Features
The Berlin Wall
An Excursion to Potsdam
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The Berlin Wall
On August 13, 1961, the German Democratic Republic began work on an “Anti-Fascist Protection Wall.” Relations between the
Eastern and Western sectors of Berlin had never been easy. The Soviets closed off their access routes in 1948, so supplies
had to be flown in from the West in a year-long airlift. There had been popular protests against the Soviet authorities, and
a steady exodus of East Berliners to the West. Finally the Eastern government decided to mark its boundary with bricks and
barbed wire.
The border was based on a 1920 map of Berlin, and this was the course taken by the wall, without regard for any houses, or
streets that might be in the way. The houses on Bernauer Strasse (Bernauer Street), which happened to be on the route, became
part of the barrier, and their exits were bricked up. Residents tried to jump to freedom from the upper windows; 20 people
were shot down. One border guard took the opportunity to leap over the partially built wall before it grew too high. Those
who didn't make it across were cut off from the West and from their friends and families as the 13-foot barricade took shape.
After the escape of 30 people through a tunnel from a bakery cellar in 1964, a large part of Bernauer Street was demolished,
and a No Man's Land was created, guarded by dogs and 302 watchtowers. Booby traps were sunk into the Teltow canal, at the
point where the border crossed the Spree river, after Günter Litfin was shot trying to swim his way to the West, on August
24th, 1961. As the restrictions increased, the escapes grew more daring. One steamship's crew got the captain drunk and shut
him in his cabin before sailing to the western bank. A homemade hot-air balloon was used to float over the wall. But the risks
were very high: 239 people were killed in these attempts, including 25 guards.
At 9:15 p.m. on November 9, 1989, under pressure from an increasingly impatient crowd, border guards lifted the barriers and
let Easterners cross the border freely for the first time since 1961. Fittingly, the first to cross were residents of Bernauer
Street.
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