Annual memorial service

Since 1979, we have held an annual memorial service on the anniversary of the deaths of the children from Bullenhuser Damm. Every year, relatives travel to the site and experience an event that is increasingly organized by and with young people from Hamburg. With speeches, music and cultural contributions, we pay tribute to the victims: twenty Jewish children from Poland, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Slovakia, two French doctors, two Dutch nurses and at least 24 Soviet prisoners. The ceremony mainly takes place in the gymnasium of the former school building and is followed by the opportunity to lay down or plant roses in the rose garden in remembrance.

In some years, the memorial service is so well attended that it is held outside in the courtyard or at other venues in Hamburg. However, a visit to the memorial site as the place of the crime and a quiet moment in the rose garden is always important for the relatives who have traveled there.

For many years, the anniversary of the murder - April 20 - was also the day of the memorial service. Recently, this has changed: Due to the fact that the date repeatedly coincided with Shabbat or high Jewish holidays, we decided together with the relatives to then choose a different date for the official memorial service. It was particularly important to the relatives that many people should be able to attend.

In years in which the memorial service cannot take place on April 20, there will still be a small public commemoration in the rose garden on that day.

In 2020, the commemoration had to be canceled at short notice due to the coronavirus pandemic. In 2021, we held a digital commemoration.