1/9/05
I went to the cemetery in Bechhofen and took photos. There used to be a wooden synagogue according to interior photos I found on the internet from 1938. I percieve the syagogue was burned down. There are no markers or signs to reach the location so I spent an hour with my dog hunting around. There are supposedly 8,000 Jewish people buried in the cemetary. There is no indication of any Jewish populaltion in the area at all. The cemetery is surrounded by a wall and has locks on it so one can not enter. The pics I took are over the wall, and If I can't get in officially, I'll just hop the fence and take pics of the names on the tombs that are legible. I found out that there was a DP camp in Ansbach with many Zionist children. Were their parents killed and buried in the cemetary? So many questions have come up. I am really shocked as there is complete denial in the area. There is beautiful landscape with attrocities under the surface. I am Italian/Dutch American and just moved here from Hawaii. I am a professional artist/photographer and teacher at a school in Ansbach. I hope I can find more history, as the people in the town will not even talk to me about it, though they have been very nice and cordial. I don't speak German, only a few words, but if I talk about my dog in English, they understand, but once I politely ask questions about the cemetary, they don't understand. Please send anyone my way who has any more information, as I am writing a story. I've been put in contact with a historian and I hope to meet with him in the next few months. As a literature teacher, I am also looking for selections for my high school students, fiction or nonfiction, that would be informative.
Ciao, Jo Anne Giubilato / Germany
Bedburg, #3189,
#41/189; L. Niedersachsen (British zone), 3/4 Poles, Balts
The German name of this town is Bedburg-Hau (Kreis Kleve). In Bedburg, there was a DP Transit Centre at least from August 1945 to April 1950 for DPs about to emigrate. Its Assembly Centre Number was 189 in October 1945, 41189 or 41/189 from Januay 1946 to June 1947 and 3180 from July 1947 to July 1949. The Displaced Persons Assembly Centre Staff number was 45 until June 1947, and 32 from July 1947 to April 1950. At least in autumn 1947, there existed a Brazilian Section for DPs about to emigrate to Brazil. Wolfgang Strobel, author of Post der befreiten Zwangsarbeiter - Displaced Persons Mail Paid in Deutschland 1945 - 1949.
The following is taken from forced labor in Bedburg
1.
Camp Zuckerfabrik Bedburg (French, Russian and Polish Kriegsgefangene during
the Rübenkampagne).
2. Civil workers camp in Bedburg Bez. Köln (Ukrainian for Aufräum- and Instandsetzungsarbeiten; Camp halter Adolf Müller;
Friedhofstrasse)
3. War prisoner camp in Frauweiler; later Rath (insgesamt ca. 90 Polish, Russian and French).
4. Foreigner workers camp of civilian workers, Bedburg Bez. Köln the Reichsbahn Bedburg (1943 - 1945 ca. 400 persons; workers from the East, Polish, Holländer; bewacht through Bahnschutz Düren; verteilt auf the Fabrikgebäude the Rheinischen Linoleumindustrie, der Bedburger Wollindustrie, der Gaststätte Fikentscher (Neusserstrasse), the School Kirdorf and the Barracks Camp House Nr. 67; Leiter war Reichsbahninspektor Klinkhammer and Rechnungsführer
Wilhelm Nussbaum, der near a Fliegerangriff ums survive kam.
5. OT-Lager Bedburg (approximately 2000 persons; Hollanders, French, Belgias, Italians, Ukrainians and Polish; the preference followed through the OT).
6. War prisoner camp Bedburg Broich (all together about 50 French and Polish
7. Civilian workers camps Bedburger Wollindustrie (bis zu 100 persons; vorwiegend Ukrainians. 15) Belsen (Hohne),
Jews, (British zone) - see Bergen
10/13/04
In May 1945 approximately 90 British Medical Students went to alieviate the suffering of the inmates at Belsen. I am trying to find anyone who remembers them and can tell me anything that they remember about them. Rowan MacAuslan / UK
Benefeld, #2523, L. Niedersachsen (British zone)
Bensheim site in German, Jews
Berchtesgaden, "Orlyk", Ukrainians; Visit Shevchenko Scientific Society Library for records 1945-50.
Bergen-Belsen (Hohne) (British zone), Jews, Dutch, Poles
Oct 14, 2013 Hi Olga,
Thank you very much for your assistance. I hope this story may help some your readers.
