The Battle of Hamburg (1945) - The Last Battle for Northwest Germany 

Other Forgotten WW2 Battles: ru-vid.com/group/PL_bcNuRxKtpFSvZ7S1r9lhxsFI862A81l&si=5fmpNxWrdN-EY5my

I feel like the British involvement in the liberation of France and invasion of Germany is underrated and isn’t talked about often. Great video!

Hi History Hustle, as a historian from Hamburg I have to mention that there was no fighting in or over the city... as you mentioned, Hamburg surrendered to the British. The mayor Gauleiter Karl Kaufmann negotiated the peaceful surrender with the British on May 3, 1945 - and on the afternoon of the same day, british troops crossed the undestroyed bridge of the river Elbe and reached the city-center without any combat action. Kaufmann became some kind of a respected person after the war because of that, despite the fact that he was responsible for quite a lot of crimes related to his role in the nazi-regime. But the people of Hamburg were grateful for the surrender and this was mentioned and talked about in families a lot after the war. My father (who was eight years old at the time) talks about it until today. It was such a great relief because the city and it's people had suffered so heavily under the bombardment of "Operation Gomorrha" in July 1943. So technically there was no battle of Hamburg (compared to Berlin or the Ruhr-district or Aachen for example). The british crossed the Elbe some days before at Lauenburg - east of Hamburg - and there was some skirmishing in the Sachsenwald. But that was it. By the way: my name at RU-vid - van Valckenburgh - originates from the dutch engineer and Fortress builder Johan van Valckenburgh. He planned and build the fortress complex of Hamburg during the 30 years war that made the city impregnable for the duration of the war. He then went back to the Netherlands and died 1625 in battle at Voorburg near Den Haag in the 80 years war... I will check out your other videos - and I subscribed! Greetings from Hamburg, Frank

The British threatened to call in Bomber Command if the Germans did not surrender Hamburg... they didn't intend to waste British lives , the Germans capitulated, knowing the game was already up. After Hamburg British and Canadian troops raced to stop the Red Army from trying to roll up the Jutland peninsula into Denmark.

Thank you Stefan. People do not appreciate the loss rates in the last few weeks of the war on the Allied side too.

Probably tactically more important than the capture of Hamburg was the dash of the British towards Lübeck at the Baltic Sea in order to possibly prevent the Red Army to pour into the Schleswig-Holstein and Danish peninsula from the east by crossing the Elbe-Lübeck-Kanal, that roughly represents the south-eastern border of Schleswig-Holstein to Mecklenburg in the east. Coming from the direction of Lüneburg , the British had crossed the river Elbe a bit downstream from Lauenburg at Artlenburg, about 35 to 40kms south-east of Hamburg. Doing so, they had to get up the steep and high geest slope there and there was German shelling on the northern bank of the bridgehead from the woods around. The spot is an ancient furt across the river and therefore there is an old ravine there(no other chance to get up the slope) at the northern bank leading into the village of Schnakenbek, a direct hit onto that ravine had killed many British soldiers. Previously a 16 year old German soldier had sunk two amphibious tanks into the river with Panzerfausts, but got killed by machine gun fire from the western bank himself. His sacrifice resulted into a holdup of the crossing for only 30 minutes. Years ago I' had seen footage of that Elbe crossing taken from Artlenburg here on YT, I think, it was issued by the Royal War Museum. The British themselves shelled the woods and villages north of the bridgehead , where German troops of all kinds were located, alone the village of Lütau and fields around were hit by a few hundred shells. All in all this fight of the Elbe crossing and the following run on Lübeck had cost about another 1000 lives on all sides, including many German soldiers , that unsuccessfully counterattacked the bridgehead over open fields from the direction of Dalldorf and Büchen. The command post of all the German troops in the vicinity was in a bunker right at the Witzeeze canal lock of the Elbe-Lübeck-Kanal, which is still there today , but not publically accessible. I live in the vicinity and I own a book dealing on those final days of the war in this part of Germany, I'm writing from the memory of what I had read there years ago , the book is catching dust on my shelf presently.

3rd in! The last battles on the western front during the second world war are definitely quite interesting. Great work as always Stefan. Your presentations are top notch.

I recall speaking to a friend of the family, he'd been to school with my father who was in the Royal Navy, and reported seeing him in Naples. He was in the DLI and told about how he'd fought from North Africa, including El Alamein, to Germany. The DLI Regiment as one of those units that saw a lot of action, in North Africa, NW Europe during the fall of France and DDay and the liberation and then all the way to the end. Also in Burma.

My Mum was born in Luneburg, she became cook for a Major Montgomery who was stationed there after the war and even cooked a dinner for Field Marshal Montgomery when he visited the Major ! Small world.

Great work, Stefan. I feel sorry for the people killed, but also for the cities themselves. They were beautiful and when the war ended, ugly modern structures were built and car parks set up where once medieval structures stood. Very sad!

My late father was part of all this and it had been forgotton until now. Thanks so much to see where my father had been.

