Our weekly email is chockful of interesting and relevant insights into Jewish history There is no gentle way to tell the story of what happened during World War II in this small Bavarian town those terrible sounds are what people here recall most vividly from 60 years ago perhaps because what they heard has never really gone away The people of this beautiful and ugly town who were here during the final days of World War II still hear the sobbing the cries of skeletal men one breath from dead then the soft slap of bodies falling in heaps on gravel and grass and blood-dampened sand There is no gentle way to tell the story of what happened back then in this Bavarian town Nazi SS guards slaughtered 161 men along Neunburg vorm Wald's roadsides and farms on the town's church lawns and in its schoolyards shot them dead or brained them with rifle butts not as some desperate tactic to win the war but because they knew they had already lost it were among the last of the 37 million people killed in World War II murdered just days before the Allies arrived to liberate them Because of how they were killed -- and even more because of what happened in the days afterward -- the end of the war for Neunburg has never quite arrived "What happened is not just something that we should not forget," said Neunburg's mayor The soldiers forced the townspeople to dig up the bodies then to mourn the murdered men and bury them with some measure of dignity That is mostly because of the actions of the U.S soldiers who arrived in town and discovered the 161 bodies dumped like trash in shallow graves on a hill Despite the scale of killing in World War II the soldiers would not permit 161 murdered men to be trivialized The soldiers forced the townspeople -- all of the 2,500 except children under 5 and the very old -- to dig up the bodies The day before these men were killed they had been prisoners in a concentration camp called Flossenburg knew that the outcome of the war was certain as the SS guards had already done at Auschwitz and other camps as the Allies drew near About 17,000 prisoners were marched out the gates that April 20 taking different routes south toward the well-known concentration camp at Dachau Prisoners too weak to hurry -- thousands of them -- were killed along the route Most of the deaths occurred in the Bavarian forests undetected silent to anybody but the prisoners and their captors but to the Germans all the words meant the same If the true magnitude of World War II -- the most destructive conflict in the history of man -- is simply too large to grasp look to Neunburg when those screams and gunshots first became part of this valley but that didn't prepare us for that Saturday night," said Rosa Hastreiter who heard those sounds at age 21 as she lay in bed its worldwide costs and purpose and heroism and sheer ugliness condensed here in the isolation of this lush green valley near the Czech border commemorations have been held to mark the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the killing factories of the Nazis: At Auschwitz and Buchenwald homosexuals and real or perceived members of the German opposition were killed in these camps and world leaders have gathered at these places to be almost isolated in its history and trapped in it Photographs from 1945 show the cobblestoned main street Houses with double-sized doors share the sides of the street with little "What the Americans did here -- maybe that could be considered harsh," said Mayor Bayerl who at 59 was not yet born when Neunburg became a killing field but knows well that prisoners from Flossenburg had been marched on the street beneath the office where he speaks "Then I think what happened and what the Nazis did -- these human beasts As frightening as the screaming and gunshots were she remembers just as vividly the sounds that followed sent this dispatch back to Baltimore: "The little men of Neunburg who say they did not know what went on in the Nazi concentration camps So do the women and older children of Neunburg." it now appears clear that many people in this town did not know what was happening up the road But it also is clear that many Germans did "Anybody who wanted to know could have known "Of course there were whispers," said the elderly Hastreiter who worked for the local government during the war or what they ignored -- many out of fear that they themselves would become prisoners or killed by the SS -- was that the camps set up for Jews and the others were not merely harsh prisons but places where hundreds of thousands of people were worked to their death The Flossenburg concentration camp and its satellite camps scarring the hills held about 100,000 prisoners The German army was collapsing on itself as the Allies strangled it was closing in on Flossenburg along with other elements of the 3rd U.S The SS at Flossenburg followed Hitler's orders which applied to all the Nazi concentration camps: The camps were to be evacuated of prisoners and rid of any evidence about the activities there Johann Deml was working with one of his brothers The Demls were and are a country-sized family - all 10 children still survive -- Alois The farm is a speck on a vast flat within gently rolling green hills SS guards and a column of about 500 prisoners from Flossenburg arrived on the Deml farm on April 21 very early in the morning," said Johann Deml straining not at all as he recalled the details and the soldiers wanted eggs and warm food 'This will be our last warm meal for some time.' "My father wanted to feed the prisoners because they were so hungry 10 of the prisoners died before the night was out It has two floors and now is filled with yellow straw and fat cows "The prisoners took up every inch of space," Alois Deml The prisoners knew they were being moved because the Allies were approaching Some left their fate in the hands of the Americans and their war partners "Most of them went under the boards that were the floor of the barn," Johann Deml said and you could hear the dogs barking and barking and you knew what would come next." "It's still in my head today," said the elder Deml now a 75-year-old farmer who cannot forget what happened when he was a 15-year-old boy "I can still see the faces of the dead men as they were piled in a cart with their heads hanging over the edges about 25 of them over the course of the night shallow depression in the hills less than one mile down the road The Nazis and the remaining prisoners were gone Like the Neunburg people of the village center the Deml brothers and their family were initially judged by the Americans as being as bad as the SS guards "Of course we knew in the end" just how brutal the SS was We didn't know about Flossenburg because we did not leave the farm The family bathed as many men they were allowed to - "They were covered in lice," Alois Deml recalled American soldiers ordered the prisoners dug up from that depression in the hills by the Deml's farm They ordered coffins constructed and individual burial plots dug The soldiers found other dead prisoners buried along virtually the entire route from Flossenburg to Neunburg and soon another body and then another body still At times they would find three or four men in a single grave and they found a few shallow graves filled with 161 bodies People here who were born after 1945 can still be touched sometimes when a mother or father or aunt finally releases once-untold memories or when they listen to people like Rosa Hastreiter as she lay in bed with the blackout shades down the shots and screams she heard marked wholesale as people walked by her house on the way to Sunday Mass these last 161 victims lay dead along stretches of road the bodies were tossed into carts pulled by horses and oxen and carried to the crest of that hill overlooking the village center Armored Division and parts of the 3rd Army found them The soldiers summoned the village's men to the hill The Neunburg men were ordered to unearth these dead men were kept on farms and open fields and made to build 161 pine coffins Black crepe was ordered attached to the white flags of surrender flapping from Neunburg's windows Army ordered the townspeople to line the cobblestone streets of the village center The newly built coffins were stacked at a crossroad just west of the town struggled up the hill to where the exhumed bodies lay the men of the village grabbed the empty coffins and at the order of the U.S following in the freed prisoners' footsteps When there were no men left to carry the bodies -- most of those in town had been drafted into the Germany military -- women and children were enlisted the reluctant pallbearers marched through the streets away from the hill and toward the center of Neunburg a spider-web network of streams that still sparkle in the glint of the sun The twisted bodies of the dead lay in open coffins held aloft on tired Neunburg shoulders the twisted bodies of the dead lay in open coffins held aloft on tired Neunburg shoulders had been ordered to stand at the side of a road "I was trying to hide behind my mother's dress holding it with my hand over my eyes," she recalled "The soldiers kept pulling me from behind her and setting me in front I'd run back behind my mother and they'd grab me by the shoulders and plant me in the front row listened to his mother as she recalled that day He had known about the shootings and about the funeral He did not know about his mother's involvement about how she was forced so close to those bodies "I had to deal with it all day in my mind and in my heart," the son said two days after hearing that from his mother was not close to people like me because of my age "I should have talked about it earlier," his mother said Photographs taken by the journalist that day show little girls with hands on their faces and each person who had lined the streets was now made to walk past these men and to look at them but it is not difficult to see the people of Neunburg averting their eyes Only some people had known before the funeral why they were being summoned to the streets But they knew it was going to be a public gathering so the women wore dresses and nice winter coats A message from the Americans was read to the assembled in German