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The children of Bullenhuser Damm

The former school on Bullenhuser Damm in Hamburg, satellite camp of the Neuengamme concentration camp, after it was cleared in May 1945. The damage caused by a bombing raid on 27/28 July 1943 and the subsequent fire can be seen.

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Media library
  • Fig. 1: Sergio De Simone - Sergio De Simone from Naples, around 1943. Yad Vashem Photo Collections, No. 14142831
  • Fig. 2: Alexander Hornemann - Alexander Hornemann from Eindhoven, around 1942. Yad Vashem Photo Collections, No. 14262100
  • Fig. 3: Eduard Hornemann - Eduard Hornemann from Eindhoven, around 1942. Yad Vashem Photo Collections, No. 14262099
  • Fig. 4: Marek and Adam James - Marek James from Radom with his father Adam, around 1943. Yad Vashem Photo Collections, No. 14265681
  • Fig. 5: Walter Jungleib - Walter Jungleib from Hlohovec, around 1942
  • Fig. 6: Georges André Kohn - Georges André Kohn from Paris, around 1944
  • Fig. 7: Jacqueline Morgenstern - Jacqueline Morgenstern from Paris at her first communion, 1944
  • Fig. 8: The defendants - The defendants in the main Neuengamme trial in the Curiohaus in Hamburg, 1946
  • Fig. 9: Entrance to the rose garden - Entrance to the rose garden, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 10: Memorial to the murdered Soviet prisoners - Anatoli Mossitschuk: Memorial to the murdered Soviet prisoners, 1985. At the entrance to the rose garden, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 11: Rose garden - Rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg, June 2022. View onto the fence with the memorial panels dedicated to the murdered children, doctors and caretakers
  • Fig. 12: Memorial plaque - Memorial plaque and fence with the granite panels for the murdered children. Rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 13: Memorial panel for Surcis Goldinger - Memorial panel for Surcis Goldinger from Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 14: Memorial panel for Lea Klygerman - Memorial panel for Lea Klygerman from Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 15: Memorial panel for H. Wasserman - Memorial panel for H. Wasserman from Poland, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 16: Memorial panel for Marek James - Memorial panel for Marek James from Radom, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 17: Memorial panel for Roman and Eleonora Witoński - Memorial panel for Eleonora and Roman Witoński from Radom, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 18: Memorial panel for R. Zeller - Memorial panel for R. Zeller from Poland, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 19: Memorial panel for Eduard and Alexander Hornemann - Memorial panel for Eduard and Alexander Hornemann from Eindhoven, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 20: Memorial panel for Riwka Herszberg - Memorial panel for Riwka Herszberg from Zduńska Wola, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 21: Memorial panel for Georges André Kohn - Memorial panel for Georges André Kohn from Paris, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 22: Memorial panel for Jacqueline Morgenstern - Memorial panel for Jacqueline Morgenstern from Paris, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 23: Memorial panel for Ruchla Zylberberg - Memorial panel for Ruchla Zylberberg from Zawichost, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 24: Memorial panel for Eduard Reichenbaum - Memorial panel for Eduard Reichenbaum from Kattowitz/Katowice, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 25: Memorial panel for Mania Altman - Memorial panel for Mania Altman from Radom, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 26: Memorial panel for Sergio De Simone - Memorial panel for Sergio De Simone from Naples, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 27: Memorial panel for Lelka Birnbaum - Memorial panel for Lelka Birnbaum from Poland, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 28: Memorial panel for Walter Jungleib - Memorial panel for Walter Jungleib from Hlohovec, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 29: Memorial panel for Bluma Mekler - Memorial panel for Bluma Mekler from Sandomierz, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 30: Memorial panel for Marek Steinbaum - Memorial panel for Marek Steinbaum from Radom, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 31: Memorial panel for the doctor Gabriel Florence - Memorial panel for the doctor Professor Gabriel Florence from Lyon, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 32: Memorial panel for the doctor René Quenouille - Memorial panel for the doctor René Quenouille from Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 33: Memorial panel for the caretaker Dirk Deutekom - Memorial panel for the caretaker Dirk Deutekom from Amsterdam, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 34: Memorial panel for the caretaker Anton Hölzel - Memorial panel for the caretaker Anton Hölzel from Deventer, rose garden at the Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 35: Painting by Jürgen Waller, 1987 - Jürgen Waller: 21. April 1945, 5 Uhr morgens, 1987. Oil on canvas, montage, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 36: Memorial stele by Leon Mogilevski, 2000 - Leonid Mogilevski: Memorial stele for the children of Bullenhuser Damm. Roman-Zeller-Platz, Hamburg
  • Fig. 37: Former Janusz-Korczak school, Hamburg - Former Janusz-Korczak school on Bullenhuser Damm 92, Hamburg-Rothenburgsort
  • Fig. 38: Memorial panels for the former Janusz-Korczak school - Memorial panels for the Janusz-Korczak school on Bullenhuser Damm, Hamburg
  • Fig. 39: Memorial panel at the former Janusz-Korczak school - Memorial panel of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg for the former Janusz-Korczak school, Bullenhuser Damm 92, Hamburg-Rothenburgsort
  • Fig. 40: Exhibition room 1 - Exhibition room 1 with symbolic suitcases with biographies of the children, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 41: Exhibition room 1 - Exhibition room 1 with symbolic suitcases with biographies of the children, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 42: Suitcase for Riwka Herszberg - Symbolic suitcase with the biography of Riwka Herszberg from Zduńska Wola, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 43: Suitcase for Ruchla Zylberberg - Symbolic suitcase with the biography of Ruchla Zylberberg from Zawichost, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 44: Suitcase for Mania Altman - Symbolic suitcase with the biography of Mania Altman from Radom, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 45: Suitcase for Eleonora Witońska - Symbolic suitcase with the biography of Eleonora Witońska from Radom, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 46: Suitcase for Roman Witoński - Symbolic suitcase with the biography of Roman Witoński from Radom, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 47: Suitcase for Professor Gabriel Florence - Suitcase for the doctor Professor Gabriel Florence from Lyon, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 48: Exhibition room 2 - Exhibition room 2 with more in-depth materials on the biographies of the children and all aspects related to the crime, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 49: The room where the murder took place - The room where the murder took place, with a partition in which the bodies of the children lay, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
  • Fig. 50: Memorial room for the murdered victims - Inscription of 1979, Bullenhuser Damm memorial site, Hamburg
The former school on Bullenhuser Damm in Hamburg, satellite camp of the Neuengamme concentration camp, after it was cleared in May 1945.
The former school on Bullenhuser Damm in Hamburg, satellite camp of the Neuengamme concentration camp, after it was cleared in May 1945. The damage caused by a bombing raid on 27/28 July 1943 and the subsequent fire can be seen.

Thumann, who had served at the Majdanek concentration camp in 1943/44, and who was known among inmates as the “butcher of Majdanek” for his involvement in the selection, gassing, and shooting of prisoners, had only known beforehand of the planned murder of the children. After the end of the war, he was recognised by former prisoners in the town of Rendsburg, and was arrested. During the first Curiohaus trial, he was accused of the murder of 13 women and 58 men, who had been brought from the police prison at Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel to Neuengamme while the camp was being cleared.[36] No arrest warrant was issued for Dr. Kurt Heißmeyer for the human experiments that he carried out. After the war, he returned to his parents’ home in Sandersleben, to the north-east of Halle (Saale). There, he first worked in the medical practice run by his father, before setting up his own doctor’s surgery. He was arrested in Magdeburg in December 1963.

On 9 March 1946, Speck was the first to admit under oath to the British Captain H.P. Kinsleigh at the Neumünster camp that he had known of the transportation of the children from Neuengamme to Bullenhuser Damm. On the same day, Frahm admitted to Kinsleigh that the children had been murdered, although he passed on responsibility for their deaths to Trzebinski, who he claimed had killed the children by an “injection to the heart”.[37] On 18 March, the main Neuengamme trial (Neuengamme Camp Case No. 1) was opened at the Curiohaus in Rothenbaumchaussee in Hamburg. The building had formerly been used for social events and as a meeting place for the teachers’ association, and therefore had a large meeting hall. On trial were not only those responsible for the murders at Bullenhuser Damm, but also 14 members of the SS camp staff at Neuengamme, who were accused of killing and abusing citizens of Allied states. The interrogations under Freud were continued simultaneously. During the trial, the accused sat in a row, wearing signs showing a number. They included Pauly (1), Thumann (3), Dreimann (5), Speck (9) and Trzebinski (14). Their German lawyers sat in front of them, and British guards behind (Fig. 8 . ). 

Gradually, facts about what happened emerged through the interrogation protocols, the statements and confessions of the accused before the court, meaning false mutual accusations could no longer be upheld, and through witness statements. The general public in Hamburg quickly learned of the pseudo-medical experiments conducted at Neuengamme and the murders at Bullenhuser Damm via the local newspapers, including the “Hamburger Nachrichten-Blatt” published by the British military authority, the “Hamburger Freie Presse”, a liberal newspaper licensed by the British, the social democratic “Hamburger Echo” and the communist “Hamburger Volkszeitung”.[38] On 3 May 1946, all four of the accused, Pauly, Dreimann, Speck, and Trzebinski, were sentenced to death by hanging for the murders at Bullenhuser Damm. Seven other concentration camp murderers were also sentenced to death, including Thumann. On 31 May, Frahm and Jauch were charged in an ancillary trial, during which the men who had already been sentenced were required to make statements. They were also given the death penalty. All the death sentences were carried out between 8 and 11 October 1946. 

In the years after the war, Heißmeyer opened a medical practice in Magdeburg, the only private practice for the treatment of tuberculosis in the GDR. He also became director of the small, also private, Klinik des Westens. In 1959, an editorial appeared in the West German magazine “Stern” in 1959, in which the author expressed his dismay that pupils in Federal German schools were not being told about Nazi crimes. The article also named Dr. Kurt Heißmeyer as an SS doctor in connection with tuberculosis experiments. After the article was published, an umbrella organisation of former prisoners of the Neuengamme concentration camp and the Committee of Anti-Fascist Resistance Fighters of the GDR (Komitee der antifaschistischen Widerstandskämpfer der DDR) began a search for more information. In December 1964, the office of the Attorney General of the GDR ordered the arrest of Heißmeyer. In an attempt to exonerate himself, Heißmeyer brought the investigators to a box that had been buried at Hohenlychen, the contents of which included X-ray images, fever charts and photographs of the children on whom operations had been conducted. He hoped that this information would prove that he had conducted his experiments according to strict scientific and ethical standards. However, an evaluation report by the Charité hospital in Berlin indicated the Heißmeyer had inserted tuberculosis bacteria directly into the lungs of at least three children. At a hearing on 6 April 1964, Heißmeyer finally confessed that “with these experiments on the children, [I have] committed a crime against humanity”. On 21 June, before the Magdeburg district court, a trial was opened against him for “crimes against humanity”. The trial ended on 30 June 1966, when he was sentence to life imprisonment. On 29 August 1967, 14 months later, Heißmeyer died in prison of a heart attack.[39]

 

[36] See also the file on Anton Thumann from the KZ-Gedenkstätte Neuengamme at: http://media.offenes-archiv.de/ss2_1_4_bio_1969.pdf

[37] Quotes from the interrogation protocols in Schwarberg: SS-Arzt 1997 (see Bibliography), page 79–81

[38] Newspaper cuttings reproduced in: Dossier Täter vor Gericht: Die Curio-Haus-Prozesse. Presseberichte, at: http://media.offenes-archiv.de/01_gruen_presseberichte_01.04.11_klein.pdf 

[39] For detailed information on Heißmeyer, see Schwarberg: SS-Arzt 1997 (see Bibliography), page 92–110; the quote on page 98 is from the court files of the office of the Attorney General of the GDR.