Excellent delivery and graphics. Good to hear the place names correctly pronounced.

I have read countless general history books about WW2. As well as many diaries of soldiers, from as many sides and theatres as possible in this war. I find the major movements and the "small", personal, histories in this war fascinating. Thanks again for this video, Stefan 👍 Greets from Grun' 🇳🇱, TW.

Thanks for another great video. It answers another question about my families history in WW2. In early May 1945 the British army rushed from Hamburg to Lubeck and in the process some of the units passed through my mothers little village SW of Lubeck. Everyone was told to stay inside, but my then 13 year old mother wanted to hide her uncle's nice leather boots, which she feared would be stolen by the allied troops. He had gotten these boots in France earlier in the war. She put the boots in an old sack and ran from the house to the barn to hide them. This is when she was shot through the leg right behind the knee. The bullet went right through the leg missing the bone. She was eventually treated by a British doctor and suffered no long term effects. It is not know if she was hit by a stray bullet or was targeted, but she was very lucky.

Thanks again Stefan ! My father fought from Kleve onwards and said there were some tough fights and the weather was foul at times.

Thank you for diligently presenting the facts of this nearly forgotten battle. As usual I enjoyed your video lecture on the subject immensely. Continue producing brilliant content.

Thank you Stefan for sharing your knowledge with us ✌🏻🫶🏻

Steven, thanks for posting this, because most of us who have an interest in WWII don't know too much about this battle!

Three of the units mentioned were in older, more famous battles. The Inniskillings and Scots Greys, were The Heavy Brigade, in the Battle of the Alma in 1854, while the 8th Hussars, were one half of the famous "Charge of the Light Brigade," at Balaclava, in the same year.

Thank you. As one of the few Englishman who is still proud of our history I am grateful for you for making this video.

Nice production ,

Great to see you got the 48-state flags right. That's a rare touch these days! Attention to detail in small things implies attention to detail in big things.

I always appreciate your history documentaries!

Fascinating... I was a Brit squaddie in Fallingbostel in the early 80s so I find this particularly interesting.. thank you and Huzzah!! 😊

Lovely presentation Stefan. I will keep on asking you for some videos on prisoner exchanges in ww2

Thank you again. That was wonderfully interesting

Outstanding video, Stefan!

As ever, excellent presentation sir. ❤

Good post, you should do one on Operation Bluecoat 1944.

Didn't know this.Thx Stefan.

Very interesting. Thank you.

1:47 Hi, Stefan! I was born in a city called Novo Hamburgo (Neu Hamburg), in south Brazil. Most of the inmigrants, including my ancestors, came from Hunsrück region, near to Luxembourg. At the arriving in 1824, from Hamburg port, they presented themselves as hunsrückers, not germans. Germany would only be a state 47 years later. The town I live, Ivoti, has the most preserved german historic houses in Brazil. Culturaly, the border of south Brazil are closer to the pampas folklore than to the rest north above, like Carnival. Obrigado e um abraço, tchê! ヽ(͡◕ ͜ʖ ͡◕)ﾉ 🍀 🇧🇷

Thanks!

thx much for another upload 🇨🇦 😁

Good share !

Interesting as ever. Particularly as my grandfather was there.thanks Stefan

At 5:47 it’s unlikely they were the Devonshires… given the name of their home town on the chalkboard board.. they appear to be a Welsh regiment or Welsh border regiment maybe ksli.

Interesting Stuff Stefan, I had never heard anything about this part of the overall European battle - thanks for your research as always!

It was an informative and wonderful historical coverage video about Hamburg invaded by the British during WW2 .video shared by an excellent (History Hustle) channel and introduced by 🙏 Sir Stefan

Nice story. Got a city-trip to Hamburg planned in march. Wil see what is left as in memorials, museums etc.

Thanks

Thanks 👍

From the footage, it seems like the smallest guy in a British infantry section usually carried the Bren.🤔

Good video. Sub'd.

Good work. BZ Did you visit the Bullenhauser Damm Memorial ro the victims of 20 April 1945?

Hi Stefan, great work. The photo of the Bren carrier when describing the battle of Ibbenbueren , was named 'Fforestfach'. This is a Welsh town, does this indicate the presence of a Welsh Battalion at the battle?

Interesting video! I’m always interested in what our British allies experienced in the war. My dad was in General Patton’s army and he said once they got across the Rhine they had a nasty battle at Frankfurt for a couple days. After that then basically all German resistance collapsed.

9th Battalion Durham light Infantry was the local Infantry Battalion from my home town Gateshead. There nickname was the Gateshead Gurkhas

i agree bro the ww2 is a huge war not the small battles were featured good job bro

Interesting history.

Cool soundtrack

Can’t believe you are in Hamburg this week aswell as Easter island 🗿😉 Hamburg nice and close compared to Easter island 🗿🫶🏻

"Instructor" your "quick wit" and " clear -eyed "focus" on the "subject matter"....keeps me in the know"!!

