Detail

The Zeithain Memorial commemorates the victims of the Wehrmacht prisoner of war camp at Zeithain, near Riesa, between 1941 and 1945. It was established for Soviet prisoners of war (POWs) from April 1941, before the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany. The first prisoners, who arrived in July 1941, were housed in the open air with no accommodation, latrines or washing facilities. A complete camp infrastructure was only gradually established.

From 1 February 1943, it served as the Zeithain Prisoner of War Reserve Hospital and developed into a central camp for injured, sick or otherwise incapacitated Soviet POWs. From October 1943, Italian, Serbian, British, French and Polish prisoners of war also arrived at the camp. Many were sent from Zeithain to the many labour detachments in Military District IV (Saxony). At the same time, prisoners who were no longer able to work returned from forced labour to the military hospital, where many died of tuberculosis.

In all, some 25,000 to 30,000 Soviet prisoners of war and more than 900 prisoners of war from other countries – including at least 874 Italians – died at Zeithain. Most of the deaths were the result of malnutrition, catastrophic hygienic conditions and the resulting infectious diseases.

The Soviet victims of the camp were buried anonymously in four cemeteries on the site of the former Zeithain military training area. On the site of the first mass graves, in the former Zeithain Russian Cemetery, is the Zeithain Ehrenhain (Grove of Honour). The current memorial, with an obelisk and an entrance gate with Soviet insignia, was built in 1949. The remaining three cemeteries for Soviet prisoners of war were also designed as memorials with obelisks. The remains in the Italian cemetery, levelled by the Soviet forces and left to decay until 1990, were exhumed in 1991 and repatriated to Italy. Today there is a monument on the site bearing the names of the victims. The remains of the Polish and Serbian prisoners were not found and exhumed until 2004.

At the instigation of the local SED leadership, a small memorial to the Zeithain camp was erected in 1985 in the former home of the cemetery gardener. Today, the history of the Zeithain POW camp is presented in a permanent exhibition in the Zeithain Documentation House and in a former camp barrack.

The memorial, funded by the Saxon Memorial Foundation, is an information and education centre as well as a contact point for relatives of former prisoners of war. Its activities include guided tours, project days and weeks, and workshops for school classes and other groups. In addition to the memorial, there is close cooperation with cultural and educational organisations in the districts of Meißen and Elbe-Elster.