06/16/2017

Day of remembrance for the victims of flight and expulsion (June 20)

The “wolf children” from East Prussia must not be forgotten! Compensations for the war victims! (Date)

The "wolf children" are high-aged today and there aren't many left. Photo: Katja Wolff/GfbV

During the federal government’s commemoration of the victims of flight and expulsion next Tuesday in Berlin, the Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) will hold a vigil to draw attention to the fate of the “Wolfskinder” (“wolf children”) and children who lived in children’s homes in East Prussia after World War II. At the same time, the human rights organization will appeal to the German Minister of the Interior, Thomas de Maizière, to officially recognize the serious fate of these innocent war victims from East Prussia and to finally grant them compensation, just like other victims’ groups.

We would like to cordially invite you and your colleagues of the picture editing teams to our vigil! Germany’s forgotten “wolf children” need our help!

Ursula Dorn, a “Wolfskind” from Gleichen, Germany, will be taking part in the event too.

Tuesday, June 20, 2017 – f rom 11.30 am to 2 pm – at the corner of Unter den Linden / Hinter dem Gießhaus near the “Neue Wache” in Berlin.

The “Wolfskinder” managed to survive the horrors of the Russian occupation thanks to many coincidences, but they lost their parents through murder, rape, abduction, hunger and disease. Some of the children found shelter in Soviet children’s homes. Thousands fled to Lithuania, often hiding on freight trains, begging or working hard for something to eat. The Lithuanians accepted them, gave them new names. Many of the “Wolfskinder” forgot all about their origins, any many founded families in Lithuania. Then, the memories came back – and many of them are still tormented by memories from the past.

Flight, expulsion, and starvation have left marks – as the former Federal President Christian Wulff said about these people, who are now elderly citizens, during a speech at Bellevue castle in May 2011: “How you must have suffered, how you must have been confused by the thought that your parents had left you or weren’t alive any more. I would like to express my admiration for your courage to live, that you managed to take control of you lives in spite of the difficult and hardly imaginable conditions.”

Header Photo: Katja Wolff/GfbV