Travel Guide "Remembrance Connects Region Oder-Warta"

72 73 The Space of Fat e The Space of Fat e The permanent exhibition, „Willkom- men in der Heimat“ (Welcome Home), commemorates the homecoming of over 1 . 5 million people who were re- leased into freedom in Frankfurt (Oder) after coming from Soviet camps. Hornkaserne (Police Directorate East) The Second World War not only led to murder, death and destruction, but also to the resettlement of mil- lions of people due to evacuation of the German eastern territories. The vast majority of these were German Armed Forces prisoners of war, but also political prisoners from the Gulag camps and several tens of thousands of women and children who had been deported to the Soviet Union as civilians for forced labour. While the situation around war retur- nees is often associated with Konrad Adenauer‘s political commitment and the border transit camp Friedland, Frankfurt (Oder) was the actual, and between 1946 – 1950 , the only discharge location for the majority of those affected. Among other things, the exhibition provides information on transport and transport routes, the extensive infra- structure for war returnees in Frank- furt (Oder) and in Brandenburg, im- portant local personalities, and the social aspects of returning home from war. The exhibition presents personal belongings of the returnees, contem- porary photographs, posters, films, documents and memories. In its present form, it is still possible to recognise what is probably the ear- liest form of exhibition on returning from war in the territory of the former GDR . It is currently being revised and will in future be shown at a central location in Frankfurt (Oder). Near the exhibition site, on the grounds of the Nuhnen estate, there is a war ceme- tery where returning soldiers are buried. They died of disease, hunger and debilitation even before their actual discharge in Frankfurt. Address: Nuhnenstraße 40 15234 Frankfurt (Oder), Deutschland www.museum-viadrina.de/museum/ willkommen-in-der-heimat/ Open: by appointment only GPS : 52 ° 20 ‘ 33 . 9 “N 14 ° 30 ‘ 13 . 2 “E Hornkaserne i