Cottbus: A Station of Remembrance – Making Deportations and Forced Labor Visible
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A Station Becomes a Place of Remembrance
The special exhibition Cottbus: A Station of Remembrance. Deportations and Forced Labor in National Socialism reveals how closely the Cottbus station was linked to the crimes of National Socialism. The former transportation hub appears not as a neutral backdrop, but as a historical site where exclusion, deportation, political imprisonment, and forced labor interlinked.
Tracks that Tell Stories of Persecution
From Cottbus, in 1938, Jewish individuals with Polish citizenship were expelled from the city and the region to Poland. During World War II, the Deutsche Reichsbahn transported Jews to ghettos in occupied Poland and to Theresienstadt. Deportation trains from western and southern German cities, as well as from occupied Western European countries, also ran over the Cottbus tracks.
The exhibition also highlights the transport of prisoners to and from the women's penitentiary in Cottbus. This creates a multi-layered historical panorama that analyzes the infrastructure of the Reichsbahn as part of state persecution and annihilation policy.
Forced Labor as Part of Cottbus City History
Another focus is on the people who were forcibly brought to Cottbus for work during World War II. In industrial enterprises, with the Reichsbahn, in municipal facilities, on farms, and in other businesses, people from numerous European countries were forced to work. The Reichsbahn played a dual role: it transported people and simultaneously exploited their labor.
Historical documents, names, local references, and digital educational resources provide insight into the living conditions of those subjected to forced labor. In December 1944, the Cottbus city archive recorded 44 camps with a total of 5,097 people from at least 14 nations. The exhibition thus connects local research with a European history of disenfranchisement, violence, and exploitation.
Four Themes, One Impressive Exhibition
The curated presentation connects four interwoven thematic fields: the exclusion and disenfranchisement of the Jewish population, the deportation trains via Cottbus, the women's penitentiary as a site of political imprisonment, and the everyday life of forced labor in the city's businesses and institutions. Media-supported elements and historical sources aid in the broader examination of the works and open up access for different generations.
The atmosphere of the exhibition is characterized by the tension between familiar city history and shocking realization. Maps, photographs, biographical traces, and source material render abstract historical processes concrete. The aesthetic experience of this exhibition arises not through decorative staging but through a concentrated engagement with names, paths, and fates.
Cultural Memory and Cultural Education
The project was developed as part of MemoRails – Stop! Here, National Socialist History is Remembered, a program of the Foundation for Remembrance, Responsibility, and Future. Involved are the Cottbus Human Rights Center e.V. and the Cottbus Penitentiary Memorial in cooperation with exhibeo e.V., the Stolpersteine Cottbus working group, and the Municipal Collections Cottbus.
The exhibition understands historical education as a contribution to human rights, the rule of law, and social cohesion. It invites a critical questioning of local history and to consider present responsibility. For art and culture enthusiasts, a compelling artistic experience of a different kind opens up: a media-based, documentary installation, where space, image, text, and memory are connected in a responsible form of commemoration.
Conclusion: Experience History On-site
The special exhibition welcomes visitors with a precisely researched, emotionally touching, and historically founded examination of deportations and forced labor in Cottbus. Those who visit the exhibition encounter not only past events but also the traces of individuals whose names and life paths are preserved from oblivion. This artistic experience of remembrance deserves attentive examination on-site and sustainably enriches cultural education.
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- Website: https://www.menschenrechtszentrum-cottbus.de
