Dignified commemoration? - Mittelbau-Dora Memorial

Military ceremony marking the tenth anniversary of the founding of the GDR at the Nordhausen cemetery of honor in October 1959. The inscription on the obelisk erected in 1946 makes no direct reference to the prisoners from the Boelcke barracks subcamp.
Photo: unknown (Stadtarchiv Nordhausen)

The cemetery of honor remained a place of remembrance after the withdrawal of the US troops. Its appearance and the manner in which those buried there were honored changed several times over the years. In 1946, the Soviet military administration had more than 200 members of the Red Army buried on the south side of the cemetery of honor. An obelisk was erected, dedicating the cemetery to “the victims of fascism 1933–1945” and thus obscuring the memory of those who died in the concentration camps. In the following decades, the commemoration of the victims of National Socialist crimes became blurred with the memorialization of soldiers and German civilians who died in the war.

Memorial stone at the Nordhausen cemetery of honor in 1987. The memorial marker, which no longer exists, did not name the prisoners from the Boelcke barracks subcamp.
Photo: unknown (Stadtarchiv Nordhausen)

Redesigns after reunification also sparked international criticism in some cases. The graves were no longer visible, and there were complaints about the unkempt appearance of the site. A new design, begun in 2023, aimed to once again make the graves visible and to make a dignified remembrance possible. The ceremonial inauguration took place on the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp in April 2025.