Ida Siekmann
Ida Siekmann ( born August 23, 1902 in Marie Werder Gorken, West Prussia; † August 22, 1961 in Berlin), a nurse, was probably the first deaths at the Berlin Wall and died only nine days after the closure of the sector boundary and the beginning of construction of the Wall.
Life
Ida Siekmann was born in Marienwerderstraße. In 1961 she lived in Bernauer Straße 48 in Berlin -Mitte. She had a sister, Martha L., who lived just a few blocks away in the western part of the city, at the Lortzingstraße. The buildings on the south side of the road belonged since 1945 to the Soviet sector, while among the road and the northern building to the French sector. By blocking the sector border, it was the residents no longer possible to go on the curb in front of their house because of these belonged to the other sector. In their house regular checks were carried out by the border police.
On August 21, the front door of the apartment building was barricaded by the GDR authorities, so as to prevent an escape from the house. Ida Siekmann threw on the morning of August 22, 1961 duvets and the like from a window on the third floor of her apartment building on the West Berlin belonging sidewalk (52 ° 32 ' 24.8 "N, 13 ° 24' 10.56 " O52. 540223413.4029327 ). So she wanted to catch her fall. A little later she jumped out the window, even before the West Berlin Fire Department was able to bring a jump cloth. Upon impact, it was seriously injured. She died on the way to hospital.
The press in West Berlin reported in detail on the incident, which caused discontent among the population. At the burial of the corpse on the municipal cemetery in the former borough of Wedding on August 29, 1961 local residents and representatives of West Berlin political participated. The coffin was decorated with flowers in the colors of West Berlin. The district taught at the crash site a a memorial. On August 23, 1962 laid there Robert F. Kennedy and Willy Brandt a wreath. The memorial was later replaced by a commemorative plaque. At the memorial for victims of the Berlin Wall is also remembers it as a photo in the " windows of memory" of the Berlin Wall Memorial. On 15 April 2010 the District Council Münster center named a street after her, the Ida Siekmann pathway.