Wulff E. Brebeck Book order

Between Myth and Mass Murder: The First Comprehensive Museum Exhibition on the History of the SS At hardly any other place did the ideology and terror of the SS stand in such close spatial proximity: Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer-SS, planned to convert the Renaissance castle in the District of Paderborn into a meeting place for the SS. The large-scale and laborious work was carried out as of 1939 with prisoners from the Niederhagen/Wewelsburg Concentration Camp located on the town periphery. At least 1,285 people died of frailty, hunger, and violence. Local and national histories intertwine at this authentic location. Wewelsburg, for example, was the site of Himmler’s last meeting with select SS-Ober gruppenführer just days before the German military invaded the Soviet Union. The SS leaders were indoctrinated for war within the staged surroundings of a Westphalian castle. The Kreismuseum’s permanent exhibition, “Ideology and Terror of the SS,” at the “Wewelsburg 1933 – 1945 Memorial Museum” comprehensively examines the history of the SS, courageously presenting its ideology and crimes, its appearance and actuality, and its past and aftermath. Original objects from the SS realm of experience, realia from the concentration camp, and the remaining National Socialist architecture provide exceptional access to this subject matter.

With its triangular floor plan, Wewelsburg Castle occupies an extraordinary position in German architectural history. The castle, which was completed in 1609, incorporates a medieval tower structure. An inscription above the main portal indicates the intentions of its builder, Paderborn’s Prince Bishop Dietrich von Fü to assert the interests of sovereignty and realize the aims of the Counter-Reformation within his territory. The dilapidated state of the building in the 19th century inspired Schinkel’s proposal to transform Wewelsburg castle into an artificial ruin, and Annette von Droste-Hülshoff was moved to make it the subject of some of her ballads. In the Weimar Republic, the Catholic youth movement held interregional events here. In the “Third Reich”, Heinrich Himmler pursued extensive plans to convert the castle into an ideological center of the SS. 1285 prisoners of a specially established concentration camp were murdered during construction. The SS blew up the building in 1945, causing extensive damage. Today, the reconstructed Wewelsburg Castle has resumed its pre-1933 function as a youth hostel, and it is the home of the Historical Museum of the Prince Bishopric of Paderborn. The neighboring guardhouse accommodates the permanent exhibition “Wewelsburg Castle 1933 – 1945, Cult and Terror Center of the SS”, which is also a memorial for concentration camp victims. It will be reopened with a new concept in 2010.