Search for the missing
GRC Tracing service, Munich
Search for the missing
The relatives of the victims searched in vain for their missing relatives for decades. However, Soviet and East German authorities either did not respond to the inquiries at all or deliberately gave the relatives false information. In other cases, the requested authorities did not have the necessary information.
If GDR citizens asked tracing services in the West for information about missing family members or acquaintances and this became known to the East German authorities, they were threatened with reprisals.
Relatives and friends often received their first clues as to the fate of the missing through statements from political prisoners who had returned from the Soviet Union. However, it was only when the archives in Eastern Europe were opened up in 1990 that the Red Cross Tracing Service in Moscow was able to provide relatives with more reliable information about the missing persons.
With the beginning of perestroika, Russian courts occasionally rehabilitated victims of Stalinism. Since October 18, 1991, it has been possible by law to have Germans murdered in Moscow rehabilitated by the military prosecutor’s office there.
Survey of returnees and relatives by the GRC Tracing Service / GRC Tracing Service, Munich
The Tracing Service of the German Red Cross
East and West German tracing services of the German Red Cross, residents’ registration or registry offices and police stations searched for the missing and made enquiries with the Red Cross in Moscow. In addition, the KgU, the East German offices of the political parties, the Investigative Committee of Liberal Lawyers and the Central Legal Protection Office of the Federal Government tried to find traces of the victims.
Work on the Central Index (ZNK) of the GRC Tracing Service / GRC Tracing Service, Munich
Index cards from the Central Index of Records (ZNK) of the GRC Tracing Service
Ingeborg Lenz, born 2.12.1927, shot 2.8.1951.
Siegfried Flack, born January 31, 1929, shot December 15, 1950.
Georg Haarmann, born 25.8.1909, shot 3.1.1953.
Ludwig Hayne, born 1.9.1931, shot 28.4.1951.
Georg Holewa, born 18.12.1921, shot 30.4.1952.
Gerhard Krüger, born 23.1.1924, shot 24.7.1951.
Johannes Manzel, born 9.9.1894, shot 5.1.1951.
Gerhard Sinnig, born 18.1.1921, shot 14.6.1951.
Emergency accommodation for GDR refugees in Berlin-Reinickendorf, 1952 / Press and Information Office of the Federal Government / Richard Perlia
“Dear Mr. President!
I apologize for bothering you with this letter. Four months ago today … my daughter Edith Bläsner … was taken away from me by the Soviet army. There was 1 officer, 1 interpreter, 1 policeman and the Russian driver … It is now my last hope to find out something about her in this way. She is accused of helping a Russian officer to escape. But that is not the case. She worked in the Special Construction Office II Potsdam, Falkensee branch … Once the officer had the camera with him … she [asked] him to take a picture of her. Because of this photograph, she is now accused of having helped the officer to escape. One thing is certain, however, if she had certainly helped him, she would certainly have gone over with him or moved out after they had fetched her the first time. But she said: “Mummy, I’m not aware of any guilt and I don’t need to go away.”
Now I can’t understand one thing, fine, may she be punished for being snapped, but why doesn’t a mother have the right to know where her daughter is? We live as free people in the D.D.R. …
Now I apologize to the President that the letter has become so long. …
Mrs. Klara Bläsner …”
[Request from Klara Bläsner, mother of Edith Bläsner, to the GDR President Wilhelm Pieck dated September 10, 1951 (excerpt) / BStU, Potsdam Branch Office].
Reception of returnees in the Friedland camp / GRC Tracing Service, Munich
GRC-Inquiry to the Moscow Red Cross about Anneliese Bunda dated February 2, 1978 with reply from Moscow dated May 7, 1979. The KGB falsified the actual date of the execution, February 14, 1952, by two years (front and back). / GRC Tracing Service, Munich
Reception of returnees in the Friedland camp / GRC Tracing Service, Munich
Reception of returnees in the Friedland camp / GRC Tracing Service, Munich
Journeyman’s certificate of Ernst Fritz Schubert, 1936.
As early as March 1958, the Red Cross in Moscow passed on the news of Ernst Fritz Schubert’s death to the GDR administration. For unknown reasons, this news was not passed on to the family. It was only from an article in “Der Spiegel” in November 1992 that his son Joachim Schubert learned of his father’s fate. The personal documents shown there, including his apprenticeship certificate, were handed over to him by the Russian secret service FSB.
Rehabilitation certificate for Gerhard Priesemann, issued by the General Prosecutor’s Office of the Russian Federation on July 20, 1992.
A public form of commemoration of the victims of Stalinism began at the end of the 1980s. Soviet authorities received requests for rehabilitation from those affected, some of which were granted. From 1991, such requests were systematically examined. Rehabilitation means that the sentence that was unjustly imposed and carried out during the Stalin era is revoked.