Operation Carthage

Operation Carthage
Part of the Second World War
The air raid on the Shellhus
Date 21 March 1945 Location Copenhagen, Denmark 55.6778°N 12.5617°E / 55.6778; 12.5617 Result British victory
Belligerents
RAAF Royal Air Force RNZAF	Gestapo Kriegsmarine
Strength
20 bombers, 30 fighters	anti-aircraft defences
Casualties and losses
6 aircraft destroyed 9 aircrew killed 1 aircrew captured	Danish Gestapo HQ destroyed 55 German soldiers, 47 Danish employees of the Gestapo killed
125 Danish civilians killed, including 86 schoolchildren 8 Danish prisoners of the Gestapo killed

Operation Carthage, on 21 March 1945, was a British air raid on Copenhagen, Denmark during the Second World War which killed 145 civilians. The target of the raid was the Shellhus, the Gestapo headquarters in the city centre. It was used for the storage of dossiers and the torture of Danish citizens during interrogations. The Danish Resistance had long asked the British to conduct a raid against the site. The building was destroyed, 18 prisoners were freed and Nazi anti-resistance activities were disrupted. Part of the raid was mistakenly directed against a nearby school; the raid caused 125 civilian deaths (including 86 schoolchildren and 18 adults at the school). The Aarhus Air Raid was a similar attack against the Gestapo headquarters in Aarhus on 31 October 1944, which succeeded.

Background

The raid was requested by members of the Danish resistance movement to free imprisoned members and to destroy the records of the Gestapo, to disrupt their operations. The RAF initially turned down the request as too risky, due to the location in a crowded city centre and the need for low-level bombing but they approved the raid in early 1945 after repeated requests. Once approval had been given, planning for the raid took several weeks; scale models of the target building and the surrounding city were built for use by pilots and navigators in preparation for a very low-level attack.

Raid

The attacking force consisted of Royal Air Force de Havilland Mosquito F.B.VI fighter-bombers of No. 2 Group RAF from No. 140 Wing RAF, comprising No. 21 Squadron RAF, No. 464 Squadron RAAF, and No. 487 Squadron RNZAF. The aircraft flew in three waves of six aircraft, with two reconnaissance Mosquito B.IVs from the Royal Air Force Film Production Unit to record the results of the attack, taking a short film. Thirty RAF Mustang fighters gave air cover from German aircraft and these also attacked anti-aircraft guns during the raid.

The force left RAF Fersfield in the morning and reached Copenhagen after 11:00. The raid was carried out at rooftop level and during the first attack, a Mosquito hit a lamp post, damaging its wing, and the aircraft crashed into the Jeanne d'Arc School, about 1.5 km (0.93 mi) from the target, setting it on fire. Several bombers in the second and third wave accidentally hit the school, mistaking it for their target.

There are two short documentaries on YouTube (17 mins) and which features an interview with Edward Sismore, an RAF navigator on the raid.

Aftermath

On the following day, a reconnaissance aircraft surveyed the target to assess the results. The damage was severe, with the west wing of the six-storey building reduced nearly to ground level. The Danish underground supplied a photograph showing the building burning from end to end. The raid had destroyed the Gestapo headquarters and records, severely disrupting Gestapo operations in Denmark, as well as allowing the escape of 18 prisoners. Fifty-five German soldiers, 47 Danish employees of the Gestapo and eight prisoners died in the headquarters building. Four Mosquito bombers and two Mustang fighters were lost and nine Allied airmen were killed. At the Jeanne d'Arc School, 86 schoolchildren and 18 adults were killed, many of them nuns.

On 14 July 1945, remains of an unidentified male casualty were recovered from the ruins of the Shellhus and transferred to the Department of Forensic Medicine of the University of Copenhagen. This happened again four days later and the two casualties were buried in Bispebjerg Cemetery on 4 and 21 September, respectively.

Film

Netflix has acquired the distribution rights for the Danish movie The Bombardment, which was first released in October 2021 in Denmark. The film is also known as The Shadow in My Eye (Skyggen i mit øje in Danish), and Netflix released the movie in March 2022.

Gallery

• 
  Shellhus before the bombing. At the time of the bombing it was painted in camouflage colours
• 
  Institut Jeanne d'Arc, a Roman Catholic girl school in Frederiksberg Allé, Frederiksberg, Copenhagen. Established in 1924, bombed by the RAF
• 
  Shellhus burning after the bombing raid
• 
  The Gestapo headquarters in the Shellhus, Copenhagen, in March 1945 during Operation Carthage. A Mosquito pulling away from its bombing run is visible on the extreme left, centre
• 
  Aftermath: ruins of the Shellhus

See also

• Aarhus Air Raid, a similar attack on Gestapo headquarters in Aarhus, Denmark
• Operation Jericho, a similar attack on Amiens Prison in France
• Oslo Mosquito raid, a similar attack on Gestapo headquarters in Oslo, Norway

References

Notes

Bibliography

• Reilly, Robin (1969). The Sixth Floor, The Danish Resistance Movement and the RAF Raid on Gestapo Headquarters. Cassell. ISBN 9780304361595.
• "Attack on Gestapo Headquarters, Copenhagen, 21 March 1945", RAF History Site: Bomber Command Famous Raids, archived from the original on 1 January 2018, retrieved 14 June 2011
• Bath, Matthias (2011). Danebrog gegen Hakenkreuz, Der Widerstand in Dänemark 1940–1945 [Danebrog Against the Swastika, The Resistance in Denmark 1940–1945]. Neumünster: Wachholtz. ISBN 978-3-529-02817-5.

External links

• (DK in English) On the entire event [1]
• (DK in Danish, encyclopaedic) On the French School (encyclopedic) [2]
• (DK in Danish, encyclopedic) On the Shell office building (encyclopedic) [3]
• (DK in Danish) On the bombing of the French School [4]

• "RAF - Attack on Gestapo Headquarters". Royal Air Force. Archived from the original on 1 January 2018. Retrieved 21 April 2015.
• IWM Interview with RAF officer Edward Sismore, who participated in the raid
• Velschow, Klaus. "The Bombing of the Shellhus on March 21, 1945". milhist.dk. Archived from the original on 10 April 2014. Retrieved 21 April 2015.