Information center for Nazi forced labor

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Forced labor barracks at Wilhelm-Raabe-Weg 23
Forced labor barracks at Wilhelm-Raabe-Weg 23
Stumbling block of the forced laborer Jan Woudstra at Wilhelm-Raabe-Weg 23

The Hamburg Information Center for Nazi Forced Labor is located on Wilhelm-Raabe-Weg in Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel . It is located on the site of a former forced labor camp and shows a permanent exhibition on forced labor in northern Hamburg from 1943–1945 in one of the remaining barracks . The information center is supported by the Willi Bredel Society .

Forced labor camp

The landscaping and horticultural company K&B applied for a permit for the so-called "Kowahl & Bruns Community Camp" in September 1942 and built three barracks near the airport to accommodate 144 foreign civilian workers and a combined washing and toilet barracks. Until 1945 the camp was occupied by forced laborers from Poland, Italy, France and the Netherlands.

The company K&B was commissioned to camouflage the airport in Hamburg, also manufactured concrete slabs for makeshift buildings and was involved in the removal of rubble. Most of the workers in the camp were employed by the company CHF-Müller / Röntgenmüller (now Philips Medizin Systeme ), at that time a supplier to the armaments industry.

One of the forced laborers, Theo Massuger from the Netherlands, later described:

“When the Germans realized that their advertising slips, with which they wanted to attract workers to Germany, were not working, they came up with something else. Without a card there was no food for my parents or the ten siblings. So I was forced to go to Germany to work. In 1943 I arrived in Hamburg and a few months later ended up in the barracks on Wilhelm-Raabe-Weg. The beds were full of bugs, the winter was cold and we had hardly any work clothes. Except on Sundays, I stood at a lathe at Röntgenmüller every day and all of that with meager food, mostly consisting of beet soup. "

- Theo Massuger

Kowahl & Bruns operated three other warehouses in Hamburg and developed into a large company for the construction and camouflage of military objects. The company had three branches in Belgium, France and the Government General and in 1944 employed over 2000 people, mostly forced laborers. The company owner Emil Bruns was sentenced to three years imprisonment in one of the Curiohaus trials after the war because he had personally mistreated female forced laborers.

Reuse

After the forced labor camp was closed in May 1945, the barracks were used as makeshift housing. In 1957 two of the three barracks and part of the wash barracks were demolished. The last barrack, originally with rooms for the camp administration, was used for residential purposes until 1997.

On April 1, 1998, the Willi-Bredel-Gesellschaft Geschichtswerkstatt e. V. the site of the forced labor camp and thus saved the last forced labor barracks in Hamburg from the planned demolition. The non-profit association Mook wat eV then secured the external structure; this work was completed in May 2000. In 2008 both buildings, including the rest of the washing and toilet barracks, were placed under monument protection (see list of cultural monuments in the Hamburg district of Hamburg-Nord ).

The Hamburg Information Center for Nazi Forced Labor was opened in the barracks in 2003 with an exhibition that was expanded in May 2005 and will be expanded further. Part of the permanent exhibition is the traveling exhibition “ My youth stayed in Hamburg - forced labor in Hamburg 1940-1945”, designed by historians at the Neuengamme Concentration Camp Memorial in 2005 .

literature

  • Uwe Leps: The forgotten camp. Forced labor in the shadow of the airport 1943 to 1945. Hamburg 2018, ISBN 978-3-00-059388-8
  • Christin Springer: Forced Labor Camp Wilhelm-Raabe-Weg 23 . In: Stattreisen Hamburg (Hrsg.): Location history region Hamburg . Cadolzburg 2004, ISBN 3-89716-520-1 , pp. 66-68

Web links

Commons : Information Center for Nazi Forced Labor  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Forced labor. Willi-Bredel-Gesellschaft, accessed on February 1, 2015 .
  2. ^ Hans-Kai Möller: The forced labor barracks in Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel - first section of a permanent exhibition opened . In: Herbert Diercks : Forced Labor and Society. Bremen 2004, ISBN 3-86108-379-5 , p. 191 ( Contributions to the history of National Socialist persecution in Northern Germany, no. 8)
  3. ↑ Hans-Kai Möller: Former forced labor camp in Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel: Presentation of a camp model in the extended permanent exhibition. In: Help or Trade? Rescue efforts for victims of Nazi persecution Bremen 2007, ISBN 978-3-86108-874-5 , pp. 180–182 (Contributions to the history of National Socialist persecution in Northern Germany, no. 10)

Coordinates: 53 ° 37 ′ 46.7 ″  N , 10 ° 0 ′ 35.4 ″  E