom September 1942 was the leader ofthe industrial testing of the V1, was tojoin the Bachem-Werk full time early in1945 to assume the position of ChiefDesigner. In 1948, he moved to the US towork at the Naval Missile Test Center inCalifornia, and in 1956 joined LockheedAircraft where he worked on the USNavy’s Polaris ballistic missile.H. GRIMMLeft:The entrance to the Bachem-Werk factory as seen duringthe war with the gatehouse in the centre and the main produc-tion hall in background. Located at No. 98 Biberacher Strasse,Waldsee, the signpost read ‘Bachem-Werk Ltd, Wood andMetal Construction’. The company name ‘ERIBA’ was takensoon to be tested. However, although the con-cept appeared promising, it was clear that along development period would still berequired before the problems of missile guid-ance and fusing were solved. (No efficientguidance system of the anti-aircraft missilesreached service application before the end ofthe Second World War).The idea of providing the missile with apilot who could control the weapon duringthe final phase of the attack might be a short-term solution and, though the steps that thenoccurred within the Reichsluftfahrtminis-terium (German Air Ministry or RLM) arenot precisely known, in the spring of 1944 theministry issued requirements for a rocket-propelled, point-defence interceptor.Four aircraft manufacturers, Messer-schmitt, Junkers, Heinkel and Bachem, pro-duced designs, all to be propelled by thesame engine: the Walter 109-509 liquid pro-pellant rocket unit. Three of the competitors,the Messerschmitt Me P 1104, the JunkersEF 127 ‘Walli’ and Heinkel P 1077 ‘Julia’,were somewhat conventional as they weredesigned to land back on skids.The fourth proposal by Dipl.Ing. ErichBachem was much more radical. His ‘Natter’was to be a semi-expendable vertical take-offinterceptor launched from a ramp. Once itreached the bomber stream, the pilot wouldfire a salvo of rockets at one bomber beforegliding away. The machine would then seper-ate in mid-air, the pilot and the rear part withthe rocket engine landing individually byparachute. Another feature of the Natter wasits semi-expendability, low-grade, non-essen-tial materials being used throughout, andassembled by semi-skilled labour.The idea was not entirely original in thatDr Wernher von Braun had already pro-posed the concept of a rocket-powered, ver-tical take-off interceptor in 1939 but theRLM had rejected it at the time as they con-sidered it offered no tactical advantage. VonBraun re-submitted the concept in May 1941but the RLM again rejected it.Also, the suggestion of a piloted ‘ramrocket’ was mooted in September 1943 by DrAlexander Lippish. His proposal was for arocket-propelled aircraft that would take offvertically and quickly climb to the altitude ofthe bombers, reaching 10,000 metres in 40seconds. The pilot would steer the intercep-tor to impact with a bomber, its solid, sharpramming point slicing through the airframe,breaking it apart. With its speed and trajec-tory significantly unchanged by the impact,the rocket would continue to climb away,finally decelerating to zero velocity at the topof its trajectory. The pilot would then releasea parachute which would recover the inter-ceptor while the pilot would bale out seper-ately at a lower altitude.from Erich Bachem’s nickname in his student days, viz, ERIchBAchem.Right:The old main production hall still stands besideBiberacher Strasse and is now being used for storage by theHymer company, a well-known caravan and motorhomemanufacturer.Aerial view of the Bachem-Werk during the war, with the main production hall in thecentre and gatehouse centre left. Biberacher Strasse can be seen top left.Men of Waffen-SS Sonderkommando Waldsee on parade in front of the productionhall (out of the picture to the right). The entrance from Biberacher Strasse is in thebackground. Under the command of SS-Obersturmführer Heinz Flessner, this specialdetachment of Waffen-SS comprising unarmed technicians and skilled workers, had astrength of about 120 men at Waldsee. According to the report compiled in July 1945by Dr Clark B. Millikan, Bachem-Werk had some 600 employees at Waldsee just beforethe arrival of Allied troops, of which about 300 were engaged on the Natter projectincluding 60 engineers. Dr Millikan was a member of the US Naval Technical Missionin Europe tasked with investigating the Natter project. The team questioned six com-pany personnel, including Bethbeder, who were under house arrest at Jerzens afterhaving been held for some weeks at Camp Haiming in Austria (see pages 18 and 19).5H. GRIMMH. GRIMMATB
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