Hello - and thanks for an interesting question!
Leuna was, and is, a large chemical-industrial site near Merseburg. It
is called "Leuna Werke", i.e. Leuna Works, in German and I think this
must be what you heard. In 1927 IG Farben started production of
synthetic gasoline there, using a process involving the hydrogenation
of brown coal. Then the "Leuna Werke" became a key target for bombers
in the later stages of World War Two and were attacked twenty times by
the US 8th. Air Force and twice by the RAF.
The links under the following excerpts will lead to more detail, but
if there is any particular aspect about which you would like more
information, please let me know and I'll do my best to follow up.
=========
THE PLANT
=========
British report in 1945:
"The Leuna Factory of the I.G.Farbenindustrie A.G. situated near
Merseberg [sic], is the biggest heavy chemical plant in Germany and
produces a very wide range of products, mainly based on hydrogen or
hydrogen and carbon monoxide. Its principal products are ammonia,
synthetic petrol derived from the hydrogenation of brown coal, and
synthetic alcohols made from hydrogen and carbon monoxide."
http://www.fischer-tropsch.org/primary_documents/gvt_reports/CIOSC/igfarben/farb-intro.htm
"I.G. Farben bought the Bergius patent rights and in 1927 built at
Leuna the first commercial hydrogenation plant to produce synthetic
gasoline. This was a logical development because the Leuna nitrogen
plant could produce more hydrogen than was needed to manufacture
ammonia. The high-pressure apparatus and the experience needed to
employ the Bergius process were also available at Leuna."
http://members.tripod.com/~Sturmvogel/ussbsint.html
"By the Second World War, the technological stronghold has developed
into the largest German chemical company of that time."
http://www.leuna.com/englisch/chemstan/i_stoff.htm
===========
THE BOMBING
===========
"The synthetic oil plants were brought back into partial production
and in remarkably short time. But unlike the ball-bearing plants, as
soon as they were brought back they were attacked again. The story of
Leuna is illustrative. Leuna was the largest of the synthetic plants
and protected by a highly effective smoke screen and the heaviest flak
concentration in Europe. Air crews viewed a mission to Leuna as the
most dangerous and difficult assignment of the air war. Leuna was hit
on May 12 and put out of production. However, investigation of plant
records and interrogation of Leuna's officials established that a
force of several thousand men had it in partial operation in about 10
days. It was again hit on May 28 but resumed partial production on
June 3 and reached 75 percent of capacity in early July. It was hit
again on July 7 and again shut down but production started 2 days
later and reached 53 percent of capacity on July 19. An attack on July
20 shut the plant down again but only for three days; by July 27
production was back to 35 percent of capacity. Attacks on July 28 and
29 closed the plant and further attacks on August 24, September 11,
September 13, September 28 and October 7 kept it closed down. However,
Leuna got started again on October 14 and although production was
interrupted by a small raid on November 2, it reached 28 percent of
capacity by November 20. Although there were 6 more heavy attacks in
November and December (largely ineffective because of adverse
weather), production was brought up to 15 percent of capacity in
January and was maintained at that level until nearly the end of the
war. From the first attack to the end, production at Leuna averaged 9
percent of capacity. There were 22 attacks on Leuna, 20 by the Eighth
Air Force and 2 by the RAF. Due to the urgency of keeping this plant
out of production, many of these missions mere dispatched in difficult
bombing weather. Consequently, the order of bombing accuracy on Leuna
was not high as compared with other targets. To win the battle with
Leuna a total of 6,552 bomber sorties were flown against the plant,
18,328 tons of bombs were dropped and an entire year was required."
THE UNITED STATES STRATEGIC BOMBING SURVEY
Summary Report
(European War)
September 30, 1945
http://www.anesi.com/ussbs02.htm
"Christian Schneider, manager of Leuna Works, one of Germany's largest
synthetic gasoline and oil plants: "Up until a week ago (middle of
April 1945), the Leuna plant was still operating, turning out a
pitifully thin trickle of fuel. The output was so small compared with
its capacity potential that production officials had difficulty
plotting it on a chart. The 8th Air Force twice knocked out the plant
so that the production was nil for a period of 15 days, and once the
RAF did the same. Once after the attacks started, the plant got back
to 70 percent capacity production for a period of 10 days. Another
attack, and the plant got hack to 50 percent. But from then on it
never got more than a mere drop in comparison to its capacity."
http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/ww2/nazis/nazidbrf.htm
More detail on the amount and effect of bombing here:
http://members.tripod.com/~Sturmvogel/ussbssyn.html
http://members.tripod.com/~Sturmvogel/ussbsgensum.html
===============
PICTURES & MAPS
===============
RAF picture of Leuna, probably from early 1945
http://www.raf.mod.uk/bombercommand/diary/images/ahbi601.jpg
Source page for photograph
http://www.raf.mod.uk/bombercommand/diary/jan45.html
Picture-diagrams of Leuna Benzin production process
http://www.fh-merseburg.de/~nosske/EpocheII/Hist/e2i_leu4.jpg
http://www.fh-merseburg.de/~nosske/EpocheII/Hist/e2i_leu2.jpg
Leuna relative to Leipzig, map
http://www.leuna.com/deutsch/weg/weg.htm
Naumburg relative to Leipzig, map
http://www.geruestbauschmidt.de/anfahrtseite.htm
==========
BACKGROUND
==========
This may be more than you actually want to know about the production
process and history of the Leuna Works. But as it came up in the
course of my research and it might be useful to you, here are a few
more links.
