Wilsnacker Strasse cemetery for the victims of war and tyranny

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Main path of the cemetery
Memorial stele

The war grave cemetery on Wilsnacker Straße in the Berlin district of Moabit is the final resting place for more than 300 people who were violently killed in its vicinity in April and May 1945.

history

Today's war grave cemetery originally belonged to the churchyard of St. John's Church . This part of the cemetery had already been cleared in 1935. During the Battle of Berlin - as it says on the plaque that was placed on the outside of the wall to the right of the entrance in 2003 - “over 300 people who perished around this cemetery at the end of the Second World War were buried. They died in fighting, in the air raid shelter, while procuring basic necessities, shot in the neck or committed suicide. ”15 political prisoners and resistance fighters from the Lehrter Strasse cell prison were killed on the rubble of the ULAP site on theInvalidenstrasse killed by the SS ; of them was Albrecht Haushofer buried in the cemetery, the other in a mass grave.

This emergency cemetery was later converted into a cemetery of honor according to the War Graves Act , which was opened in 1955, based on a design by the garden architect Wilhelm Alverdes .

Brief description and monuments (selection)

Albrecht Haushofer's grave of honor

The cemetery is surrounded by a brick wall. From the entrance, the main path leads to a limestone stele designed by Karl Wenke , which is crowned by a bronze cross. Three sides of the six-sided column show reliefs with thorn tendrils and barbed wire. There are also years, a clover leaf and the symbols Alpha and Omega on the stele. There is no labeling.

The beds are planted with evergreen ground cover such as ivy and shade green. There are memorial stones for known war victims. The brick fountain gives a good impression of Alverde's planning.

The grave of honor of Albrecht Haushofer, who was murdered on April 23, 1945, is located in the cemetery . The grave is in the northeastern part of the cemetery. The plaque at the entrance to the cemetery quotes verses from Haushofer's " Moabiter Sonnets" :

“Madness alone was master in this country.
His proud run closes in the fields of corpses,
And misery, immeasurable, rises. "

Other names

Memorial plaque at the entrance: Wilsnacker Strasse cemetery for the victims of war and tyranny

The cemetery is listed under different names on the internet and in literature:

  • Ehrenfriedhof Wilsnacker Strasse
  • Cemetery opposite the district court
  • Wilsnacker Strasse cemetery
  • Wilsnacker Strasse cemetery for the victims of war and tyranny
  • War cemetery (Moabit)
  • War cemetery on Wilsnacker Strasse

See also

literature

  • Jörg Haspel, Klaus von Krosigk (Ed.): Garden monuments in Berlin, cemeteries. State Monument Office Berlin. Contributions to the preservation of monuments in Berlin 27 (2008), Michael Imhof Verlag, Petersberg, ISBN 978-3-86568-293-2
  • Bernd Hildebrandt, Ernst Haiger (Heimatverein and history workshop Tiergarten): End of the war in Tiergarten. The history of the war grave cemetery Wilsnacker Straße , Lehmanns Media 2008, ISBN 978-3-86541-312-3

Web links

Commons : Friedhof Wilsnacker Straße for the victims of war and tyranny  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ehrenfriedhof Wilsnacker Strasse. Monuments in Berlin. In: Senate Department for Urban Development and the Environment. Retrieved May 30, 2015 .
  2. ^ German digital library: Berlin, Wilsnacker Strasse. Name: Ehrenfriedhof Wilsnacker Straße. In: Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation. Retrieved May 30, 2015 .
  3. ↑ Graves of victims of war and tyranny, inventory of individual graves and collective graves. (PDF) District: Mitte. In: www.stadtentwicklung.berlin.de. Retrieved May 30, 2015 .
  4. ↑ Silke Böttcher: In the land of the Moabites. In: www.morgenpost.de. October 22, 2005, accessed May 30, 2015 .
  5. ↑ Ulrich Paul: Newton's grave: three cemeteries shortlisted. But Rainer Hildebrandt is still without a grave. In: www.berliner-zeitung.de. February 10, 2004, accessed on May 30, 2015 : “Meanwhile, it is more problematic where the founder of the Wall Museum Haus am Checkpoint Charlie, Rainer Hildebrandt, who died at the beginning of January, can be buried. Hildebrandt's wish was to be buried in the cemetery for the victims of war and tyranny on Wilsnacker Strasse in Moabit next to his friend, the resistance fighter Albrecht Haushofer. "
  6. ↑ Original name in Wikipedia
  7. ↑ War graves cemetery. In: www.openstreetmap.de. Retrieved May 30, 2015 .
  8. ^ Bittschier, Klaus: Berlin-Tiergarten, war grave cemetery Wilsnacker Straße. Online project Fallen Memorials. In: www.denkmalprojekt.org. April 10, 2007, accessed May 30, 2015 .

Coordinates: 52 ° 31 '30.9 "  N , 13 ° 21' 3.1"  E