Stalag IV H
The Zeithain Memorial Grove in Zeithain near Riesa commemorates the victims of the Stalag 304 (Stalag IV-H) Zeithain prisoner-of-war team camp at this location. It existed between 1941 and 1945, from 1942 as a branch camp of the Mühlberg main camp IV B with the designation Stalag IV B / Z.
history
Even before the German attack on the Soviet Union , the High Command of the Wehrmacht (OKW) decided to set up a total of 60 front stalags for Soviet prisoners of war . While these camps were to be set up in the Generalgouvernement and in the occupied Soviet territories, 14 locations were also planned within the German Reich , including the Zeithain military training area . Each of these camps should be able to accommodate up to 30,000 prisoners. In April 1941, preparations for the construction of the camp began in Zeithain. From July 1941, around 2,000 prisoners of war began building accommodation for the guards and farm buildings. Prisoner barracks did not follow until September. By the end of 1941, the number of prisoners in the camp rose to over 10,000. The camp was completed at the end of 1942. During the construction phase, around 7,000 prisoners fell victim to typhus , the catastrophic hygienic conditions and inadequate nutrition and medical care. Around 1,000 prisoners were transported to the Buchenwald concentration camp and murdered there.
Due to the increased importance of forced laborers for the German war economy, the camp was gradually converted into a military hospital for prisoners who had died or fell ill in work detachments, but the living conditions in the camp were only marginally improved. A total of around 25,000 to 30,000 Soviet and more than 900 prisoners of war from other countries died in Zeithain.
After primarily Soviet prisoners of war were initially housed in the camp, from October 1943, as a result of the Italian surrender, increasing numbers of Italian so-called military internees also reached the camp. Likewise, after the suppression of the Warsaw Uprising, around 1,400 Polish prisoners were transferred to the camp.
On April 23, 1945, the Red Army liberated the Zeithain POW camp. The Soviet military administration decided first to investigate the crimes in Zeithain and later to erect a memorial. The Zeithain honor grove and various cemeteries were built by 1949, but non-Soviet victims were not honored.
memorial
The historical processing of the camp history began in 1977. In 1984 the SED leadership decided, with the approval of the Soviet military authorities, to erect a memorial in the Zeithain cemetery / honor grove on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the end of the war . In April 1985, the first permanent exhibition was set up in the former home of the cemetery gardener, but it was exclusively dedicated to the fate of Soviet prisoners of war. Due to the deficiencies in the content, the Saxon Memorials Foundation sponsored historical research into the camp from 1995 onwards, from which a new (provisional) exhibition was created in 1999. In 1997, a separate association was founded. Since January 1, 2002, the memorial has been directly sponsored by the Saxon Memorials Foundation. Since June 2003 the memorial has a new permanent exhibition designed by the Irish architect Ruairí O'Brien . The core of the exhibition is a walk-in showcase in the original prison barracks. This glass building is a microclimatic object that separates the visitor from the original environment in terms of time and in this way absorbs him into this environment. In this way, visitors are made aware of the conditions at the whereabouts of the former prisoners, because they were exposed to the weather conditions. The exhibition builds a bridge between the present and the past and makes history tangible and tangible for visitors. The core idea in O'Brien's exhibition architecture is the pedagogical approach of discovery learning. The users should be able to control the learning speed, learning steps and depth themselves and an independent, individual learning process should be encouraged. The exhibition is an example of living monument preservation.
In addition, changing special exhibitions and educational offers for schools are offered.
literature
- Jörg Osterloh: A completely normal warehouse. The prisoner of war crew main camp 304 (IV H) Zeithain near Riesa / Sa. 1941 to 1945. 2nd edition. Kiepenheuer, Leipzig 1997, ISBN 3-378-01018-5 ( Series of publications by the Saxon Memorials Foundation in memory of the victims of political tyranny 2)
- Bert Pampel: Looking for traces and remembering. Memorial sites for the victims of political tyranny in Saxony. Kiepenheuer, Leipzig 1996, ISBN 3-378-01011-8 ( Series of publications by the Saxon Memorials Foundation in memory of the victims of political tyranny 1)
Web links
- Website of the Zeithain Memorial Grove
- “Elbradweg should go to the warehouse” , interview of the Sächsische Zeitung with new managing director Siegfried Reiprich
Notes, receipts for comments
- ^ Josefine Janert writes of 32,000 dead after consultation on site. The daily newspaper , August 14, 2013, p. 5: The camp in the Heide. The report deals with international work camps today for the maintenance of the camp and looks back from there in camp time
- ^ O'Brien, Ruairí (2005): Microarchitecture. In: Art & Architecture Journal. 02/2005, 61, 42-45.
- ^ O'Brien, Ruairí (2008): Intercultural Interpretations: Not Wasting Wasteland. In: Ricca Edmondson & Henrika Rau (Eds.): Environmental Argument and Cultural Difference. Locations, Fractures and Deliberations, 261-286.
Coordinates: 51 ° 20 ′ 51.5 ″ N , 13 ° 21 ′ 28.9 ″ E