History and timeline
http://www.mdr.de/nachrichten/sachsen-anhalt/615279.html
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mdr.de%2Fnachrichten%2Fsachsen-anhalt%2F615279.html&langpair=de%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8&oe=UTF8
Background on Leuna
http://www.mdr.de/geschichte/themen/wirtschaft/3969.html
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mdr.de%2Fgeschichte%2Fthemen%2Fwirtschaft%2F3969.html&langpair=de%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8&oe=UTF8
Extensive technical information, assembled in 1945
http://www.fischer-tropsch.org/primary_documents/gvt_reports/CIOSC/igfarben/farb-toc.htm
Background on IG Farben
http://reformed-theology.org/html/books/wall_street/chapter_02.htm
I'm relieved you said the spy was not crucial to your question, as I
have tried and tried but can find no trace of him online. I would be
happy to continue my search if you have any further clues about where
he was captured, how or when. Searches on the net for him in Leuna,
Mersenburg, Leipzig, Naumburg and Jena have produced nothing. It did
occur to me that if this story came from anecdotal information, it
could be related to one of the pilots shot down and captured in the
area, but perhaps that doesn't fit at all with what you know.
I hope this is useful, but please don't hesitate to request
clarification if you think I could help further on any point.
Good luck with the biography!
Regards - Leli
searches using these terms:
Leuna Benzin benzene
synthetic oil gasoline petrol
bombers bombing air force
plant works werke
spy agent intelligence spion
"bomb damage" report reports
other place names
1944 1945 etc.
leuna werke
://www.google.co.uk/search?q=%22leuna+werke%22&btnG=Google+Search&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8 |
Request for Answer Clarification by
butch13-ga
on
30 Jun 2003 09:03 PDT
Leli,
My source, the subject of my biography, tells me that the Leuna spy
was an English student (Oxford, he thinks) who parachuted into the
area with a radio transmitter and got a job in the Leura Werke, where
he may have been employed for months. He lived with a local family.
He was captured in the summer of 1944, probably after the July
bombings, and executed. My source tells me that he read a newspaper
account of this perhaps 20 years later. I realize that this is not
much to go on, but why not give it a shot. If you make it, you'll
come up platinum! (You're already gold, in my book.) Your work is
fascinating to me. Is there a book I can read to learn to be a better
researcher? Thanks for your help.
Butch13
|
Clarification of Answer by
leli-ga
on
02 Jul 2003 11:37 PDT
Hi Butch13
No good news, I'm afraid, and no trace of the spy your subject
remembers reading about.
Exploring the topic in general has turned up very little about British
agents actually in Germany, although there are many tales of
undercover operations in France or Belgium. It sounds like the sort of
mission that would have been undertaken by the Special Operations
Executive/ SOE, or possibly the SIS, as they were responsible for
intelligence gathering. If you're interested, there is background
information available about how the SOE trained agents. (links below)
Three emails I've sent to possible sources of help have not yet been
answered and so I'm becoming less and less hopeful of finding a way to
track this down, even if we could get a more specific fix on the
newspaper story (which newspaper, which year?).
I can only offer you book titles and three suggestions for
people/places you might ask.
One is Professor MRD Foot whose name keeps cropping up in this
context. He wrote "Special Operations Executive 1940-46" published by
the BBC in 1984. This is an agency contact for him:
http://www.pfd.co.uk/scripts/get.py/books/?authors%20Professor%20M%20R%20D%20Foot
(I didn't email him because I thought it would be slow going through
an agency.)
Another is a historian, Mark Seaman, who's connected with the Imperial
War Museum in London.
"Mark Seaman is an intelligence historian and has written extensively
on the Special Operations Executive."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/war/wwtwo/foxley_report_06.shtml
Although I did email the museum, I just sent it as a general
information request. It's possible that something marked for the
attention of Mr. Seaman might get through to him personally.
Email address at the bottom of this page:
http://www.iwm.org.uk/lambeth/index.htm
The Tangmere Museum at a World War Two air base has "a permanent
exhibition that tells the base's history of involvement with wartime
SOE and SIS missions."
http://www.24hourmuseum.org.uk/trlout_gfx_en/TRA14055.html
http://www.tangmere-museum.org.uk/history.htm
Their email is at the bottom of this page:
http://www.tangmere-museum.org.uk/
Then there are the books suggested here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/war/wwtwo/soe_training_06.shtml
The booklist comes at the end of a few pages of information which
start here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/war/wwtwo/soe_training_01.shtml
A book which I've looked at which doesn't help (except with general
background) is "Within Two Cloaks" by Philip Johns Kimber (1979)
I really wish I could have helped with this. The information must be
out there somewhere, though I'm pretty sure it's not online. Of course
I'll let you know at once if I do hear anything from an email
correspondent.
In the meantime, good luck with your research and the biography.
Please don't hesitate to ask if I can clarify anything further.
Leli
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