My grandmother had been very ill in hospital. The Germans told my grandfather, Jan Bernacki that she died as they brutalised him and deported him and his four children to Germany as forced workers. When the war ended they went to Bergen-Belsen DP camp, which was a complex of brick buildings that had been used by the German military during the war. There were other Catholic Polish DPs there but the large majority were Jews. Jan met Feliksa Gniot, who had been widowed during the war, and her daughter. Jan and Feliksa knew each other before the war and were from the same parish. They married at Bergen-Belsen DP camp in mid 1946 (apparently many DPs were marrying). Around that time, the Polish section of the camp was being closed down and they went to stay at Watenstedt-Salzgitter DP camp until 1949-1950. They then moved to Fallingbostel emigration processing centre and were accepted by Australia. They proceeded from Fallingbostel to Seedorf, and then to Bagnoli camp in Naples, Italy aboard the SS "Skaugum". Next, the family embarked on the SS “General Muir” [USAT General C H Muir] for Australia. They were immediately taken to Bathurst migrant camp but within a few weeks their children were dispersed to various places within the state of New South Wales for employment. Jan and Feliksa went to Villawood migrant hostel where they lived for a few years before obtaining their own home.
National Archives of Australia: http://www.naa.gov.au/
John Bernacki johnbernacki@tadaust.org.au
The personal documents of the
former residents of the Bergen-Belsen DP-Camp (also named Hohne Camp).
These documents are still in the register office
of the city hall of Bergen. If you have any questions about birth-
or death certificates or about civil mariage certificates you can write to:
Postal address (P.O. Box):
Standesamt Bergen
Postfach 1199
D-29296 Bergen
Street Address for visitors:
Standesamt Bergen
Deichend 3
D-29303 Bergen
Phone: +49 (0) 50 51
/ 479 0
Fax: +49 (0) 50 51 / 479 39
Marlene Habermann Tel
05 05 1 / 47 91 9
To find the marriage certificates at least the month and year of marriage should be known. The lady responsible for this kind of requests speaks English quite well, so there should be no difficulties in communication.
About the locaton of documents concerning the religious marriages nothing is known, I'm sorry. Schulz, Elfriede Elfriede.Schulz@stiftung-ng.de
Stadtarchivar: Kurt-Werner
Seebo Email:
Tel.:
05051/911 107
The city link : http://www.bergen-online.de
Postfach 11 05
29201 Celle
Tel: 05141/916-0
Fax: 05141/916-488
E-Mail: Info@lkcelle.de
Markt Berchtesgarden
Postfach
11 52
83461
Berchtesgaden
Angelika Brossig contributed
the following research:
Bergen-Belsen lies between three cities: Bergen, Winsen and Celle (Kreisstadt)
Home page of Bergen-Belsen: http://www.bergenbelsen.de
City
Archives : Stadtarchiv
Bergen
Am Museum 2
29303 Bergen
Homepage
of city Winsen: http://www.winsen.de/--
There is no archive but this contact is:
Christian Riech http://www.winsen.de
Rathaus Stadt Winsen (Luhe), Zimmer 2.10
Schlossplatz 1
21423 Winsen (Luhe)
Telefon: 04171 657-129
Fax: 04171 657-168
E-Mail: riech@stadt-winsen.de Homepage of the bigger "Kreisstadt
(county townCelle": http://www.landkreis-celle.de/-- there
should be archives http://www.landkreis-celle.de
contact under Kreisverwaltung - Kreisarchiv: the Kreisarchiv-archiver: Rainer.Voss@lkcelle.de
Kreisarchiv (war archives)
Street address:Landkreis
Celle
Kreisarchiv
Trift 26, Gebäude 6
D-29221 Celle Landkreis Celle
Postal address: Kreisarchiv
Postfach 1105
D-29201 Celle
Tel: 05141
/ 916 353 Fax: 05141 / 916 4
Memorial http://www.scrapbookpages.com
Bergisch Gladbach
City Archives Bergisch Gladbach - Stadtarchiv
http://www.bergischgladbach.de
Bergzabern
American POWs; DPs
in Germany; Steven
Spielberg Film Archive: Story RG-60.3572, Tape 2520
Excellent footage DPs in Bergzabern, April, 1945 See: http://resources.ushmm.org
Berka - Bad Berka (a spa town
with mineral springs
Liste der Unternehmen,
die im Nationalsozialismus von der Zwangsarbeit profitiert ... <http://www.dpcamps.org/ZA_Eng.pdf>
Gefaengnis 192 Bad Berka Bad Berka Kdo. Buchenwald 563 Bad Berka Tonndorf
Kdo. Buchenwald 222 Bad Berka, Unterkdo. von Tonndorf Buchenwald Kdo.
