Hamburg Hamburg Hamburg (; ; officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg; ; Low German/Low Saxon: "Friee un Hansestadt Hamborg") is the second-largest city in Germany with a population of over 1.8 million. One of Germany's 16 federal states, it is surrounded by Schleswig-Holstein to the north and Lower Saxony to the south. The city's metropolitan region is home to more than five million people. Hamburg lies on the River Elbe and two of its tributaries, the River Alster and the River Bille. The official name reflects Hamburg's history as a member of the medieval Hanseatic League and a free
Bombing of Dresden in World War II east-west along the central European uplands. The city was at the junction of the Berlin-Prague-Vienna railway line, as well as the Munich-Breslau, and Hamburg-Leipzig lines. Colonel Harold E. Cook, a US POW held in the Friedrichstadt marshaling yard the night before the attacks, later said that "I saw with my own eyes that Dresden was an armed camp: thousands of German troops, tanks and artillery and miles of freight cars loaded with supplies supporting and transporting German logistics towards the east to meet the Russians". An RAF memo issued to airmen on the night of the attack indicated that a