9 June 1965 – 11 January 1966 · Over the wall
Dieter Brandes – shot at the Nordbahnhof, died months later
Eighteen-year-old Dieter Brandes was shot a few metres from the last barrier at the Nordbahnhof; paralysed, he died in hospital seven months later.
Dieter Brandes, born on 23 October 1946 in Frankfurt an der Oder, spent his first 16 years in children's homes. After a failed escape attempt in 1964 he was sent to a youth reform institution. His parents believed he wanted to reach his birth mother in Hamburg.
On 9 June 1965 he travelled to East Berlin. At about 9 p.m. he set off a signal device on the Nordbahnhof grounds. A non-commissioned officer checking the posts called on him to stop and fired a warning shot; when he kept going, the NCO opened fire. Brandes collapsed a few metres before the last obstacle.
West Berlin residents in the Ernst-Reuter-Siedlung watched guards carry him away with limbs hanging limp, and the next evening a wooden cross was put up on the Gartenstraße. In fact he had survived, with a shattered chest and a badly injured lung, and was paralysed from the waist down.
He was moved to the Berlin-Buch hospital, where doctors repeatedly declared him unfit for questioning; proceedings against him for attempted illegal departure were dropped in October 1965. He died of circulatory failure on 11 January 1966.
After his death the Stasi tried to portray him as a criminal. He was buried anonymously at the Baumschulenweg cemetery. The shooter was never identified and the investigation was closed in 1996.
Sources
- Brandes, DieterChronik der Mauer
- Dokumentation: Sie starben an der Berliner MauerDer Tagesspiegel
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