Mass suicide in Demmin

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Memorial above mass grave in Demminer Friedhof

The mass suicide of Demmin was a mass suicide , including extended suicides from several hundred to over one thousand civilians in the Pomeranian town of Demmin between April 30 and May 4, 1945 occurred when the Red Army near the end of World War II, the place took.

description

Map of Demmin with the three bridges
Area destroyed in May 1945 (gray) in Demmin (exhibition church)

When the Red Army advanced on Demmin, the city was - apart from the inhabitants - fully occupied with refugees from Pomerania , East and West Prussia . After the Red School, which served as a military hospital, was evacuated by the Wehrmacht , soldiers, police officers and party leaders fled the city. As a rearguard , pioneers of the Wehrmacht, under the supervision of the SS , blew up the Kahlden Bridge and the Meyenkrebs Bridge over the Peene behind them. This cut off the escape route to the west. The 65th Army of Batov of the 2nd Belarusian Front advanced to Demmin from the east and south-east . On the morning of April 30, the 30th tank brigade reached the Tollensebrücke on the southern outskirts of Demmin via Vorwerk , which apparently had only been blown up that morning. They were shot at by three German tanks and an anti-aircraft position from the urban area . There was an hour-long exchange of fire. The two railway bridges of the Berlin Northern Railway over Peene and Tollense and the small bridge of the Demminer Bahnen over the Tollense were also only blown up by a rear guard of the Wehrmacht when the Red Army approached the city. The Russian tanks therefore did not initially cross the Tollense. However, their accompanying infantrymen soon managed to cross the river and advance into the city. At the same time, the 38th Panzer Brigade advanced north of the Tollense to Demmin and reached the city at around 11:00 a.m. When there was little resistance, the brigade and two infantry regiments penetrated the city around noon. At the Luisentor there was a brief exchange of fire with a group of 15 to 20 Hitler Youths . At around 3 p.m. the 38th Panzer Brigade reached the Meyenkrebs Bridge that had been blown up. In the afternoon the 30th Panzer Brigade managed to cross the Tollense over a makeshift bridge. Around 5 p.m. Demmin was taken by the Red Army. 21 Demminers killed themselves that day. Others initially hoped to get away. The first Red Army soldiers took Demmin's watches and other valuables from the residents.

“Because the Soviet units could not move on as planned, they were still in Demmin on the eve of May 1st - and now in a dangerously angry celebratory mood. 'Hundreds of soldiers swarmed out in search of watches, jewelry, schnapps, women, fun and lust and violence,' writes Huber. Houses were set on fire, large parts of the old town were soon on fire, and the screams of raped women pierced the night. The suicide wave reached its peak on May 2nd. "

- Sybille Marx : Evangelical newspaper

The exact number of suicides and children killed is unknown. An activity report published in November 1945 by the district administrator of the Demmin district named a number of 700 people who had died by suicide. In later estimates, which were based solely on impressions and hearsay, contemporary witnesses always named new and sometimes significantly higher numbers. The contemporary witness, the future pastor Norbert Buske , who in 1995 collected some of these reports in his book The End of the War in Demmin 1945 , assumes at least 1,000 suicides. The permanent exhibition in the city church of St. Bartholomaei also mentions this magnitude: “The number of dead adds up to well over a thousand.” “The Demmin Regional Museum finally came to a cautious estimate of 500 in 2013 based on the death books and records of the Demmin cemetery Deaths in the course of the mass suicide in Demmin and referred to a significant number of unreported cases. "

history

Free deaths in Demmin May 1945, foundling now in the cemetery

For months since the Nemmersdorf massacre in East Prussia, Nazi propaganda had stoked fear of the “Bolshevik beasts” and their immense brutality. General mass hysteria also spread through reports from refugees . The Red Army soldiers carried the experience of over 1000 days of fighting “in their heads and hearts” (Sybille Marx). The German Wehrmacht had waged a "race-ideological war of annihilation " ( Andreas Hillgruber ) against the civilian population in Eastern Europe .

"Every Russian who entered Demmin had cause for revenge and retribution, for feelings of hatred and triumph."

- Florian Huber

Many German women were raped . In addition, many Germans were aware of the guilt that the country had incurred. So followed "probably the largest mass suicide in German history" (NDR). People used everything that was worth killing themselves: razor blades, ropes, poison or they went - weighted down with stones - into the ice-cold water of the rivers. Their own children were also regularly killed as an extended suicide.

"I've just killed my family, now I'll kill a few Russians and then I'll die myself."

