Marienfelde Refugee Transit Camp Memorial

The Marienfelde refugee transit camp in the south of Berlin was for decades the first stop for people fleeing from East Germany and East Berlin to the West. The foundation stone was laid on 30 July 1952, and on 14 April 1953 the first section with ten residential blocks for around 2,000 refugees was inaugurated. The camp began operating in August 1953, replacing a smaller reception centre in Charlottenburg.

On 20 September 1956 the one-millionth refugee was officially registered. After the Berlin Wall was built on 13 August 1961, the number of arrivals fell almost to zero; it rose sharply again only in 1989. In 1993 the last refugees and resettlers left the camp; it then served as a reception centre for ethnic German resettlers and, from December 2010, as transitional housing for refugees.

An association has kept the history of the site alive with an exhibition since 1993. In 1998 a commission of the German Bundestag classified it as a memorial of national significance. Since April 2005 the permanent exhibition “Flucht im geteilten Deutschland” (Escape in Divided Germany) has shown more than 900 exhibits on around 450 square metres. Today the memorial is part of the Berlin Wall Foundation.