And from the words it is now apparent that the funeral was not merely for 161 men murdered in this town but for all those killed in the camps the people of Neunburg were being held responsible not just for the murders on their land but for the sins of all of Hitler's Germany "Look upon the mutilated broken and bloody bodies," the statement said in part "They are bodies carrying the marks of cruel disease brought about by the wretched treatment they have suffered in your own land "They are the bodies that have been so brutally beaten and violated that they are scarcely recognizable as human beings "May the memory of these tragic dead rest heavily upon the conscience of every German so long as each of you shall live." because in a real sense they had liberated the town soldiers reacted unreasonably when they discovered the 161 dead men and has always thought it wrong that the whole town was held responsible soldiers forcing him to carry a body through Neunburg "Of course people were outraged," he said of the treatment of the prisoners which he said was learned in detail only after the war "We felt compassion for these poor creatures But we did not identify with the deeds of the Nazis that many Germans who were not directly involved in the massacres knew what was happening in places like Flossenburg and Dachau as German are all to blame," said Cotheo Maenner a high school teacher and a curator at the Neunburg museum He teaches his students in detail what happened here 60 years ago "This whole thing that Germans didn't know what was going on is a lie," he said "That people didn't know all that was going on -- that is true is there anybody more responsible than the people whose country did this?" was grateful that the Americans had arrived She remembers rushing to the building she worked in and removing the picture that adorned every office The morning of the funeral she was ordered to appear at a crossroads on the outskirts of town and I remember the boot of the man sticking over the edge of the coffin but I remember most thinking not to stumble or not to fall because the body would spill." said the funeral was troubling but left him feeling no more responsibility "I have never had a dream about the funeral since Hastreiter dismissed his comments with a wave of her hand but how could I see these men and not be marked after what they had been through using a word that people here still seem to consciously avoid "We all can share responsibility if it means no genocide ever again." Some of the 161 men shot in Neunburg were reclaimed by their families The others are buried with hundreds of other prisoners killed in the death marches and later found in the Bavarian forest They are buried in a four-tiered cemetery on a grassy bluff Sun researcher Paul McCardell contributed to this article The Baltimore Sun Germany is not all about Bavarian fairytales and castles. Read, The Brothers of Auschwitz by Malka Adler, if you want to get a better understanding and insiders account of what led up to the slaughter of innocents in the village of NEUNBURG VORM WALD, for the crime of being a Jew. A very dark and foreboding read, but one that should not be forgotten with the passage of time. Thank you for signing up for the aish.com free newsletter. The simple looking annexe for the medium voltage grid control center provides additional space needed to accommodate the switch to renewable energy sources – you would not guess that it is a wooden construction. At sunrise when the first sunbeam is falling over the treetops and the morning dew drips off the blades of grass you would not get any premonition that this is the heart of a gigantic energy grid. ElevationHidden in the forest the control center of the medium voltage grid is situated in the Upper Palatinate, a part of Bavaria, Germany.  The 53 employees are not only controlling the voltage in Bavarian power supply, but also the natural gas grid in East- and North Bavaria. If there is a blackout in Bavaria, a signal light turns on in Neunburg. Courtesy of Architekturbüro SteidlSince 30 years the area plays a significant role in our energy future. It contents the former largest solar-hydrogen pilot power station designed by architect Michael Steidl from Architekturbüro Steidl in 1987 and transformed into a control center in 2007. Now the high-security complex had to be extended, because of higher computational costs induced by the German Energiewende. South ElevationThe design team of Architekturbüro Steidl added an elevated extension volume to the existing building stock by absorbing its design language in objective simplicity. “We took the yellow window frames as a corporate color coding and transported this code from the facade into the detailing of the interior”, explains Interior designer Barbara Steidl. Courtesy of Architekturbüro SteidlTo accent the color yellow, we combined it only with black metal elements at the façade. In contrast to the dark façade white and grey dominate the interior design and according to the color scheme decent yellow elements can be noticed in the detailing. Courtesy of Architekturbüro