But who were all these people – and how did they end up as occupiers in a foreign land?
The comments expresses the writer’s opinions.
Kristian Ilner (48) is a civil lawyer, advisor in the Fellesforbundet and in his spare time he likes to write books. In «From Heroism to Reconciliation. The German soldiers on Alfaset », he addresses ten of the Germans on Alfaset – and asks himself what kind of people they really were.
Many died – great need
We must first rewind the tape back to 1940, when German forces on 9 April attacked Norway. In Drøbaksundet, the huge warship “Blücher” was sunk by Norwegian torpedoes – and, of course, the legendary cannons at Oscarsborg. In the new book, the author assumes that 830 soldiers were among the many dead.
During the ensuing fighting of the following weeks, a few hundred more Germans were killed.
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Death cult
Those killed from Blücher were picked up by the sea or they drifted ashore. Some of the fallen received temporary graves at the site. Others were laid to rest in local cemeteries. But – with the Nazi death cult and the worship of fallen heroes – the occupiers needed a large area for a solid honorary cemetery.
Already a few days after the march, the German officers marched up to Oslo municipality to “ask” for a suitable area. And they had obviously decided in advance – so there was no question of accepting anything other than 950 goals at Ekeberg.
Efforts to turn the park into a warriors’ burial ground were rapid. A platform was built with huge stairwells. On top hung the swastika eagle and a cross.
Constant salutes
People in the area quickly became accustomed to the crowds of uniformed people flocking to and from – some to attend funerals, others to visit graves.
The bangs from the German rifles that were fired in honor of a deceased person – or in connection with the celebration of anniversaries and holidays – rumbled between the house walls and were at times a real nuisance.
A couple of years after the end of the war, the facility at Ekeberg was maintained by German prisoners of war. But it was always clear that the graves had to go. The occupiers had looted large parts of the district’s finest outdoor area – with beautiful views of the fjord and the entrance.
So this thorn in the eye had to go. And in the autumn of 1952, work began on digging up the dead again.
To Alfaset
Their last – and final – resting place was to be a remote plot on Alfaset. From lying in single graves with wooden crosses, pitched roofs and the name burned in with Gothic letters, the dead now came in graves with up to six in each.
The names were engraved on granite crosses, with the date of birth and death of the dead, as well as military rank and – in some cases – also civil title.
Suicides or soldiers who were executed by their own were not considered “worthy” of a place on the “Kriegerfriedhof Ekeberg”, so a whole series of such graves were also moved from local cemeteries throughout Eastern Norway.
The Gestapo, who were sentenced to death and executed, eventually came to the land on Alfaset.
Also read: An SS guard in the “Norwegian” concentration camp Sachsenhausen
German organization
The work was completed in 1954. Eventually, the burial ground became part of the larger municipal cemetery that arose. The Ministry of Culture handles contact with the semi-official organization that takes care of German war graves across most of Europe – and pays for Oslo municipality’s care and maintenance.
During the tourist season, Germans – of all ages – occasionally show up and go. Some will see the grave of a brother, father, grandfather in a distant land. Others come out of sheer curiosity.
In German
Kristian Ilner also became curious about the stories of fate that hide behind each of the 3000 names that are embossed on the wall in a common monument of stone. So he picked out the names of nine men and one woman, and then he started sniffing.
A few years of study in Germany came in handy when he started writing for municipalities and historical archives around the entire Federal Republic.
Eventually the answers came – from a mayor here, a local historian there, an archivist.
Also read: The hunt for Nazi elders
The letters from Germany were often discouraging reading for a hopeful writer in Norway. Many of his appointees had left few traces in this Jammerdal. Elsewhere, Ilner managed to make contact with descendants or distant relatives – people who could tell a little. And who were often also curious about what the Norwegian could tell about the relative who 80 years ago lost his life – and was buried – in a foreign country.
A painter’s friend
The painter’s friend Adam Rutkowski was – for example – 29 years old and had a wife and children at home in Holzmarkstrasse 2 in Berlin. On April 9, he was on board the Blücher, and became one of those who later floated drowned ashore. If he even knew where Norway was, let alone had his own opinion about the attack of which he was now a part – we will probably never know.
Rutkowski was simply one of those little people who had no choice but to pull on the uniform of “people, leader and fatherland.”
He was perhaps an enthusiastic Nazi who wanted to take part in the fulfillment of Hitler’s dream of an entire continent under the sign of the swastika.
But it is quite possible that he was completely indifferent to politics, and most of all would have been at home with his wife and daughters in their small home right by the Jannowitzbrücke in Berlin-Friedrichshain.
Erna
It is also not good to know how Erna Voigt (1916-1944) ended up in Norway during the war, but it was probably a desire for adventure that made her sign up to become a secretary in a staff office – with the opportunity to live abroad and experience a couple of adventures.
She died on New Year’s Eve 1944, which may lead the mind in the direction of the British air strike on the Gestapo headquarters on Victoria Terrace.
Kristian Ilner does not know if she became one of the bomb victims when the tram on Drammensveien was hit with both Norwegian and German fatalities. It is also conceivable that Erna had simply contracted a fatal disease. We will never know this either, because her name was such that there are 13 of them in the dozen.
Read more comments from Asbjørn Svarstad
Crete and Pleti
Some of the dead on Alfaset came from large industrial cities, others from settlements far away from popular custom. Some were Catholics from the south and west of their homeland, while others were strict Protestants. Some conservatives, others radicals – without talking openly about sympathy with the Communists or the Social Democrats.
Some were ardent Nazis and conscientious militarists who did not mind being warriors, far from home, in a daily life of speed and drama.
But very many of Hitler’s 350,000 men – and a few thousand women – hated this existence. It could also be life-threatening, even though service in Norway was far preferable to ending up on one front or another. Sabotage and / or bombs could cause trains to derail, planes to fall, transport ships to sink.
Beautiful Norway
Kristian Ilner puts it this way:
“Many of those who served in Norway probably felt that they were lucky to come to a relatively peaceful and scenic country. Most of the soldiers stationed in Norway survived. For some, the time in Norway was a happy time with a sense of community with fellow soldiers, where the uniform erased class divisions and brought together the cross-section of German men into something common. Many Norwegians developed a pragmatic and well-functioning relationship with this enemy, and some of the soldiers found lasting love with Norwegian women. ”
The total casualty figures are a bit unclear, but it is at least clear that 11,500 German soldiers are buried in Norway – divided between Solheim in Bergen, Havstein in Trondheim, Botn in Saltdal and the central war cemetery in Narvik.
Antifascists
I have often felt the same curiosity that Kristian Ilner describes in his book, during visits to Alfaset or – for that matter – similar facilities around the whole of Europe.
Here and there is also the name of the occasional grotesque mass murderer – always without an SS degree – but often with a bland police title. Only the date of death gives an indication that the person in question was convicted and executed by the legal Norwegian authorities after the war.
But on Alfaset there are also German anti-fascists who were killed because they had rebelled against the Nazi despots. Some even because they had collaborated with Norwegian resistance fighters. The last group has also been forgotten – so on Alfaset you can say that everyone has become equal.
Read more from the Norwegian debate
Statues of women
The author draws the long lines in recent German history, and is keen to explain that new generations of Germans have actually done more than most to work up the gloomy history. A few generations after Hitler, the reunited Germany appears as something close to European model democracy.
In 2013, the original cemetery at Ekeberg was converted into a “sculpture park” by the Oslo man Christian Ringnes.
Nowadays, there are female bodies in all varieties that characterize the area. But also one of the stairwells from that time has been restored – so that it is now possible to get an impression of how gigantic it all was.
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