- Teacher Gerhard Moldenhauer : Gisela Zimmer, see literature

"Free deaths, lost in the meaning of life - Hundreds of known and unknown victims of the Demmin tragedy of May 1945 rest here in the mass grave and in individual graves"

- Memorial stone on the evangelical cemetery in Demmin, quote from an old Demmin teacher

Historical context

In the course of Germany's military defeat , there was a wave of suicides throughout the Reich, among which the mass suicide in Demmin is believed to be the largest. After the defeat of the German Wehrmacht in the Battle of Stalingrad in February 1943, there had already been the first large wave of suicides. The Wehrmacht alone registered over 2,000 suicides by soldiers in the following weeks. Such reports also increased among the civilian population. Official figures are not available, however, as their publication was discontinued when the war began in 1939. After the landing of the Allies in Normandy in the summer of 1944 mainly had Air Force again registered a significant increase in suicides and attempted suicides. After the Nemmersdorf massacre , which was instrumentalized in National Socialist propaganda , this expanded into an “epidemic which, starting from East Prussia, soon accompanied the entire collapse of the Third Reich .” Within a short time, the social ban on suicide expired: “The taboo had fallen. “Suicides became a“ compelling phenomenon accompanying the final battles for the Third Reich. ”The wave of suicides followed the course of the front, and sometimes preceded it. In the western parts of the country, which were captured by the American and British troops, there were no "similar rampant mass suicides" as in the areas into which the Red Army was advancing. However, the authorities in Upper Bavaria also registered a tenfold increase in suicides between April and May 1945 compared to previous years. A steep rise in the suicide rate was also noted in North Baden and Bremen in 1945.

Florian Huber sees the “suicide epidemic” as “an answer to the emotional downfall” that accompanied the collapse of National Socialism: “The wave of suicide was the extreme expression of a void of meaning and pain that people experience in the face of error, defeat, and humiliation , Loss, shame, personal suffering and rape. "

literature

  • Florian Huber : Child promise me that you will shoot yourself, The Downfall of Little People 1945 , Berlin Verlag, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-8270-1247-0 .
  • Demmin Regional Museum: The end of the war in Demmin 1945 - dealing with a difficult topic , self-published, 2013.
  • Norbert Buske : The end of the war in Demmin 1945 . Reports, reminders, documents. State Center for Political Education Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Regional studies booklets. 1st edition. Schwerin, Helms-Verlag 1995 ISBN 3-931185-04-4
  • Norbert Buske: The end of the war in Demmin 1945 . Thomas Helms Verlag, 2nd corrected edition, Schwerin 2007, ISBN 978-3-935749-95-4 .

Web links

Single receipts

  1. ↑ Foundation for Art and Science Neubrandenburg: 70 YEARS OF THE END OF THE WAR IN NEUBRANDENBURG . 1st edition. Neubrandenburg 2018, p. 11 .
  2. ↑ Elke Scherstjanoi: The capture of the city of Demmin by the Red Army on April 30, 1945. In: The end of the war in Demmin. Dealing with a Difficult Legacy. Demminer Regionalmuseum , Demmin 2013, ISBN 978-3-00-041820-4 , pp. 27-48.
  3. ↑ "The first Russian was shot at five past eleven in front of the red hospital," says the Demmin watchmaker Rolf-Dietrich Schultz. Back then, at the age of nine, he was an eyewitness from a cellar on Treptower Strasse. The gunman is evidently school teacher Gerhard Moldenhauer. The NSDAP follower had explained to a neighbor: "I have just shot my wife and children, now I want to kill a few Russians." There was also a skirmish at the Luisentor. The Russians fired tank shells at the old city gate, the last meeting point for the Hitler Youth. Then there was - at first - calm. The excesses began that evening. (Vernier, Robert: "Tragedy on the Peene", Focus (May 8, 1995) The last days of the war - Tragedy on the Peene .)
  4. ↑ There were fanatics who shot at passing Russians who had planned to do so. I take the teacher Gerhard Moldenhauer, who said to his neighbor: 'I have just killed my family, now I'll kill a few Russians and then I'll die myself.' And that's how he did it, and with this he took on a guilt that now, according to Soviet martial law, led to Demmin being released for three days for looting. Demmin has been released for looting for three days, which means we set fire to the city and we practice martial law here. (Gisela Zimmer: End of the war in Demmin, NDR broadcast, online version )
  5. ↑ Sybille Marx: When a wave of suicide swept through Germany , Evangelische Zeitung, April 29, 2015
  6. ^ Permanent exhibition The End of the War in Demmin in the Church of St. Bartholomaei
  7. ↑ Florian Huber: Child promise me that you will shoot yourself. The downfall of the little people 1945. Berlin Verlag, 4th edition 2015, p. 137.
  8. ↑ Studienrat Moldenhauer, a Nazi follower, shot his wife and three children before he fired a bazooka at the Russians and hanged himself. (Beate Lakotta, see literature)
  9. ↑ Florian Huber: Kind promise me that you will shoot yourself, The Downfall of Little People 1945 , Berlin Verlag, 2015, p. 136
  10. ↑ Florian Huber: Kind promise me that you will shoot yourself, The Downfall of Little People 1945. Berlin Verlag, 2015, p. 86.
  11. ↑ Only for 1940 are internal party figures available, according to which the number of suicides fell significantly in parallel to military victories. Florian Huber: Child promise me that you will shoot yourself, The Downfall of Little People 1945. Berlin Verlag, 2015, p. 135.
  12. ↑ Florian Huber: Kind promise me that you will shoot yourself, The downfall of the little people 1945. Berlin Verlag, 2015, pp. 86, 89f, 92.
  13. ↑ Florian Huber: Kind promise me that you will shoot yourself, The downfall of the little people 1945. Berlin Verlag, 2015, pp. 106, 111.
  14. ↑ Florian Huber: Kind promise me that you will shoot yourself, The downfall of the little people 1945. Berlin Verlag, 2015, p. 106, 253f.