The End of the War @museum.de

17 smokestacks, a jumble of roofs and buildings – by the end of the Second World War, the ironworks covered a vast area!

This might help you to get your bearings: today's museum is at the top left of the photograph showing the works – behind the impressive Main Administration Building erected in 1913. The tallest of the smokestacks overlaps part of that building. To the left of the Main Administration Building, right at the edge of the photograph, you can see the Roman Catholic church, which still stands opposite the museum today.

The railway tracks right in front of the Main Administration Building lead to what was then the main station, or the state railway station. These days, it’s Thale central station. It marks the southern boundary of the factory grounds. At the very top of the photograph is another set of tracks leading to a second station, the Bode Valley station. That was part of a private railway line linking Thale with Blankenburg and Quedlinburg, which came into service in 1908. Turntables linked the factory tracks to both railway lines.

The photograph was taken in December 1944. Every inch of space at the Thale ironworks was built on. The plant had been producing armaments for years. It was an armaments factory – and yet it remained completely intact.

How did the town of Thale and the ironworks escape being bombed? So far, historians haven’t come up with a conclusive answer.

In April 1945, Thale was liberated by US forces. In keeping with the agreements reached at the Yalta Conference, it was transferred to the Soviet occupation zone from the 1st of July.

The plant had not been destroyed and remained fully functional. Since there were only two operational steel works and rolling mills in the Soviet occupation zone in Germany, nothing was dismantled. On the contrary: production resumed quite quickly.