memorial site Torgau
judiciary injustice – Dictatorship – resistance

With its two military prisons Fort Zinna and Brückenkopf and the Reich Military Court, which was moved from Berlin to Torgau in August of 1943, Torgau became the hub of the Wehrmacht penal system during the Second World War. After the end of the war the NKVD, the Soviet secret police, established Special Camps No. 8 and No. 10 at Fort Zinna and the nearby Seydlitz Barracks. Germans were interned in Camp No. 8. German and Soviet citizens who had been convicted by Soviet military tribunals were imprisoned in Camp No. 10. The East German People's Police used the prison at Fort Zinna as a penal institution from 1950 to 1990. In the 1950s and 1960s, the facility was used especially for political prisoners. Until 1975, juvenile offenders were also imprisoned in Torgau.

The Memorial Site Torgau was established as an organisation in 1991 for the purpose of documenting the history of the Torgau prisons during National Socialism, the Soviet occupation and the period of the German Democratic Republic. Today the Memorial Site Torgau is part of the Saxon Memorial Foundation dedicated to the memory of the victims of political dictatorship.

The central prison site – Torgau-Fort Zinna – is now in use as a correctional institution of the Free State of Saxony. Therefore, the Memorial Site Torgau and its exhibition is not located there but in Hartenfels Castle.

Dear visitors,

We are delighted that our new permanent exhibition ‘Courage and Powerlessness’ will open on 23 August 2024. We want to celebrate this. There will be a varied programme of events and guided tours around the reopening. Please feel free to drop by.

We will also be offering guided tours and project days again from September 2024. Please contact us to arrange an appointment. We ask for your understanding that we will not be able to organise guided tours and project days during the closure period.
 

Memorial Site Torgau
Hartenfels Castle
Schlossstr. 27
04860 Torgau

Tel.: +49 (0) 34 21 - 71 34 68
Fax: +49 (0) 34 21 - 71 49 32
email: erinnerungsort.torgau@stsg.de