Bergen-Belsen Memorial

The Bergen-Belsen Memorial in Lohheide, Lower Saxony, marks the site of a prisoner-of-war camp, a Nazi concentration camp and a postwar camp for displaced persons. It is known around the world as the place where Anne Frank and her sister Margot died in early 1945. A long modern documentation center and a quiet heathland of mass graves and memorials make it one of the most important Holocaust memorials in northern Germany.

What happened here

The German army set up a POW camp here soon after World War II began; from 1941 most inmates were Soviet prisoners, who died in huge numbers from hunger and disease; some 20,000 dead were buried in a cemetery close by. In April 1943 the SS took over part of the site, first as a camp for Jewish prisoners intended for exchange with Germans held abroad. From 1944 it became a destination for sick prisoners and evacuation transports from other camps. Massively overcrowded, the camp descended into starvation and epidemics: more than 18,000 people died in March 1945 alone. Of about 120,000 prisoners, more than 52,000 died here.

British troops reached the camp on April 15, 1945, and found over 10,000 unburied bodies. Their photographs and film footage became some of the defining images of Nazi crimes. A displaced persons camp in nearby barracks remained until 1950.

What you will see

The documentation center, opened in 2007 and nearly 200 meters long, covers the POW camp, the concentration camp and the DP camp in separate sections, with documents, objects and video interviews with survivors. Video stations have English subtitles.

Outside, almost nothing of the camp buildings survives, as the British burned the barracks to stop disease. Instead you walk across open heath to the walled mass graves, the obelisk and inscription wall from 1952, the Jewish memorial set up by survivors in 1945, the memorial stone for Anne and Margot Frank, and the House of Silence. Relief models and information panels help you locate the former camp sections.

Tickets, opening hours and tours

Admission is free (as of October 2026). The documentation center is open daily 10 am to 6 pm from April to September and 10 am to 5 pm from October to March; the grounds are always accessible. The center closes during the Lower Saxony Christmas school holidays.

On summer weekends there are open guided tours in German and English, which require registration. Group tours last 3.5 hours and are often booked far ahead. Plan two and a half to four hours for an independent visit. There is a café in the entrance area and free parking.

How to get there

Bergen-Belsen lies about 25 km north of Celle, roughly between Hanover and Hamburg. Driving is by far the easiest option: leave the A7 at Soltau-Süd (about 25 minutes to the memorial) or the A352 at Mellendorf (about 35 minutes) and follow the brown signs rather than GPS. By public transportation, take a Deutsche Bahn train to Celle, then bus 100 or 900 and change to line 110 to "Belsen, Gedenkstätte". The memorial advises against using buses on Sundays and public holidays, when service is very limited. A day trip from Hanover works well; from Hamburg or Berlin it is a long day.

Visiting with children and accessibility

The memorial does not publish a fixed minimum age, but the exhibition includes liberation photographs and the grounds are a cemetery with mass graves, which is a heavy experience for younger children. Prepare teenagers in advance. Indoor areas are step-free with elevators, wheelchairs can be borrowed for a deposit, and some outdoor paths are unpaved.

Is it worth visiting?

For anyone interested in the history of the Holocaust and World War II, yes. Bergen-Belsen tells a different story from the better-known camps near Berlin and Munich: that of exchange prisoners, of the collapse of the camp system in 1945, and of survivors rebuilding their lives in the DP camp.