"Fled, Expelled, Uprooted" - Childhoods in Mecklenburg 1945 to 1952

About one million Germans who had to leave their homes in Southeastern and Eastern Europe as a result of World War II ended up in Mecklenburg and the remaining part of Pomerania west of the Oder River. More than a third of them were children. How did they experience their arrival and reception? What was childhood like in a foreign environment in the immediate post-war period? What could the host society do for these children under the dictates of the Soviet-style reorganization? Many contemporary witnesses have reported on their fate, often in writing, at an advanced age. Based on conversations and reports, more recent literature and sources, the exhibition provides insight into childhoods that were marked by hunger and loss, deprivation and hard work. Especially in Mecklenburg and Vorpommern, where the fate of expulsion affected almost every second inhabitant, the memory is still very present today, despite decades of silence under socialist conditions.

Children on the run - this is still a highly topical subject. The consequences, as the experiences of those interviewed show, have a lifelong effect.

The exhibition of the Mecklenburg Foundation and the State Agency for Civic Education is shown in the Waren Museum of City History with the support of the European Academy M-V and the Partnership for Democracy as part of the federal program Democracy Live. Admission is free.