I had seen on a television documentary where men with radiation detectors entered an overgrown tunnel entrance in a German forest, and in the tunnel the radiation levels became extremely high. I had seen photos of Allied dismantling of a prototype Nazi power reactor on Wikipedia here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_nuclear_weapons_program#/media/File:German_Experimental_Pile_-_Haigerloch_-_April_1945.jpg
however this photo appears to show an industrial prototype and not a physics experiment, and criticality had not been achieved at this facility. So, I wondered if the underground radiation was from the original research prototype.
WWII nuclear scientists from Germany were secretly recorded conversing after after the defeat of the Nazis, and of course they were unaware of the U.S. "atomic pile" criticality at the University of Chicago. In the transcripts of their discussions, they refer to an "engine" which seems to be their term for a power reactor. I see the following statement on page 12 of the transcripts at http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/pdf/eng/English101.pdf
"History will record that the Americans and the English made a bomb, and that at the same time the Germans, under the HITLER regime, produced a workable engine."
which tells me they were all aware of a research reactor having achieved criticality. Does this seem correct?
Last paragraph:
> Der Vermehrungsfaktor (das Verhätnis Voll- zu Leermessung) ergab sich etwa zu 7. Damit war der Haigerlocher Reaktor nicht kritisch geworden. Berechnungen ergaben, dass etwa die eineinhalbfache Reaktorgröße notwendig gewesen wäre. Eine Vergrößerung war im April 1945 nicht mehr möglich, weil weder weiteres Uran noch Schweres Wasser vorhanden war.
Google Translate:
> The multiplication factor (the ratio of full to empty measurement) was about 7. Thus, the Haigerlocher reactor was not critical. Calculations showed that about one and a half times the reactor size would have been necessary. An enlargement was no longer possible in April 1945, because neither more uranium nor heavy water was available.