Buchenwald 566 Bad Bramstedt Bad
www.dpcamps.org/ZA_Eng.pdf
You may search the Buchenwald archives http://archive.org/details/Buchenwald
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_Berka
In 1945, bombing targets of the Oil Campaign of World War II were
the Bad Berka oil plant,[2] oil storage,[3] and
underground forced labor plant.[4]
Oil
Bad_Berka
Bad_Berka#cite_note-3
Forced_labor
Bad_Berka#cite_note-4
http://www.google.com
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history
Berlin (4 occupational zones: US, British, French, Russian)
History
with photos http://www.ddr-bilder.de and more photos
of east and west Berlin by Hans-Joachim Helwig-Wilson
Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin (German Historical Museum, Berlin)
Searchable
archives data bank: http://www.dh-museum.com
Berlin Airlift Humanitarian relief Operation
Chowhound / Operation Vittles
http://www.fas.org
Berlin
Archives: http://www.bgr.de
Tel.: +49 (0)30 / 369 93 119
Fax: +49 (0)30 / 369 93 300
E-mail: thorsten.bernhard@bgr.de
Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin Preussischer Kulturbesitz
Handschriftenabteilung
Potsdamer Str. 33
10785 Berlin
Tel.: 030.266 - 2841
E-mail: handschriftenabt@sbb.spk-berlin.de
Bundesarchiv Berlin
Postfach 450569
12175 Berlin
Tel.: 01888.7770-0
Fax.: 01888.7770-111
E-mail: berlin@barch.bund.de
http://www.bundesarchiv.de
Jewish Museum in Berlin
English: http://www.jmberlin.de/home_english.htm
Deutsch: http://www.jmberlin.de/tp1130111.htm
e-mail: archive@jmberlin.de
3/20/05 Hallo, liebe Olga Kaczmar,
RE: From New York Times August 14, 1947, Genf :
http://www.deutsche-zeitung.com:
(Computer
translated from German) "The UN Special Committee for Palestine returned after a seven active
inspection of DP camps in Austria, Germany and Geneva. The route led the group
to Munich, Vienna, Berlin and Hamburg. In Berlin in 13 August reports of General
Lucius D Clay, the US military governor, Clay indicated that in the numbers
of the military units in the US zones of Austria and Germany of AntiSemitism
due to the violent, antisocial and criminal behaviour of the Eastern European
DPs (which are all Jewish) strongly increases. It was recommended that these
DPs be permitted to enter Palestine, before any incident with American soldiers
(who were struck, monies robbed and killed by Jewish DPs) leads to more serious
spontaneous reactions on the part of other soldiers. Sir Brian Robertson, the
envoy of the British military governor, pflichtete its views decided." Kind
regards, freundliche Grüsse, Egon-Karl
Ullrich /Germany
We visited Berlin and saw the holocaust monument (wasn't fully complete yet - opened this past May 2005) about 3 city blocks from the Brandenburg Gate. The Reistag is right down the road from here and is where the German government is centered.
We found two document centers in Berlin. (1) many people go here - looks like its working - this is in Berlin by the Document Wall Exhibit area by the old 3rd Reich Justice building where the People's Court was centered (part of East Berlin). There are a couple of trailers on the site and still need to construct buildings. (2) The second is next to Check Point Charlie where a couple of hundred people or more passed away trying to escape the Berlin Wall or East Germany in areas outside of Berlin. What a sad place this was - as there are black crosses about eight feet high and in the center of the cross on a metal card was the person's name, if identified, where they came from and what happened. Each cross represents person who died escaping from GDR (East Germany) - looked like there were 200 of them. The document center needs contributions to build.
It was fascinating to visit Berlin, beautiful city. I hope to return and visit more. You should see how developed when there was East and West Berlin - there's 2 train stations and a 3rd is being built as none of the 2 can handle all the bullet trains effectively. In places, Berlin looks like the Bronx, NYC or cities in the Northeast USA - very spread out but not many skyscrapers like Frankfurt (has tallest buildings in Germany) that looks like Chicago.
