Wehrmacht prison in Torgau

Wehrmacht prisons existed in Torgau between 1936 and 1945. During the Nazi period there were in Torgau first two of eight prisons of the Wehrmacht ( "Fort Zinna" and "bridgehead").

Today, or since the 1990s, the Torgau Documentation and Information Center (DIZ), the office of the Saxon Memorials Foundation in memory of the victims of political tyranny , provides information about the history of the Torgau detention centers during the time of National Socialism , the Soviet occupation and the GDR .

Since the central detention center Fort Zinna is used as the penal institution of the Free State of Saxony, the DIZ Torgau is not located there, but in the nearby Hartenfels Castle .

Until the end of the Second World War

Fort Zinna , a fortress , was a military prison of the Prussian army since the middle of the 19th century . After the abolition of military justice in the Weimar Republic , the prison was used for civilian purposes. It was expanded in 1936 during the armament of the Wehrmacht, making it the largest and most modern prison in the Wehrmacht .

In 1941 this institution was a stopover; many convicts, who were transported from here to punitive battalions , spent a certain time in Torgau. In 1943 the fortress became the seat of the Reich Court Martial , which had finally been relocated from Berlin via Potsdam to Torgau. From 1943 to 1945, over a thousand death sentences like in Torgau and there as elsewhere enforced .

The bridgehead was set up as a military prison just before the Second World War in 1939. It was initially subordinate to Fort Zinna, but soon gained its own prison status.

There were also two provisional military prison facilities: Feldstraflager I and Feldstraflager II .

Fort Zinna was liberated by the US 69th Infantry Division in late April 1945 .

→ cf. also: Penal Division 500

Prominent prisoners

In Torgau were some French (including Vice Admiral Hervé de Penfentenyo ((1879-1970)) and Levacher), British and US officers in captivity . The guards treated them according to the Geneva Conventions , so they did not need to work, were given regular exits from their cells and received letters and food packages via the IRK ( International Red Cross ). The officers apparently systematically used their privileges to establish contact with trustworthy German prisoners. The head of the 7th Prisoner Company in Fort Zinna, Captain Clausnitzer, was known among the prisoners for his anti-Nazi sentiments. It was not possible to escape, also because there was an outside guard of the fort led by officers who were particularly loyal to the line.

Regular Bible evenings by the prison chaplain enabled the prisoners to exchange ideas. Food and even weapons were exchanged there. The resistance fighters Werner Krauss worked for a time on the orderly room of the prison, and so came to interesting information.

In the very last hours before the Americans occupied the fort, the political prisoners persuaded their guards to flee in civilian clothes. When the US soldiers arrived there, 129 political prisoners from the ranks of the Wehrmacht were still sitting in the cells. Among them was Karlheinz Ziesemer .

Soviet special camps. Political prison system in the GDR

The Soviet occupation forces operating between September 1945 and October 1948 in Torgau, the special camp no. 8 and no. 10 Torgau . 800 internees died in Torgau, many more after their deportation to the Soviet Union.

Today the Torgau correctional facility is located in Fort Zinna , the bridgehead is a meeting place for predominantly left-wing youths and offers rehearsal rooms for local bands. The history of the place is from the Documentation and Information Center Torgau of, job Saxon Memorial Foundation in memory of the victims of political tyranny , worked up and tell; there are several places of remembrance in the city .

literature

• Michael Eberlein, Norbert Haase: Luxembourg forced recruits in the Torgau Wehrmacht prison - Fort Zinna 1943–1945 . Foundation of Saxon Memorials to Remember the Victims of Political Tyranny, Dresden 1996, ISBN 3-9805527-0-5 ( Testimonials - Paths of Sorrows 1).
• Michael Eberlein, Norbert Haase, Wolfgang Oleschinski: Torgau in the hinterland of the Second World War. Military justice, Wehrmacht prisons, Reich court martial . Series of publications by the Saxon Memorials Foundation in memory of the victims of political tyranny, Vol. 6, Leipzig 1999, ISBN 3-378-01039-8 .
• Kurt Kohlsche: “That's how it was! You didn't know that. ”Sachsenburg concentration camp 1935/36 and Wehrmacht prison Torgau-Fort Zinna 1944/45 - a prisoner's fate . Introduced and commented by Yvonne Hahn. Foundation of Saxon Memorials in Memory of the Victims of Political Tyranny, Dresden 2001, ISBN 3-9805527-6-4 ( Testimonials - Paths of suffering 7).
• Bernd Ziesemer : A private against Hitler. Looking for my father. Hoffmann and Campe, Frankfurt / Main; February 2012, ISBN 978-3-455-50254-1 .

Web links

• Documentation and Information Center (DIZ) Torgau , office of
• Saxon Memorials Foundation to commemorate the victims of political tyranny

swell

1. ↑ See DIZ Torgau: permanent exhibition , last viewed on March 1, 2012.

Coordinates: 51 ° 33 '53 "  N , 12 ° 58' 59"  E