After eight years of gathering and verifying statistics, the city fathers of Frankfurt (prewar pop. 550,000) counted the cost of the war that Hitler started. Between 1939-45, reported the municipal bureau of vital statistics, 14,701 Frankfurt men were killed in action (64% on the Russian front); 5,000 more are listed as "missing in action," but of these, 75% are almost certainly dead.
By age groups, 43% of all Frankfurters born in 1917 were killed, along with 40% of those born in 1918. Though Frankfurt ranked 15th on Germany's list of war-damaged cities,* more than half of its homes were destroyed by...