Sachsenhausen Oranienburg Memorial Site – in the place of horror

Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp was the first new foundation of a concentration camp after the appointment of Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler as head of the German Police in July 1936. The complex, which was designed as a concentration camp on the drawing-board by an SS architect, was supposed to give architectural expression to National Socialism’s inhuman conception of the world and to subjugate the prisoners symbolically as well to the claim for absolute power on the part of the SS. Between 1936 and 1945, more than 200,000 people were imprisoned at Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp (KZ) because of the Nazi regime of terror. Today, the town of Oranienburg, which dates back to Princess Henriette of Orania, is a place of living architectural history with concerts, theatre and cabaret performed in Brandenburg’s oldest baroque castle complex on the one hand. On the other hand, exhibitions at the Sachsenhausen Memorial Site and in historic buildings recall the history of the Sachsenhausen Nazi Concentration Camp (1936 to 1945). Authentic cell blocks, shacks and watch towers can be visited. Sachsenhausen Memorial Site and Museum considers itself to be an open “place for learning” and offers its visitors a variety of possibilities to deal with the terrible history of the place.