Oberer Kuhberg concentration camp was a

concentration camp Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simply ...

built and operated by

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

on the site of Fort Oberer Kuhberg.

History as a fort

Fort Oberer Kuhberg was built from 1848 to 1857 as part of the

Fortress of Ulm The fortress of Ulm (''Bundesfestung Ulm'') was one of five federal fortresses of the German Confederation around the cities of Ulm and Neu-Ulm. With its 9 km polygonal main circumvallation Ulm had the biggest fortress in Germany in the 19th ...

. It was used until the 20th century and is one of the biggest forts in Europe. It was fit to hold 5,000 soldiers in peacetime, and up to 20,000 in wartime. It happens to contains the

Ulm Minster Ulm Minster (german: Ulmer Münster) is a Lutheran church located in Ulm, State of Baden-Württemberg (Germany). It is currently the tallest church in the world. The church is the fifth-tallest structure built before the 20th century, with a ...

, the tallest church in the world.

History as a concentration camp

It was repurposed as a concentration camp for political dissidents from November 1933 to July 1935. It held more than 600 political prisoners during this time. The purpose of the camp was to intimidate those who opposed the Nazi regime. One notable prisoner was

Kurt Schumacher Curt Ernst Carl Schumacher, better known as Kurt Schumacher (13 October 1895 – 20 August 1952), was a German politician who became chairman of the Social Democratic Party of Germany from 1946 and the first Leader of the Opposition in the West ...

, a politician who became the leader of the

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties For ...

from May 1946 to August 1952. Today, Oberer Kuhberg lives on as a museum. It is mostly intact, and many parts of the former camp are open to visitors. File:Ulm-Oberer_Kuhberg-2008-04-26-13.jpg, Fairground File:Ulm-Oberer_Kuhberg-2008-04-26-04.jpg, Reduit File:Ulm-Oberer_Kuhberg-2008-04-26-38.jpg, Example of a cell File:Ulm-Oberer_Kuhberg-2008-04-26-39.jpg, Replica of prisoner's beds

References

{{Authority control Nazi concentration camps Historic sites in Germany