Putlitzbrücke deportation memorial
The Putlitzbrücke deportation memorial ( ) is located on the east side of the Putlitzbrücke in the Berlin district of Moabit . At this point, the bridge spans the Moabit freight yard , from whose tracks 69, 81 and 82, from January 1942, more than 32,000 Jewish citizens were deported to the concentration camps .
The memorial was designed by the sculptor Volkmar Haase as part of the Art in Urban Space program and erected in 1987. It shows a 2.5 meter high stainless steel sculpture, the front part of which is reminiscent of a tombstone. This is crowned with a Star of David , which is worked as a sunk relief . The inscription is at about knee height:
LEVELS
THAT
ARE NO
LONGER
LEVELS.
A STAIR
THAT IS NO LONGER A STAIR .
CANCELED.
SYMBOL OF THE PATH
OF NO WAY MORE WAR
FOR
THE
OVER RAMPS
RAILWAYS
LEVELS
AND STAIRS
THIS LAST WALK HAD.
FROM THE PUTLITZSTRASSE RAILWAY
STATION
TEN THOUSANDS OF JEWISH CITIZENS OF BERLIN WERE DEPORTED
TO EXTERMINATION
CAMPS
AND
MURDERED
IN THE YEARS
1941–1944
The part of the memorial behind it shows, referring to the inscription, a repeatedly kinked and deformed staircase to heaven.
The memorial has been the target of anti-Semitic smearings and desecrations from its erection to the present day . On August 29, 1992, the memorial was the target of an explosive attack that damaged it so badly that it had to be temporarily dismantled and restored. It was re-erected in March 1993. A plaque on the bridge railing next to the memorial reminds us of this attack.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Stefanie Endlich: Paths to Remembrance / Memorial sites and places for the victims of National Socialism in Berlin and Brandenburg . State Center for Political Education, Berlin 2007, p. 238f.
- ^ For example, the Jewish memorial desecrated again . In: Berliner Zeitung , December 18, 2003 and Police Report - memorial smeared . In: Berliner Zeitung , October 6, 2009
Coordinates: 52 ° 32 '8.4 " N , 13 ° 20' 37.6" E