Hannover (plaque, Heisterbergallee)
Historical background
On April 1, 1893, Alexander Moritz Simon founded a Jewish gardening school (Gartenbauschule Ahlem) at today’s Heisterbergallee 10 (i.e. in Ahlem). During the war, from June 30, 1942 to April 8, 1945, it housed a Gestapo prison, in which Italian, Polish and Soviet forced labourers were murdered between 1944 and 1945 (they have their memorial there). Over 2,200 people were deported from there to concentration camps. More than 250 Roma and Sinti from Hannover and its environs were imprisoned here. They were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau on February 29, 1944. On the 52nd anniversary of the deportation, a plaque dedicated to the German Sinti was unveiled. In 1995, an exhibition of the names of the victims of the Ahlem Prison was created, including Gypsy names.
Description of commemoration
Heading from the tunnel with the names of the victims of Ahlem to the memorial dedicated to the Italian, Polish and Soviet forced laborers – about halfway down, next to the path marked with a wooden rail we will find a slab made of concrete dug into the ground and surrounded by lawn, with a memorial inscription in honor of the (Deutscher) Sinti in German.
Inscriptions
Text in German:
HERR MEIN GOTT. BEI DIR SUCHE ICH / SCHUTZ! RETTE MICH VOR MEINE / VERFOLGERN, HILF MIR – SONST BEISSEN / SIE MIR WIE LÖWEN DIE KEHLE DURCH / UND NIEMAN KANN MICH IHNEN / ENTREISSEN! // JEDE MENSCHENSEELE, DIE DAS BÖSE / UNS GERAUBT HAT. SOLL FÜR UNS, DEN // NIEDERS. [Niedersächsischer] VERBANT DEUTSCHER SINTI / UNVERGESSLICH SEIN. / DURCH GOTTES GNADEN.
Translation:
O LORD my God, I take refuge in You; save me and deliver me from all my pursuers, or they will tear me apart like a lion and rip me to pieces with no one to rescue me.*
Each human soul which was stolen from us by evil will be unforgotten for us, the Association of German Sinti of Lower Saxony. Thanks to the grace of Lord.
*Ps 7, 2-3, quoted from: The Bible – the New International Version.
Date of the unveiling
February 29, 1996
Author
Dieter Gerhard (stonemason)
Initiator
Niedersächsischer Verbant Deutscher Sinti (he Association of German Sinti of Lower Saxony)
Address
Memorial Ahlem-Mahn- und Gedenkstätte Ahlem (Heisterbergallee 10), 30453 Hannover-Ahlem
– junction with Wunstorfer Landstrasse
Location
Tablica Sinti:
52°22’40.3″N 9°40’16.2″E
52.377861, 9.671167
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Materials
Puvogel, Ulrike/Stankowski, Martin: Gedenkstätten für die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus. Eine Dokumentation, 2., überarb. und erw. Auflg., Band I, Bonn 1995, S. 414-415.
Gallery
Plaque:
School:
