75 years liberation

Commemoration 2020

Commemoration of the 75th anniversary

Due to the Corona pandemic the events planned to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the liberation had to be cancelled. However, some of the speeches were delivered as video films. Together with historical information and messages from all over the world you can find these contributions here.

THE CAMP

Situation in the camp when the British arrived

The Bergen-Belsen concentration camp was established in the spring of 1943. It was the first Nazi concentration camp to be set up solely for Jewish prisoners initially. These prisoners were to be exchanged for Germans interned abroad.

MEASURES

British measures immediately after the liberation

The British soldiers were utterly unprepared for the inferno they encountered when they entered Bergen-Belsen on 15 April 1945.

BERGEN-BELSEN MEMORIAL

The creation of the Bergen-Belsen Memorial

In October 1945, after the victims of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp had been buried in mass graves and the former prisoner huts had been burned down, the British military government instructed the German administration to redesign the site of the former camp and submit plans for a memorial.

Other Historical sites

Historical sites

Another site with a direct historical connection to Bergen-Belsen is the barracks complex (Niedersachsenkaserne) near the village of Belsen, where the Bergen-Belsen DP camp was located between 1945 and 1950.

Biographies