Hauptfriedhof Dortmund

Cemetery description

In 1921, in a separate part of the Main Cemetery in Dortmund, located in the Rennweg Street, a Jewish cemetery was established. During World War II, in this burial site were interred not only Jewish victims of the Holocaust but also 600 foreign citizens who were killed or died as prisoners, prisoners of war, or forced labourers.
Among them were 5,095 Soviets, more than 280 Poles, 106 Yugoslavs, and the citizens of many other countries. Single graves as well as memorials commemorating particular nations are scattered over this vast area. After the war, Polish displaced persons who were staying in refugee camps and were awaiting their return to their homelands or further emigration decided to create, in the Main Cemetery, a memorial site devoted to the Polish citizens who had died or had been killed in Dortmund and its surroundings and who, in the vast majority of the cases, were buried in this cemetery. The monument, built in 1946, is in the form of a long wall with the image of a Polish white eagle placed on its central part, while 10 memorial sandstones have the Polish victims’ names inscribed upon them. The memorial site, renovated in 2018, still presents itself very well.

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