Over the Reich: Total Air War is an interactive digital map displaying Allied bombing targets in Axis-occupied Europe, 1940-45. It compares American industrial precision targets and British city area targets, revealing the lengths Germany went to to disperse industry and stifle discontent. It is explorable online and allows multiple contributors.
Department: History
Supervised by: Prof. Patrick Major
Over the Reich: Total Air War is an interactive digital map using Google Maps to trace the epic bombing war over Europe, reaching from Norway to Sicily, and Brest in northwest France to Ploiesti in Romania. Geographic information systems (GIS) allow the efficient digital capture of enormous amounts of information otherwise buried in long publications. The map is designed as a public-facing online reference work for scholars and aficionados of the Second World War. A website has been set up in anticipation of release in 2025. Over the Reich seeks answers to difficult questions over the morality of area bombing of cities by RAF Bomber Command as well as precision bombing by the American USAAF, including new research questions: - Did indiscriminate British raids cause collateral damage to Axis industry? - Did inaccurate USAAF precision raids cause collateral deaths among civilians? - How far did the German economy have to disperse its production to evade bombing? - To what extent was the Holocaust ‘economised’ in 1944/45 to cope with strategic bombing? The project is at a stage where the PI has plotted around 10,000 sites for a ‘total map’ of the entire air war. The UROP researcher would create additional layers from archival materials already gathered to reconstruct individual raids (a sample of British raids on the Ruhr, Hamburg and Berlin; and American raids during ‘Big Week’ in 1944). Google Maps allows multiple users, as well as the curation of images and testimonies to rescue the past from the rubble.
Reading contemporary historical documents made available by the PI and plotting raid tracks, incidents, bombing hits on the ground, witness testimony and uploading damage diagrams of industrial sites onto a digital map. (Google Maps is very user-friendly and I have used it during summer schools on campus - the basic principles can be taught in 1 hour.)
Background knowledge of the Second World War; accurate reading of historical documents and ability to summarise; basic familiarity with using shared electronic files. A reading knowledge of German would be a definite bonus, but not essential since can be provided by PI.
Use of satellite Imagery to match contemporary with historic locations; understanding of Geographic Information Systems incl geolocation; UROP researcher would be taken a few times to National Archives for additional data gathering to learn primary source skills; possible public presentation opportunity at RAF Museum conference, Sept. 2024
From University (Edith Morley 146 if needed) or from home.
Flexible
Monday 10 June 2024 - Friday 19 July 2024
The deadline to apply for this project is 5pm on Friday 5th April 2024. To make an application, please go to the following link and complete the application form: https://forms.office.com/e/pMgea0dAHv. To find this project in the application form, please filter ‘school of project applying to’ and select School of Humanities