Skogsbrand berlin
This is surely one of the grimmest sites on this list. Many of the gravestones and mausoleums show bullet holes from the fighting in Just as today, the Martin Gropius Bau was a museum in The street it lies on however was not called Niederkirchnerstraße, but Prinz Albrecht Strasse — notorious for housing the headquarters of the Gestapo. Today, the building next to Martin Gropius Bau is gone, replaced by as the Topography of Terror exhibition, but it was clearly an important target for the invading Soviet army.
Today, the supporting columns still show clear signs of the fighting. The Red Army had to take the factory floor by floor, and even today its walls bear the marks of small arms fire, as well as mortar and artillery strikes. When we meet, in a cafe on Yorckstraße, he is able to point out evidence of lasting damage mere steps away on the nearby Yorckbrücken bridges. This enormous brick structure was defended by Anti Aircraft, Volkssturm and Police units and anti-aircraft guns were fixed to the roof.
Today, rock climbers use the pock marked walls to practice, gaining footholds in the shell scarred walls. In one of the supporting columns of the S-Bahn bridge on Leibnizstraße in Charlottenburg, there is a shell hole which has pierced entirely through the supporting beam. This AEG Allgemeine Electricitäts Gesellschaft factory was built in — but the damage you can see today comes from the 26th April when the Soviets began their assault on the factory when attempting to bypass the Humboldthain flak towers see above.
In one photo from the period, you can even see that one of the bridges has collapsed, blocking off the street entirely. Today, major damage can be seen all along the structure. These walls look as though the fighting happened yesterday.
At first, the Yorckstrasse bridges might not look like much, but these famous Berlin landmarks have stood since around Forty five distinct railway bridges once crossed here, some of which are still in use — and they bear a number of distinct marks from the warfare of When the Soviets were approaching from the east, moving up Yorckstraße from Gneisenaustraße and Neukölln, these bridges made a convenient defensive position for the retreating Germans.
The Red Army bypassed the building, and the defending forces surrendered on May 3rd. The dirty white paint job also dates from World War II, when the supports were coloured so as to be visible during the blackout. The fighting here occurred between April 30 and May 1, , when the Germans were attempting to breakout westwards towards Spandau. On the 26th April , when the Soviets were advancing from the North West, they bombarded the structure with mm Howitzers — but it managed to hold out.
Since they remain relatively untouched, cemeteries are a good place to look for war damage in Berlin — and this graveyard has a particular significance for the Nazi period. Book Direct & Save On Flexible Rates And Cancellation. At dawn on April 29th , the st Soviet Rifle Division assaulted the Gestapo Headquarters and managed to capture it after heavy fighting. The iron itself has been warped by the impact and one of the rivets has been forced out, while the wall opposite shows clear signs of battle damage too.
Berlin Blockade
Between the Olympic Stadium and Ruhleben U-Bahn station lies an area of scrubland and forest known as the Murellenschlucht und Schanzenwald. Today, this wooded area is a favourite of dog walkers, but the ridge pictured above is exactly where the young troops were strapped to three posts and executed. He even shows me a table on the side of the bridge which displays the last time they were painted.
When Peter Graham visited this site, he even found mangled bullets just below the sandy soil. This is a dramatic one. The return fire they took from the SS defenders is still visible on the side of the museum. Built with forced labour between October and April , these enormous structures were manned by Luftwaffe helpers often schoolchildren and managed to down 32 aircraft during the war. The Stadtbahn railway viaduct runs east from Friedrichstraße S-Bahn station, and formed a major defensive barrier during the fighting in The Soviet 7th corps reached this heavy stonework structure on April 30th, and they were held up for long enough that the SS Nordland Division attempted to break out north along Friedrichstasse on May 1.
At these 12 sites — all taken from the Berlin Battle Damage blog — you can still witness the scars of for yourself. The Berlin Blockade was an attempt in by the Soviet Union to limit the ability of the United States, Great Britain and France to travel to their respective sectors of the city of Berlin. The fairly unremarkable building, behind a small used car dealership on Saalestraße in Neukölln, shows clear evidence of heavy fighting.
You can even see the spiralling lines of the rifling, left by the shell as it passed through. The fighting was extremely fierce, as can be seen by these ravaged walls, where most of the damage was likely caused by small arms fire. The battle which scarred this structure took place on April 24, when the Soviet 7th Corps came up against a mixed force composed of elements of the Wehrmacht, SS, Volkssturm and Hitler Youth units.
Brand i Tyskland hotar tre byar
Berlin Battle Damage is a blog on facebook and twitter — with a website forthcoming — which seeks to document the scars this city still bears from the war. His grave no longer has any markings — but there are photos of Hitler visiting the site. On April 25th Soviet forces advanced from the south and hit the German defence line along the S-Bahn ring, where the railway embankments formed an effective barrier. The major damage you can see below was probably caused by a bomb or artillery fire.
This place was used as a training area and rifle range during the war, but it also holds the spot once known as Execution Place No 5, where any conscripts who refused to report for service, deserted or refused to fight were shot as an example and a warning to the other troops. Explore Somewhere New & Make Your Stay In Berlin Memorable With Hilton.