Kirchberg is a low hill of
Hesse
Hesse (, , ) or Hessia (, ; german: Hessen ), officially the State of Hessen (german: links=no, Land Hessen), is a States of Germany, state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt. Two other major histor ...
,
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
.
{{coord, 49, 41, 16, N, 8, 37, 36, E, region:DE-HE_type:mountain_source:kolossus-dewiki, display=title
Site of Massacre
On 24 March 1945 - three days before American troops reached nearby
Bensheim
Bensheim () is a town in the Bergstraße district in southern Hessen, Germany. Bensheim lies on the Bergstraße and at the edge of the Odenwald mountains while at the same time having an open view over the Rhine plain. With about 40,000 inhabita ...
- twelve German and foreign prisoners, men and women, were murdered by the
Gestapo
The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe.
The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one organi ...
north of the Kirchberg summit. Among the murdered were three American paratroopers (W.H. Forman, R.T. McDonald, Ray F. Hermann). A memorial stone commemorates the act. The murdered were Rosa Bertram, Erich Salomon and Walter Hangen from Worms, Lina Bechstein from Kriegsheim, Gretel Maraldo from Offenbach am Main, Jakob Gramlich from Bonsweiher, two Frenchmen Eugene Dumas and Lothaire Delaunay, Dutchman Frederik Roolker, and three other unidentified People. Pole Johann Goral survived the shooting with serious injuries. Besides him survived Russian Alexander Romanov, as well as the four Groß-Rohrheimer citizens Heinrich Ahl, August Lautenbach, Henry Menger and Georg Ackermann. The memorial stone, which is located at the place of execution, can be reached - coming from the Brunnenweg - on a narrow steep path up to the Kirchberg.
Hills of Hesse