Köln (memorial, Kennedy-Ufer)
Historical background
In the 1930s, mass meetings of National Socialists, attended by Hermann Goering, Joseph Goebbels or even Adolf Hitler, took place in the Cologne Trade Fair building complex. In the autumn of 1939, the same infrastructure began to be used as a prisoner-of-war camp, and then as a place of detention of various groups before their deportation, including to Buchenwald, but also to the East, as in the case of a group of about 1,500 Roma and Sinti from Cologne and Rhineland, who were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau during the five days of May in 1940. The last deportation that from the nearby Deutz-Tief railway station took place on October 1, 1944, and the destination place for the detainees was KL Theresienstadt (Czech Republic).
The Trade Fair building complex also accommodated a complicated network of satellite camps under KL Buchenwald.
Thousands of people lived here in inhuman conditions, divided into categories such as “professional criminals”, “political prisoners”, “homosexuals”, “Gypsies” and others. Prisoners included those persecuted because of race, faith or beliefs, German and foreign Gestapo prisoners, prisoners of war, people requiring “social rehabilitation by labour” and other forced labourers. Apart from the groups listed above, there were also prisoners of the Third SS Construction Brigade (III SS-Baubrigade), who during the day removed dead bodies from the streets and defused bombs. Looted property was also stored in the exhibition halls.
According to KuLaDig (KultbornLandschaft.Digital) – see: https://www.kuladig.de/Objektansicht/O-19831-20111107-4, until 1945 in the so-called Messelager Deutz (‘Deutz Exhibition Centre camp’) there were the following ”camps” and ”prisons” (sources of each piece of info were give in brackets):
– A camp for prisoners of war transported to Cologne – on the exhibition grounds, from autumn 1939 (Museenkoeln.de)
– Transition camp for the Sinti and Roma in exhibition halls, before deportation to Poland, May 1940 (museenkoeln.de)
– Place of deportation of Jews from Cologne and Rhineland to Poland, from October 1941 (Museenkoeln.de)
– An auxiliary prison for police and Gestapo prisoners; barracks camp in Tanzbrunnen in the amusement park, from September 1942. There was also a “labour camp” and a transit camp for Gestapo prisoners (Fings, Messelager, pp. 78-83 and 145-148, Kraus 1999, No. 103 and museenkoeln. de)
– Concentration camp – external / camp of the commandant of KL Buchenwald; barracks of the Third SS Construction Brigade in the Messeturm (tower) area on the exhibition grounds – there were 300-1000 prisoners there from September 18-21, 1942 to May 1944 (Schulte 2005, p. XXXVIII, Fings 1996, pp. 148-149, Kraus 1999, No. 191 and museenkoeln.de),
– A concentration camp outside the city of Cologne, about 50 prisoners, from August 12, 1944 to February 27, 1945 (Schulte 2005, pp. 218 and Fings 1996, pp. 149-151),
- Ostarbeiter camp (laboru camp for prisoners from the East) (Fings 1996, p. 54)
Description of commemoration
The memorial in the shape of a red brick wall, referring in shape to the style of construction of the exhibition hall located behind the memorial (currently the exhibition hall houses a complex of RTL television and others). The wall is about 2 m high and is situated on the base covered with white, granite paving stones.
The wall is covered with metal sheet, which is supposed to protect it from weather conditions. Visitors can place small stones there, a custom known from Jewish cemeteries.
In the upper left corner of the memorial (the one closer to the Rhine embankment) there is a bronze plaque with an inscription in German.
In 2014, the monument was renovated at the initiative of the president of the Cologne Trade Fair.
Inscriptions
In German:
Messegebäude, Messegelände
und der anschliessende Bereich waren während des Zweiten Weltkrieges ein zentraler Ort der nationalsozialistischen Gewaltherrschaft in Köln.
Hier befand sich eine Reihe von Lagern. Ein Aussenlager des KZ-Buchenwald, Lager für Kriegsgefangene sowie Zwangsarbeiterinnen und Zwangsarbeiter, ein Sonderlager der Gestapo für deutsche und ausländische Häftlinge. Von hier aus gingen die Transporte in die Konzentrationslager ab und 1940 wurden Sinti und Roma sowie zwischen 1941 und 1944 Juden deportiert.
Hunderte kamen in den Lagern und bei Arbeitseinsätzen ums Leben.
Tausende Männer, Frauen und Kinder wurden von hier aus in den Tod geschickt.
(Errichtet 1993)
Translation:
Exhibition buildings, market grounds and neighbouring grounds were the central place of the tyranny of the National Socialists in Cologne during World War II. A group of camps were located here: the satellite camp of the Buchenwald concentration camp, a camp for prisoners of war and forced labourers, a special Gestapo camp for German and foreign prisoners. Transports to concentration camps departed from here, from 1940 – the Sinti and Roma, from 1941 to 1944 – Jews. Hundreds of people were killed in the camps and at work. Thousands of men, women and children were sent to die from here. (Built in 1993)
Autor
Wolfgang Reuter
Date of the unveiling
January 26, 1993
Address
Kennedy Ufer (close to Messeturm – the Messe Tower, currently housing an RTL TV complex), 50679 Köln-Deutz, Germany
Location
50°56’38.8″N 6°58’10.0″E
50.944111, 6.969444
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Materials
http://gedenkorte.sintiundroma.de/index.php?ortID=47
„Messelager Deutz”. In: KuLaDig, KultbornLandschaft.Digital. URL: https://www.kuladig.de/Objektansicht/O-19831-20111107-4 (Abgerufen: 18. Januar 2018)
„Mahnmal für die Opfer des Messelagers Deutz”. In: KuLaDig, KultbornLandschaft.Digital. URL: https://www.kuladig.de/Objektansicht/O-127170-20150602-3 (Abgerufen: 18. Januar 2018)
Puvogel, Ulrike/Stankowski, Martin: Gedenkstätten für die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus. Eine Dokumentation, 2., überarb. und erw. Auflg., Band I, Bonn 1995, S. 569-570.
Gallery
