Rosenstrasse Protest

Here a unique event in the history of the Third Reich took place: a public protest against the deportation of Jews. Initially, Jews that had ‘Aryan’ wives were kept at work in factories, safe from concentration camps. But in 1943 after the defeat at Stalingrad, the Nazis were determined to make Germany ‘Jew-free’. Making arrests all over Berlin, they transported hundreds of Jewish men who had ‘Aryan’ wives into an administrative building of the Jewish community that previously stood at this square. Soon the wives gathered in front of it, demanding the release of their husbands. They stayed here for days, even after the SS threatened to shoot. Their men were released.

The memorial by Ingeborg Hunziger celebrates the women protesters. It was put up in 1995, but approved in the last months of the GDR.

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