SteidlBy moving out of the building stock the cube has a clear direction, which is not only readable from slim openings at the side facades, but especially at the conference room that is situated at the end of the cube with a fully glazed façade. It creates a panorama view over 10.000 installed photovoltaic panels - A look ahead into the future of energy production. Courtesy of Architekturbüro SteidlThe project was selected by a jury of the Bavarian Chamber of Architects for this year’s Architektouren which is a performance show of Bavarian architecture giving the people the chance to look behind locked doors and take part in informative conversations about contemporary architecture You'll now receive updates based on what you follow Personalize your stream and start following your favorite authors If you have done all of this and still can't find the email At restaurant Obendorfers Eisvogel located at Der Birkenhof Spa & Genuss Resort which overlooks the waters of the Oberpfälzer Seenlandes chef Sebastian Obendorfer is immersed in nature from which he draws the ingredients to create his unique cuisine at the two-Michelin-star restaurant Obendorfer began his culinary journey at the Mandarin Oriental under Mario Corti in Munich before stints at Michelin star restaurants Falco with Peter Maria Schnurr in Leipzig and ZweiSinn in Berlin where he worked alongside him as Head Chef and ultimately as sole Head Chef since 2021.  Obendorfer describes his culinary philosophy as “modern accurate in terms of craftsmanship and cosmopolitan – both in the search for the most excellent products possible and in the aromatic design” The chef’s experience is in classic French restaurants where the kitchen style was always product-oriented this has had a great influence on my handwriting,” says the chef we have found our own way to develop and perfect our handwriting.” See dishes from the menu at Eisvogel with comments from Obendorfer "Unagi is a Japanese word that refers to freshwater eel We serve our eel with a sweet soy-based sauce which goes very well with the fermented red cabbage and the spicy note of the wasabi rounds off the whole dish." crispy langoustine inspired us to combine the sweetness of the crustacean with the salty and spicy flavours of Asian cuisine." we have combined the earthy notes of truffle and Jerusalem artichoke with creamy egg yolk and braised oxtail which is why we serve this course only with a spoon in our restaurant." "We wanted to bring the focus to the quality of the meat that's why we only have light side dishes and a very light beef tea to accompany the meat." which we have combined with the essential strawberry seed oil which gives together with the hibiscus the finish." This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks The action you just performed triggered the security solution There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page with a symbolic connection of two power cables the ‘Gabreta Smart Grids’ project celebrated its official kick off Political representatives and the CEOs of the E.ON companies in charge of the project (Bayernwerk and EG.D.) attended the opening event that took place in Neunburg vorm Wald (Germany) Gabreta is a cross-border project that contributes to the implementation of the Project of Common Interest (PCI) 10.11 aiming at the digitalisation of the energy distribution networks in Bavaria and Czechia by strengthening and modernising the electrical infrastructure (i.e.: new MV substations and lines) installing new communication equipment (i.e.: optical fibre and power line communication) smart components (i.e.: monitoring and remote-control devices) and developing the ICT based control system and applications In order to achieve this goal, the project counts on EUR 100 million of EU funding under the CEF Energy programme which amounts to half of the starting investment The EU grant will contribute to increase grid hosting capacity enable remote monitoring and control of MV grids and improve grid observability and network planning “Gabreta will be instrumental to modernise the distribution grid in the border region These developments will increase the flexibility security and quality of supply of the electrical grid enabling the integration of decentralised renewables and contributing to the broader goals of the European Green Deal Completing this complex project by the end of 2028 will require unwavering dedication and commitment CINEA will remain devoted to collaborating with all stakeholders helping to ensure the success of this project We are confident that Gabreta will exemplify the power of cross-border cooperation to improve lives of our citizens,” said Olivier SILLA from CINEA who participated in the opening event remotely The implementation will be carried out by the respective network subsidiaries of the two companies Bayernwerk Netz GmbH and the Czech network company EG.D. in an area that covers almost 70,000 square kilometers Gabreta Smart Grids is scheduled to run until the end of 2028 https://www.gabreta-smartgrids.eu/ Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page.