in detail
In 1938, a barrack camp close to the town of Hinzert near Hermeskeil in the Hunsrück region was created for workers on the Westwall and the Reich autobahn. The following year, the camp became a police custody and SS "re-education" camp for workers at the construction site who found disfavor with the SS. After France, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands were overrun, the camp received new duties: On July 1, 1940, the Hinzert SS Special Camp fell under the authority of the Concentration Camp Inspector and personnel was taken over by the Waffen-SS.
It is estimated that abaout 10,000 prisoners were held in the SS Special Camp/Hinzert Concentration Camp. At least 302 prisoners were murdered or died from the effects of their imprisonment. The average time spent at Hinzert was only a few months because from there it was determined whether the prisoner would be sent to another larger concentration camp. In addition to opponents of the SS regime, mainly people from Luxembourg, Poland and France were incarcerated there. However, there were also numerous prisoners from the Soviet Union, Belgium and the Netherlands. Only a few Jews and Sinti were among the prisoners in Hinzert. Some of them were murdered in the camp.
Over the years, a number of satellite camps developed in the surrounding area of Hinzert and farther away from the SS Special Camp there were a number of satellite camps in which prisoners were forced to perform extremely hard and dangerous work for industry, the army and the NSDAP. In November 1944, after the Ardenne offensive failed, the Hinzert Camp fell under the authority of the Concentration Camp Buchenwald. The camp was partially abandoned on March 3, 1945. Some of the remaining prisoners were set on forced marches to Hesse, where they were liberated near Friedberg by American soldiers in April. The prisoners that remained behind in the camp were liberated by American soldiers in mid-March 1945.
In early March 1946, the corpses of prisoners from Luxembourg which were still identifiable were exhumed and reburied together with other concentration camp victims in the city of Luxembourg on March 10, 1945. The other victims were buried at a memorial cemetery on the grounds of the former Hinzert SS camp where the memorial is now located. In 1948, the memorial chapel was erected and in the 1970s, two commemorative stones honoring the Luxembourg victims of mass shootings in the Hinzert forest were placed at the memorial by the Luxembourg "Amicale Hinzert".
Since 1989 "the Former Hinzert Concentration Camp Documentation and Encounter Site" has preserved the memory of the camp by organizing various events. Since 1991, the state of Rhineland-Pfalz has intensified the memorial work and the State Center for Political Education has taken various measures to commemorate the victims and to help educate people about the Nazi period. Joint work with organizations of former Hinzert prisoners in Luxembourg and France plays a large role in these activities and contact to other countries such as Poland and Belgium is also being established.
1939
Police custody and SS "re-education camp" for workers who found disfavor.
July 1, 1940
The Hinzert SS Special Camp falls under the jurisdiction of the Concentration Camp Inspector. The staff is taken over by the Waffen-SS.
January 19, 1945
The camp is placed under the authority of the Buchenwald Concentration Camp. On March 3, the camp is closed.
1946
Those of the dead who can be found in the mass graves in the camp`s environs, are exhumed and reburied in a memorial cemetery on the grounds of the former Hinzert Concentration Camp.
1989
The sponsor association "The Former Hinzert Concentration Camp Documentation and Encounter site" ("Dokumentations- und Begegnungsstätte ehemaliges KZ Hinzert e.V") is founded.
1991
A variety of memorial and research activities are developed by the State Center for Political Education.
1997
Development of a system of information panels in four languages by the State Office for Political Education and erected at the memorial and in the neighboring woods at the "sites of atrocities."
