6 Group Unavailable
547 aircraft- 223 Halifaxes, 204 Lancasters, I 13 Stirlings, 7 Mosquitoes. 24 aircraft- 14 Halifaxes, 6 Stirlings, 4 Lancasters - lost, 4·4 per cent of the force.
This raid did not proceed according to plan. The H2S 'blind marker' aircraft overshot the aiming point badly and the 'visual markers' could not correct this because their view of the ground was restricted by thick haze. German decoy markers may also have been present. The main weight of the attack thus fell on the western suburbs and outlying towns and villages. But, even so, large fires were started at both the Henschel and Fieseler aircraft factories, at the city's main hospital and at several other important buildings. The eastern suburb of Wolfshanger was devastated, Kassel's casualties were 118 dead - 68 civilians, 12 military and 38 foreigners - and 304 injured. Musgrove, in his excellent book Pathfinder Force,* records that a large ammunition dump at Ihringshausen, just north of Wolfshanger, was hit by a chance bomb load and the resulting explosions attracted further bombs; photographs taken later showed 84 buildings at the military location destroyed and a great mass of craters. The outlying townships of Bettenhausen and Sandershausen were also severely hit but details for these places are not available.
source: The Bomber Command War Diaries, Martin Middlebrook and Chris Everitt
Halifax aircraft LK925 lost during operations against Kassel, Germany. W/O 2nd cl, G.J.Crebbin, Sergeant C. Wardrope and Pilot Officer L.C. Main were killed. Three Canadians, WOs. Reynoldson, Cudmore, and Sergeant Depape taken Prisoners of War, one of the crew, not Canadian, missing believed killed.
