©GARF, Moskau
The jail was completed in the summer of 1944 and had 32 narrow cells, into which were crowded eight or more inmates. In the middle of the long building were interrogation room. Here, members of the SS and Gestapo brutally tortured their victims, many of whom did not survive the ordeal.
The purpose of the jail was to break any form of resistance in the camp. In the autumn of 1944, the SS broke up multiple resistance groups and held over 300, largely Soviet, French, and German inmates, in the detention cells. Approximately 200 of them, almost exclusively Soviet citizens, were publicly hanged in the following months on the
Local GDR officials had the massive stone building demolished down to its foundations in 1952—against the protests of former inmates. In 2011 protective measures were taken by extending the walls of the foundations with concrete. Rammed concrete walls indicate the location of the former walls of the jail yard.
