On Memorials to the Holocaust

What struck me the most about Berlin were the memorials. There are memorials everywhere: the Berlin Wall Memorial, Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, a memorial to all victims of war and tyranny, a memorial on the site of the massive book burning at the beginning of the Nazi regime, a memorial to fallen Soviet soldiers in World War II, and, most importantly, the Holocaust memorials. Throughout the month, I’ve made an effort to visit the Holocaust memorials in each place we went. It's interesting to see the different approaches to creating a memorial to such a horrific period of human history, and each brings out a different emotion. I'd like to use this post as a chance to discuss the various memorials I saw throughout the month.

The first memorial I visited was in Prague. The main Holocaust memorial is located within the Jewish Quarter in the first synagogue you can enter after you purchase a ticket. The walls of the synagogue are filled with the names of every Jewish Czechoslovakian that was murdered in the Holocaust. There were hundreds of thousands of names, listed one right after another, filling each wall of the synagogue. Six million, the total number of Jews murdered in the Holocaust. is a hard number to fully grasp, but when a portion of those names are listed out in front of you the weight of the loss of life begins to hit hard. Around 263,000 Jews who had resided in the territory of the Czechoslovak Republic were murdered in the Holocaust.

 

In Leipzig, the Holocaust memorial stands on the foundations of the synagogue that was destroyed during Kristallnacht on November 9-10, 1938. There are around one hundred metal chairs set up as they would be if the synagogue was still standing. Perhaps the empty chairs are representative of the murdered Jews who used to sit in that exact spot before the synagogue was destroyed, or perhaps, as Ashley suggested, the chairs are waiting to be filled again. It’s an interesting duality to consider: the memorial serves both as a way to remember the horrible things that happened there in the past as well as a suggestion of hope for the future. Almost all of the Jewish population in Leipzig, over 11,000 people, were murdered in the Holocaust.

As is to be expected, there are many Holocaust memorials in Berlin. Near the Brandenburg Gate and the eastern entrance to Tiergarten Park is a collection of memorials to the various groups persecuted in the Holocaust. I only found a small part of the memorial to the Roma and the Sinti peoples, but this part of the memorial includes two quotes from a former chancellor and former president calling the persecution an act of genocide. The memorial to the victims of the euthanasia program stands just outside the Berlin Philharmonic concert hall. It consists two large steel structures that form a sort of echo tunnel. As you walk through, the send of your own footsteps echoes almost overwhelmingly loudly in your ears. The memorial to the LGBTQ victims is a large concrete rock with a window that shows a TV screen. The screen shows scenes of gay and lesbian lovers kissing in public. The final memorial in this collection is the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. There are 2,711 concrete slabs of varying heights laid out in straight lines along uneven ground. Each of these memorials requires interaction. With regards to the Jewish memorial, our tour guide told us that the memorial is not complete until you are standing within it. I feel like the same is true for all of them. You gain the full experience when you walk through the echo tunnel, watch the screen in the LGBTQ memorial, and walk among the stones in the Jewish memorial.

Memorial to the Roma and the Sinti

Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe

Memorial to the victims of the Euthanasia Program

Memorial to LGBTQ victims

Memorial to LGBTQ victims

We also went to Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, now a memorial and museum, while we were in Berlin. Though its now been a few weeks since we were there, I still don’t quite have the words to describe it. It was a tremendously moving experience, and one I don’t think I can forget.

The memorial in Wittenburg had the strongest imagery of all those that I saw. Located directly under an offensive, anti-Semitic carving on the Stadtkirche, this memorial is a small, bronze square with something coming up at the cracks. At first glance, I was confused as to what it was supposed to represent, but our guide explained that it represents human flesh seeping up from under the ground, suggesting that what happened can not be ignored or swept under the rug, nor can the fact that writings by Luther were used as justification for anti-Semitic actions during the Nazi regime. 

There is not a large memorial to the Holocaust in Salzburg. There are, however, small gold squares on the streets marking where Jewish people once lived before they were deported. Though a smaller memorial compared to otheres, seeing these markers really struck me, perhaps because of how personal they are. Each marker details the persons name, when they were arrested, when they were deported, where they were deported to, and when and where they died.

I think that a critical piece of remembering the Holocaust is witnessing the places in which it took place. In bearing witness to the sites of such misery, we try to remember it in as much an entirety as we can. Remembrance is the first step towards creating a world in which acts of extreme persecution and genocide cease to exist.