Footsteps of WWII · Berlin & eastern Germany
Sachsenhausen Memorial and Museum
Camp memorial · Jul 1936–22 Apr 1945
The story
Built in July 1936 just north of Berlin, Sachsenhausen was laid out as a model camp, a triangle overseen from a single gatehouse, and it trained SS camp staff. More than 200,000 people passed through, including Soviet prisoners of war murdered in large numbers in 1941. Station Z, with its crematoria and later a gas chamber, was built outside the wall in 1942, and prisoners forged British and American banknotes for Operation Bernhard. In April 1945 the SS drove most prisoners out on a death march; Soviet and Polish troops freed about 3,400 left behind on 22 April. The NKVD then used the camp as Special Camp No. 7 until 1950.
What to look for
Enter through Tower A, with its 'Arbeit macht frei' gate, onto the semicircular roll-call ground. See the reconstructed barracks, the cell block, the foundations of Station Z and the 1961 East German obelisk. Exhibitions cover the camp, the Soviet special camp and the memorial.
Plan your visit
Grounds and exhibitions 8:30–18:00 (31 Mar–26 Oct), 8:30–16:30 (27 Oct–30 Mar). Free; audio guide €3.50. S1 to Oranienburg then 20 minutes' walk. Allow half a day.
Things change, so check opening times before you travel.
Nearby sites
- Reichstag, Berlin · 29 km
- Soviet War Memorial, Tiergarten · 29 km
- Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe · 29 km
- Site of the Führerbunker · 29 km
- German Resistance Memorial (Bendlerblock) · 30 km
- Topography of Terror, Berlin · 30 km
All 160 sites in Footsteps of WWII →
Footsteps of WWII: Europe 1939–1945
A free field guide for your phone: the route, the maps and the stories built in, even with no signal. The whole Second World War in Europe, from the first shots at Westerplatte on 1 September 1939 to the German surrender in May 1945: Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain, Normandy, Arnhem, Bastogne, Stalingrad, Berlin and the camps, in 15 areas from Britain to Russia.
Open the guide