The Canadian role in the world wars needs more videos.

One thing the Brits did was stop the Russians going beyond Lubbeck and taking Denmark by getting there first.

Can you do one on Douvres La Deliverande in normandy? My cousins grandfather was killed there and we have both been to his grave but from what I can establish is the germans held out for a month there.

2:00. It wasnt the failure of Market Garden that gave the Germans time to regroup. It was Eisenhower's overall broad front strategy, including failures in the Hurtgen Forest, Lorraine, Operation Queen and the Alsace which gave the Germans time to regroup. Eisenhower dispersed the allied armies over a 500km front, squandering/wasting vast amounts of men and supplies in pointless secondary campaigns.

The dam was busted' in May 1943 by Lancaster's of the RAF's 617 squadron during Operation Chastise on the night of 16-17 May 1943, together with the Edersee dam in northern Hesse. The bombs used were the bouncing bombs' developed by Barnes Wallace who also developed the Tallboy Bomb designed to penetrate concrete bunkers (such as the U-Boat pens at St Nazaire etc)

Great video. Thank you!

To think, that just 15 years later, The Beatles were playing the Indra Club in Hamburg..

Sad to think of all the extra dead (civilian and military) as Doenitz waited 3 days to surrender after he suceeded Hitler. The post war famine where many tens of thousands more died, would not have been so severe either.

6:35 there is a weapon not often seen

It would be a really nice touch if you actually went to the trenches and the bunkers in the forests, like in Budapest, you could've gone to any of the several big defensive lines, ammunition bunkers, surveillance bunkers, anti-tank trenches, and more...

1st In, So @ 02:27 you claim the "Battle for Achen" was known as "America's Stalingrad", Care to share where you got this source of information from or moniker the from? or did you just make it up?

It’s pity that in this presentation the battle for Hamburg dose not start till 8min and 13 seconds in. He spends a lot of time getting through Nth Afrika , UK , Normandy.

Yeah, another shamefully overlooked battle is that of Keren…And a safe bet many El Alemainers have never even heard of it much less care about it even when they hear it mentioned…

for the British the major objective was Lubech and ensure that the Soviets did not move into Danmark.

Excellent video . I can’t help but think that even though everybody involved knew it was the end people were still dying . I’m glad I’ve only know peace in Western Europe in my lifetime . I’m not forgetting Ukraine 🇺🇦

As a side-note: the concentration-camp Neuengamme near Hamburg was liberated on may 2nd 1945.

It would be interesting to have numbers "strong resistance", "many casualties" etc ... We can't figure the scale of magnitudes + battle for Hamburg was not really a battle if well understood. Rather negotiated surrender. We understand allies had to fight city after city, village after village. Such weird strategy from 3rd Reich as everything was better than Soviets. This regime had no clear strategic priorities from the beginning. The only priority was it's own survival at the cost of germans. 😂

The Inniskillings was a N Ireland regiment no longer in existence

👍🏻🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

The British did more than it's share of fighting against the Germans and the Japanese, the Americans always get there stories told as though they Won the War themselves, just saying from Glasgow 😎👊🇬🇧

REspect and the battles of the east [Kohima etc.] were dreadful

My Dads regiment the Queen Royal West Surreys took the surrender of Hamburg, Cpl Pass was shot dead as he went forward to accepting the surrender, i have a photo of him being interviewed by Frank Gillard it was online but has been removed , i read that the SS murdered 5 men of Dads battalion with pick axis. @ 9;7 is the town hall where above the Greman officer is the regimental flag . its on youtube

Hamburg today is very beautiful. Having come out of the 2nd world war ruin.

Surviours of july 43 bombing sheltered at the horse race track horner renbahn ?

40 thousand? 25 thousand? Using very low estimates? Read the book "The destruction of Dresden."

2nd in 🎉

I think the number of people killed in the bombing of Dresden was closer to 100000. With the people fleeing from the east it is difficult in getting the right numbers.

5 min to start the topic Lack of information Poor interest. Someone should highlight this interesting topic much better

Sooo... basically Monty had very little success from the end of summer (MarketGarden) to practically the end of the war. And during the summer very little success i.e.- Caen and Failaise and the Schelde. Prior to that he struggled up the short side of Sicily and ran across the vacated lands of North Africa. Hard to picture him as much of a general.

Mileys Dempsey was Irish 🇮🇪

Will you do a video on the genocide of Hindus ordered by Churchill as a token of thanks for fighting on their side and for providing British freeloaders with free money, free gold, free mineral resources, free timber, free coal, human resources and also a video about his Hindu-hatred and racism of British. There are about 2 dozen genocides that the British executed in Bharat. Any video on that?

The Red Army were more merciful in those dark days. They never destroyed whole German cities bombing from the air.

HISTORIAN: "HAMBURG WAS A CASE OF SERIOUS OVERKILL." AMERICAN HISTORIANS: "WHAT DO YOU MEAN?" OUR PILOTS WERE HEROES."

Thanks!