Closed youth work center Torgau

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Building complex of the closed youth work yard Torgau
Administration building, today a memorial
Lock area with memorial steles and cell wing

The closed Jugendwerkhof Torgau (GJWH) was a disciplinary unit in the system of special homes of youth services in the GDR . He was directly subordinate to the Ministry of Popular Education . Günther Lehmann was the head of the institution in Torgau from 1964 to 1968 and Horst Kretzschmar from 1968 to 1989.

According to an order of April 22, 1965, inmates of youth work centers and special children's homes aged 14 to 20 who "intentionally seriously and repeatedly violate the home rules" were assigned to the closed youth work yard.

history

The GJWH Torgau was opened on May 1, 1964, largely taking over the facilities of the former youth prison. The building complex was surrounded by walls around 5 meters high, which were additionally secured with barbed wire and broken glass. One of the two courtyards was equipped with a storm track. The buildings contained barred common rooms and bedrooms, production facilities, as well as detention and dark cells.

The task of the GJWH was to generate the willingness of the inmates to submit to all future measures of re-education without contradiction. The former head Horst Kretzschmar described this as “initiating a willingness to re-educate”. Military drill, a rigid system of punishment, monotonous physical work and ideological training were intended to deprive those young people of any resistance who had been noticed in the special homes through multiple outbreaks or resistance to the re-education there. As a result of the unbearable living conditions, targeted humiliation and physical abuse, there were a number of suicides and self-mutilation, the number of which has not yet been definitively determined. The State Security registered the last committed suicide on April 29, 1988. By the time it was closed on November 17, 1989, more than 4,000 young people passed through the facility, which could accommodate 40 male and 20 female inmates.

Torgau was the only closed youth work center in the GDR.

Eberhard Mannschatz was responsible for setting up the youth work center ; his portrait hangs in a room of the memorial with those of the other responsible persons: the home manager and Margot Honecker .

Historical and legal processing

In the former administration building of the GJWH there is now the memorial for the closed youth work center Torgau . The prison wing was converted into a residential complex. A permanent exhibition in the lower rooms of the memorial shows everyday life in the GJWH using documents and contemporary witness reports. It also points to the history of repressive home education in the German Democratic Republic and throughout Europe. One of the tasks of the memorial is to enable a broad exchange between those affected, many of whom suffer from post-traumatic stress disorders and physical and mental damage. The work is carried out by the initiative group Geschlossener Jugendwerkhof Torgau e. V. The association finances them with project funds that have to be applied for each year, mainly from the State of Saxony and the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and Media.

Although some studies are already available (see literature ), the scientific research of the GJWH Torgau is not yet complete.

In December 2004, the Berlin Court of Appeal declared that the consignment to the GJWH Torgau was fundamentally contrary to the rule of law. The basis for this was the similar conditions in the institution, which were not preceded by a final conviction of the inmates. Former inmates are therefore entitled to compensation. Before doing so, they have to undergo criminal rehabilitation from the responsible regional court.

According to the psychologist Beate Mitzscherlich, who examined children's homes and work yards, sexual abuse was a “normal part of home upbringing”. The home manager and a guard regularly abused the girls.

The work of the initiative group Geschlossener Jugendwerkhof Torgau eV was recognized in 2015 by Federal President Joachim Gauck by awarding the Federal Cross of Merit to the chairwoman, Gabriele Beyler, and her deputy, Bettina Klein.

Web links

Commons : Closed youth work center Torgau  - collection of pictures

literature

  • Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport of the State of Brandenburg (Ed.): Briefing to Torgau . Texts and documents on authoritarian youth welfare in the GDR, Volume 4. BasisDruck Verlag, Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-86163-089-3 .
  • Verena Zimmermann: "Creating the new person". The re-education of difficult to educate and delinquent youth in the GDR (1945–1990) . Böhlau Verlag, Cologne, Weimar, Vienna 2004, ISBN 3-412-12303-X .
  • Andreas Gatzemann: The upbringing to become a "new" person in the Torgau youth work center . LIT Verlag, Münster 2008, ISBN 978-3-8258-1599-8 . (= Der Jugendwerkhof Torgau. The end of education . LIT Verlag, Münster 2009, ISBN 978-3-8258-1996-5 .)
  • Heidemarie Puls: shadow children behind Torgau walls . Rinck Verlag, Rostock 2009, ISBN 978-3-9811262-3-5 .
  • Daniel Krausz: Jugendwerkhöfe in the GDR. The closed youth work center Torgau . Diplomica Verlag, Hamburg 2010, ISBN 978-3-8366-8617-4 .
  • Grit Poppe: Locked up . Oetinger Taschenbuch Verlag, Hamburg 2011, ISBN 978-3-8415-0056-4 .
  • Grit Poppe: Run away . Oetinger Taschenbuch Verlag, Hamburg 2015, ISBN 978-3-8415-0329-9
  • Nicole Glocke: Education behind bars. Fates in homes and youth work centers in the GDR. Mitteldeutscher Verlag, Halle 2011, ISBN 978-3-89812-782-0 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Andreas Förster: Torgau: A fascist spot . In: Berliner Zeitung . ( berliner-zeitung.de [accessed on September 9, 2018]).
  2. ↑ §2, Paragraph 3 of the order on special youth welfare homes of April 22, 1965, in: Journal of the GDR II No. 53 of May 17, 1965, p. 368.
  3. ^ Horst Kretzschmar: The development of the youth work yard Torgau and the socio-educational task (diploma thesis) ; ed. from Humboldt University, Berlin January 26, 1972, p. 21.
  4. ↑ Andreas Gatzemann: The Youth Torgau. The end of education . Lit Verlag, Münster 2009, p. 55 ff.
  5. ↑ Report from May 6, 1988: Suicide of an inmate of the closed youth work yard Torgau on April 29, 1988. In: BStU MfS HA XX No. 9205.
  6. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original dated November 7, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.horch-und-guck.info
  7. ↑ https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/inland/jugendwerkhof-torgau-stalins-vermaechtnis-im-herzen-11726015.html?printPagedArticle=true#pageIndex_0
  8. ↑ File number 5 Ws 169/04 REHA; Kammergericht Berlin, 5th Senate for Rehabilitation Matters.
  9. ↑ https://www.tagesspiegel.de/politik/sexueller-missrauch-in-der-ddr-der-schrecken-von-torgau/24073752.html
  10. ↑ https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/inland/jugendwerkhof-torgau-stalins-vermaechtnis-im-herzen-11726015.html?printPagedArticle=true#pageIndex_0
  11. ↑ Order of Merit for Beyler and Klein on the eve of German Unity Day.

Coordinates: 51 ° 33 ′ 22 "  N , 13 ° 0 ′ 32.8"  E