I still think about this trip, and have a better understanding of what your family
went through. A. Sucharew. Bettenhausen (Kassel) United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration Archives Record Group: PAG 4 Box 23: Area Team: 717: Bettenhausen
UNRRA Team 717:
Y. Tabard
C. Fustier
C. Van Ackere
A. Mougnot
L. Portmann
J. Duesberg
P. Duffreysseix
A. Levert
J. Bion
M. Rots - Dr.
E. Vinot
Biberach, Jews (see e-mail & book listed under Jordanbad), Ukrainians
Biberach archives: http://www.biberach.de
Main
Building: Hauptgebäude
Rollinstrasse 9, 88400 Biberach Tel.:0 73 51 / 52-0
Fax: 0 73 51 / 525-350
Office
of Information: Amt für
Information und Kommunikation
Riedlinger Strasse 88, 88400 Biberach Tel.0 73 51 / 55-1616
Fax: 0 73 51 / 52-50016
Camp Lindele at Biberach:
Dear Ms Kaczmar,
perhaps you are interested in these pages on Lindele Camp at Biberach in which mostly
deportees form the Channel Islands were interned during WW II:
http://www.weberberg.de
Exerpts from the book on Lager Lindele:
http://www.weberberg.de
Keep up the good work! Dierk Andresen Organization: http://freemail.web.de/
UNRRA Children's Center for Orphans Biberach, Germany (French Occupation Zone).1946
Hello Olga,
My quest to find out more information about my mother and father has led me to your site on displaced persons camps in Germany. The first thing that struck me is the number of camps listed... we cannot imagine...
So I am now in need of some guidance. I have found from my mother's records that she was in a DP camp in Biberach. How can I confirm that this is the case?
What records can I search to determine that this is the case and will there be any information on how she possibly got there from Lithuania? Are there listings held in archives that could be a source for me...
Any suggestions would be most welcome...kindest regards,
Ellen Osman / Australia
Bielefeld -2 camps #32/163; (British)
City archive: Stadtarchiv BielefeldRohrteichstrasse 19
33602 Bielefeld
Tel: 05 21 - 51 24 71
Fax: 05 21 - 51 68 44
http://www.bielefeld.de/de/rv/ds_stadtverwaltung/arch/
Evangelische Kirche von Westfalen Landeskirchliches Archiv
Postfach 10 10 51
33510 Bielefeld
Phone: (0521) 594-0
Fax: (0521) 594-267
E-mail: archiv@lka.ekvw.de
Web site: http://www.archive.nrw.de
Hello:
I found your contact on the web. We are looking for information on : Franz PANTEL We presume that he died during the invasion of Russia in 1945. He was a soldier with the German army during WW2. His brother eventually settled in Bielefeld (near Dortmund) after the war. Have you any information on a list of German soldiers who were killed or went missing in Russia in 1945? Thank you in advance for your assistance. Sincerely, Richard J. Pantel
4/11/05
Dear Olga,
My mother is alive and tells me the camp was in Bielefeld. It
was a big school house with a hospital across the road. They slept in classrooms
with blankets dividing the rooms into smaller living quarters for the different
families. She says it was a beautiful place, at least on the outside. The
place looked like a park. When they were brought to Germany from Ukraine,
they were picked by a man named "Hamms" who had a furniture factory that was changed into a place where they supplied wooden crates for bombs and grenades and other such munitions for the soldiers of Hitler. She says it was near Hanover and the town was called "Banandorf,
or something like that. I have searched towns in and around Hanover and cannot
find it. I am trying to research all the things my partents have told me
and try to write a life story book for my 82 yr. old mother. It will be something
her great grandchildren can read and see where they came from. If you have
any other info on what I have asked. Please let me know. I would be very
appreciative. Thank You, Martha Bakeman
Reply: place Banandorf does not exist in Germany, so no doubt it is misspelling. I have no idea which place that could be, but I think probably today forms part of Bielefeld. I even consulted the list of street names of Bielefeld, but I don't find any that could match. Senne I and Senne II were two places and two communities, both form today part of the town of Bielefeld. Wolfgang Strobe, author of Post der befreiten Zwangsarbeiter - Displaced Persons Mail Paid in Deutschland 1945 - 1949.
Bierde (British zone)
Bissingen / Teck
Blankenfelde – Malhow 1941 – 1945 Berlin District Forced Labourers Hospital and West-to-East post-war refugees camp
Submitted by: Alan Newark Braveheart180203@hotmail.com
http://achtelpetit.de/meinleben.html (computer
translated)
On 21 April 1945 engaged the Red Army in the afternoon out of beautiful linden
tree and book coming in book wood. On the village green before the
church, former party comrades of the NSDAP had to bury the fallen Soviet
soldiers before they were tranferred later to the monument into the beautiful
woods moor. Beginning of the '40's was erected a hospital for
seriously ill Ost (East) workers on a leased field piece of the city goods
Blankenfelde.
