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The Life and Work of Konrad Zuse (by Horst Zuse) |
| Part 6 (continued): The Z4 after the War |
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Most people today cannot imagine how bad the situation in Germany in 1945 was. Berlin was attacked every day and night by more than 800 bombers. Konrad Zuse eventually fled from Berlin with his pregnant wife Gisela and the Z4 in March 1945. The Z4 itself was transported on a military truck. This was made possible by some confusion between the Z4 computer and the V2 rocket. At that time, Konrad Zuse denoted his machines as V1, V2, V3 and V4, where the V stood for "Versuchsmodell", meaning "trial models". Thus, the military mistakenly believed that Konrad Zuse had parts of the V4 rocket, a successor of the V2 rocket (of course my father and the Z4 (V4) computer had nothing whatsoever to do with these rockets).
However, due to this confusion, may father gained access to a military truck, which was used to transport the Z4 to Göttingen (300 km away from Berlin). For this trip, which took one week, they could only move during the night because there were low-level aircraft attacks in the daytime. During the day the party found makeshift shelter with farmers. In Göttingen Konrad Zuse presented the Z4 to the Professors Prandtl and Küssner of the Aerodynamsche Versuchsanstalt (areodynamics research institute). It was originally intended that the Z4 should be delivered to the underground factories in Nordhausen, where the rocket V2 was in serial production. However, Konrad Zuse was deeply shocked by what he discovered there. Although he was by now completely accustomed to the bombings in Berlin, he now saw the inhuman atrocities of the Third Reich with his own eyes. Twenty thousand concentration camp prisoners worked under unimaginable conditions in kilometer-long tunnels. After seeing this, Konrad Zuse declared: Anywhere, but not here. Fortunately it was possible to take the truck southeast to Hof, then via the burning Munich to Kloster Ettal, and finally to Haus Ingeborg in Oberjoch (Bavaria) in the alps, where he arrived in April 1945. |
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| In the Haus Ingeborg, which is about 10 km from Hindelang (Allgäu, Bavaria) Konrad Zuse met Wernher von Braun(7) with part of his group (about 100 persons) and General Dornberger for the first and last time in his life. My father was able to have a brief discussion with Wernher von Braun, and he later said that von Braun had not forseen the role computers were to play in the future. After a few days Konrad Zuse left the group and proceeded to Hinterstein, which was about 20 km away from Oberjoch, because he did not want to be involved with the V2 rocket in any way. In Hinterstein my fasther hid parts of the Z4 in a barn of the Hotel Steinadler. | (7)Wernher von Braun was the head of the team in charge of designing and constructing the V2 rocket in Peenemünde in the north east of Germany (General Dornberger was the commander in Peenemünde). After the war, Wernher von Braun moved to US, where he could proceed with his work on rockets. Wernher von Braun was later involved in satellite projects and the Apollo moon rocket. | |
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| Fig.50 (Left). The Hotel Steinadler in Hinterstein (Allgäu). Fig.51 (Right). The barn where the Z4 was hidden from 1945-1946. It is interesting to note that the Z4 was the only computer in Germany (and probably in Europe) until 1951! | |
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The situation around Hinterstein was complicated. For example, there were more than 1200 refugees, 200 soldiers, and so forth. Konrad Zuse and his wife found a room in the House Tannheimer. From 1945 till 1947 it was almost impossible to restore the damaged Z4, which was, at this time, the only computer in Germany (and probably in Europe)!
Konrad Zuse desperately wanted to resume work on the Z4, but his first problem was to survive the years after the war. In order to get some food, he made woodcuts and sold them to the farmers and the American troops. Figure 53 shows a woodcut by Konrad Zuse, which depicts Hinterstein. The Z4 computer was hidden close to the church. |
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| Fig.52 The small village of Hinterstein (1985). Fig.53 (Right). A woodcut of Hinterstein by Konrad Zuse (1946). |
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Fig.54 (Left). The House Tannheimer in Hinterstein, where Konrad Zuse and his family found room on the first floor (the four windows at the front edge of the house). Fig.55 (Right). A woodcut of the House Tannheimer by Konrad Zuse (1945). |
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| Fig.56 (Left) A three color woodcut (60cm x 80cm) of the waterfall Zipfelsfälle in Hinterstein by Konrad Zuse. He used three separate wood plates, one for yellow, one for blue, and one for red (the green color was created from the colors yellow and blue). Each wood plate was pressed onto the same piece of paper in turn to create the final image. Fig.57 (Middle). A woodcut by Konrad Zuse, which shows the hut Roßhütte and the Erzberg mountain close to Hinterstein in the winter of 1945/46. Fig.58 (Right). A woodcut of the church in Hinterstein in 1946. | ||
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