Official memorial service on January 27th at the Central Station
On the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp, the city of Darmstadt will commemorate the victims of the Nazi genocide on Tuesday, January 27, 2026. This year marks the 81st anniversary of the commemoration. Citizens and members of the media are expressly invited to attend.
Mayor Hanno Benz emphasized the special responsibility of today's society: The most important lesson from Auschwitz and the other extermination camps of the Nazi regime is never to look away or remain indifferent to inhumane ideology, exclusion, and antisemitism. Remembrance means action and requires civic courage, vigilance, and active opposition to all forms of contempt for humanity.
Commemorative event with student project and musical contributions
The official commemoration ceremony of the City of Science Darmstadt will take place on Tuesday, January 27, at 11:00 a.m. in the Centralstation . Doors open at 10:30 a.m. For security reasons, bag checks will be conducted at the entrance. The event is being held in cooperation with the Martin-Behaim-School and the Darmstadt State Theatre , which will provide the musical accompaniment.
The focus is on a cross-curricular project at the Martin-Behaim-School. Students have intensively studied the Stolpersteine (stumbling stones) in Darmstadt and the fates of the persecuted people. This included independent research, exploring historical backgrounds, and excursions to sites of Nazi persecution in Darmstadt, including the former freight depot. Several podcasts have been produced as part of the project, two of which will be presented at the commemorative event.
Remembering the victims from Darmstadt
During the Nazi dictatorship, more than 3,400 Jews, including numerous children, were deported from Darmstadt to the extermination camps Auschwitz-Birkenau, Belzec, Majdanek, Treblinka, Sobibor and Piaski and murdered.
January 27th has been the official Holocaust Remembrance Day in Germany since 1996, at the initiative of then Federal President Roman Herzog. Since 2005, at the initiative of then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the day of remembrance has been observed worldwide.
(DARMSTADT – RED/PSD/stip)