It subdivided would suffer itself into an annexe for tuberculosis and sick with contagious illnesses and a department for normal, were however not able to work that. Then there was another department, the so-called woman barracks where predominantly pregnant women were accommodated.
While the GDR time a further lodging was operated in Blankenfelde on the territory of the Revierförsterei. It concerned a refugee camp, that fled of the golden west into the GDR. The warehouse was constructed 1958 and was operated until 1979. Preferred western defectors were accommodated here.
http://www.blankenfelde-mahlow.de
Translation from German
Foreigners hospital Mahlow 1942-1945
MUNICIPALITY Blank-Mahlow
Karl-Marx-Strasse 4
15827 Blankenfelde
Phone: 03379-333 0
Fax: 03379-333 202
E-mail: blankfeldemanagement@mahlow.de
www.blankenfelde-mahlow.de
The foreigner was hospitalized in the south of Mahlow district, in the woods near the cemetery Blankenfelde. The area is now partially forested. Landowners was and is the Berlin City of goods GmbH and a small part of the Parish Blankenfelde. On the premises are plenty of ruins of buildings. When Brandenburg State Office of Historic Monuments it is conducted in March 2007 as a memorial ground.
By August in 1942, there was a transit camp for forced labor, before it was then foreign hospital. In total there were 25 barracks. The number of beds was between 700 and 848.
"We have many bodies lying on the stretcher and carried out in the morgue need to bring. Many died, very many of them. Most were from tuberculosis, sick or injured. " Quote of Hanna Magola, Galicia (now southern Poland, western Ukraine). As a Forced Laborer she worked in the foreign hospital Mahlow, in the operating room and the kitchen, from the summer of 1942 worked until February 1945.Aerial view of 24/03/1945. On the left side of the Foreigners hospital. Aerial
view country collection
the national survey and Geobasisinformation Brandenburg
Project: Establishment of a Memory and Memorial site
Historical Background
Location
Personnel
Origin of forced labor
The municipal council Blank-Mahlow decided in November 2009, to plan and establish on the grounds of the former "foreigner hospital Mahlow" a permanent memorial The project was begun in 2010.
In the Nazi era, from 1942 to 1945 Mahlow's foreigners' hospital was a central facility responsible for all the diseased forced labor in the Berlin and Brandenburg district. The purpose of this facility was the treatment of especially the most severely diseased and disease forced laborers who had to be treated separately from the German population to treat.
1494 men, women and children died here in Mahlow, more than half of tuberculosis. They are all listed in the Sterbebücher Mahlow with the community name recorded, along with the Blank-Mahlow community's memories but the wartime people and the place of their suffering have, as far as possible, disappeared.
140 people were in hospital for operation provided; 80% of the hospital's foreign personnel were Russian [probably Ukrainian, Olga's comment] or Polish laborers working as nurses or laboratory workers.
Several Russian forced laborers acted as doctors. This means that the Hospital itself was also an establishment in which forced labor was done and, accordingly, the site was guarded and fenced. As a branch service of the Main Health Office in 28 March 1944 Mahlow's foreign hospital had the following departments: surgery, gynecology, obstetrics, Internal Diseases (adult), infectious diseases, tuberculosis department.
Of forced laborers who died there: 1050 / originated in Russia, 124 from the Ukraine and 120 from Poland. Death Books have been compiled for another 11 nations including : France, Holland, Czech Republic / Slovakia, Italy.
Bleckede (British zone)
P. Bleidorn, Ansbach, Bavaria (See Ansbach for archives)
10/11/04 Dear Olga,
Fantastic web site. I was born at Bleidorn, my mother was Latvian and my father
was a captain in the German army. Everything has been more or less hush hush
or half truths. Would there be any records of my birth and information on my
father? My name is Maris Silarajs, mother's 1st name is Elza, father's Raimonds.
Where would be the best place to start to reconfigure my past? Thank you, Maris
Silarais
4/14/08
Hello Olga,
My name is Allison Sieczka, I found your website in the hopes of finding out
more about my grandfather.
He was a displaced person. All I was told by my mother
was he was a cook for the German army while there. He passed
away when she was very young.
Please let me know if you could help me. Thank you,
Allison Sieczka asieczka@sbcglobal.net
