Hohenschönhausen Prison

• Hohenschönhausen Prison is a German Stasi prison which is now a museum. 
• Finsished construction in 1939
• It was originally established in 1945 as a holding camp for those who would be later shipped to Soviet Camps known as Special Camp #3. 
•  1948-Labor
• More than 20,000 people 
• Not enough food
• Small and cramped areas for the amount of prisionsers
• Officail Soviet Statistics list about 900 deaths, but realisticly there were closer to 3000 in about one year
• In 1951 it became the main remand prison for the Stasi
• Contained a Hospital 

•  Under Stasi
• Contained various prisoners 
• Leaders of June 17, 1953 uprising
• Jehova's Wittenesses
• escapees - August 13, 1961
• Walter Linse
• Kidnapped in 1952 - executed in Moscow a year later
• Prisoners rarely knew why 
• Psychologically tortured - threaten them and their families and friends
• Physically tortured
• Many times were arrested and imprisoned for attempting to escape East Berlin 

• October 3, 1990 Prison was closed when the  German Democratic Republic became the Federal Republic of Germany

Prison watch tower 

Map of the Prison 

Inside the prison 

An overall look of the prison

Sources

Berlin guide. 2005. http://berlin.barwick.de/sights/east-berlin/hohenschoenhausen-memorial-center-prison-museum.html

http://en.stiftung-hsh.de/

 http://www.awayplan.com/germany/berlin/things-to-do/hohenschoenhausen-prison

Stasi - Shield and Sword

• Stasi:  It's official name in German: Ministerium für Staatsicherheit (“Ministry for State Security”) founded in 1950.  
• "secret police" of the East German Government post World War II. 
•  Its main responsibility was counter intelligence against the West by public surveillance and espionage  (such as the USA and other countries seen as a threat) (Cameron).
• Had Spies all over the Country
• Based on a model from Moscow
•  Enforce unity
• Destroy all opostion

• In 1967, Karl-Heinz Kurras shot Benno Ohnesorg, a college student, at a demonstration. 
• According to Kulish of the New York Times, Kurras lived a double life as a West Police officer, and a spy for the Stasi (Kulish 2009).  

• Erich Mielke 
• Joined communist party at the age of 15
• 1957-1989
• Positions in the GDR as well
•  Though, it seemed that there was enough evil he did as the head of Stasi, it took a 61 year old murder to put him in jail in 1992 for 6 years.  
• He died in 2000. 
• Looking at this it is shocking to see the end of this German tragedy is still remembered by many and this man's death was only 12 years ago. 

Thousands of people demonstrated against Stasi informants in the eastern German city of Leipzig on March 3, 1990.

 Erich Mielke in 1985

Stasi surveillance files.

Benno Ohnesorg being cradled by a woman after he was shot during a demonstration in West Berlin in 1967

Sources:

Schulze, Hagen. Germany: A New History. London: Harvard University Press. 1998.

Cameron, Joel D. Encyclopedia Britannica: Stasi.  http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/563751
/Stasi

Binder, David. Erich Mielke, Powerful Head of Stasi, East Germany's Vast Spy Network, Dies at 92
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/05/26/world/erich-mielke-powerful-head-of-stasi-east-germany-s-vast-spy-network-dies-at-92.html

Kulish, Nicholas. New York Times: Spy fired Shot that Changed West Germay http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/27/world/europe/27germany.html?hpw&_r=0