Berlin Wall Escapes1961–1989

May 1962 · Window jumps · Bernauer Straße

Dieter T. and four friends fail at Ackerstraße 43

An 18-year-old who had fled once in 1961 and come back tried again with four friends from the house at Ackerstraße 43 in May 1962, and failed.

A tall white gable wall reading 'Ackerstraße' and '1961' above a large black-and-white photo of people at a low wall, with a tree-lined street and parked cars to the right.
Ackerstraße seen from Bernauer Straße in May 2015; a gable wall at the corner carries the Berlin Wall Memorial's mural of a 1961 photograph Photo: Orderinchaos. Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Dieter T. had already reached the West shortly after the Wall was built in 1961, but he went back to the GDR.

In May 1962, aged just 18, he and four friends tried to escape to West Berlin by way of the apartment building at Ackerstraße 43, on the corner of Bernauer Straße. The attempt failed.

Black-and-white photo taken over the top of a graffiti-covered wall: beyond a sanded patrol road with a small military vehicle stand a square watchtower, a fence and a long white inner wall, with a tenement block and bare trees lining a street in the distance.
The border strip at the corner of Bernauer Straße and Ackerstraße in 1989, seen over the Wall from the Bernauer Straße side Photo: Gerd Danigel, ddr-fotograf.de. Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

In July 1962 the group planned a third attempt near the Charité hospital, but the plan was discovered in advance.

Sources

Historians and memorials

Facts checked against the sources: September 2026

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Berlin Experiences, “Dieter T. and four friends fail at Ackerstraße 43”, Berlin Wall Escapes, 2026, https://berlinwallescapes.com/escapes/dieter-t-ackerstrasse-43-1962/ (accessed [date]).

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