Your expert private guide will meet you at the Brandenburg Gate and from there take you on an in-depth walking tour of Berlin during the Second World War. You will learn about the history of Germany prior to the 20th century and the backdrop to the rise of the Nazi party in the 1930s. You’ll learn of the book burnings carried out by the Nazis in 1933, the summary firing of Jewish professionals from the civil service and public life, and the rise of anti-Jewish violence, sanctioned in law, that exploded with Kristallnacht (the pogrom of the Night of Broken Glass) in 1938.
Berlin was the capital of the Nazi regime and, prior to Hitler’s rise to power, a center of Jewish life in Germany. The stops along your tour will walk and talk you through the horrendous events of the Second World War and its immediate aftermath which resulted in the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the West. The Berlin Wall came to symbolize this political and ideological divide – it was a physical symbol of the so-called “Iron Curtain” – a metaphor that became a real, 7000 km barrier made of fences, walls, and minefields and manned by watchtowers. You will walk along the former border strip and end up at the famous Checkpoint Charlie, a former border crossing for the Allies, diplomats and foreigners.
As well as the Brandenburg Gate and Checkpoint Charlie, some of the many stops, both fascinating and harrowing, include:
The Topography of Terror (from the outside): this site was the SS and Gestapo HQ – now a museum that chronicles the horrors of the Nazi regime, including the mass deportation of Jews to the death camps.
The location of Hitler’s underground bunkers, which is now a symbol of the Nazi’s demise, as the actual site has been destroyed.
The many memorials to the victims of the Nazis: The T4 memorial to the victims of euthanasia; the memorial to Homosexuals Persecuted Under Nazism; and the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, a vast field of stelae dedicated to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust. You will also visit the Soviet War Memorial in the Tiergarten, which honors Soviet soldiers who fell during the Battle of Berlin.
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 Germany has been reunified and Berlin has been rebuilt and renewed. Symbols of modernity and unity now abound throughout the city and you will get a chance to touch on these as well on this profoundly moving and fascinating tour of Berlin through the lens of the events of the Second World War.