in detail
Between 1938 and 1945, about 132,000 women were imprisoned in the Ravensbrück Women's Concentration Camp, approximately eighty kilometres from Berlin; 90,000 of these women did not survive the camp. Approximately 900 women were deported to Ravensbrück from the Netherlands, most of them because of their resistance activities against the German occupying forces. The largest group of women from the Netherlands came from the Vught camp in September 1944 to Ravensbrück, where the living conditions were extremely bad at this time. Because of the lack of space, the women had to spend very cold nights in the open and many became sick or died as a result. In April 1945, the survivors from the Netherlands were liberated by an initiative of the Swedish Red Cross.
The monument, which was built in 1975 from a design by Joost van Santen, consists of a centrally placed metal column, which transmits light impulses and acoustic signals that are reflected by the circle of columns arranged around it.
The monument on Amsterdam's Museumplein commemorates the women who were deported to the German concentration camp of Ravensbrück. The monument was established in 1975 on the initiative of a committee of former prisoners in the Netherlands.
1944
The largest group of women from the Netherlands arrived in the Ravensbrück women’s concentration camp from the Vught transit camp (at that time Herzogenbusch).
1975
Installation of a monument on the initiative of a committee of former prisoners of the Ravensbrück concentration camp.
Fürstenberg/Havel, 1940/41, Huts of the Ravensbrück Women's Concentration Camp, Collection MGR/SBG.
Amsterdam, 25 April 2004, »Women of Ravensbrück« Memorial, Mirjam Huffener.
Amsterdam, 25. April 2004, Commemorative ceremony at the »Women of Ravensbrück« Memorial, Mirjam Huffener.
Amsterdam, 25 April 2004, Dutch former prisoners a the »Women of Ravensbrück« Memorial, Mirjam Huffener.