The city of Würzburg (in Franconia, in the north of Bavaria) was attacked as part of the strategic bombing campaign in World War II by the Allies against Nazi Germany.

[1]: 19  The major raid occurred on March 16, 1945, when Royal Air Force bombers dropped incendiary bombs that set fire to much of the city, killing an estimated 5,000 people and almost completely obliterating the historic town.

The decision to bomb the town was made by RAF Bomber Command in High Wycombe, due to favorable weather conditions predicted for the sixteenth of March.

The author Detlef Siebert wrote that "Some ... like Würzburg or Pforzheim were primarily selected because they were easy for the bombers to find and destroy.

These illuminated the target area, marking them out by flares on Green parachutes, which the German population called "Christmas Trees."

The bombers had to fly over the red marker, take a specially assigned altitude and flight path, and trigger their bombs at different times.

Within a very short time isolated pockets of fire emerged, and this developed into a single area-wide firestorm with temperatures from 1500-2000 °C.

To avoid being caught in the fire-storm or suffocating, many people ran for their lives and tried to reach the banks of the Main river or the edge of town.

In the ruins of the city in the days which followed 3000 dead were recovered or identified, and an additional 2000 unregistered refugees are believed to have perished under the rubble.

The Staircase with the famous fresco by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo survived due to an exceptionally strong ceiling construction for the 18th century.

The American occupation forces immediately after the war secured the dilapidated building monuments in an exemplary manner.

Before the war, the population of Würzburg had been about 108,000, whereas in early 1945 it held 75–85,000 people due to attrition caused by military service.

On the day of its capture by American troops (April 6, 1945), 36,850 city residents registered, and the population rose again to 53,000 by the end of 1945.