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All Latvia Memorial in Smecere Pine Forest
AO Edited

Memorial in Smecere Pine Forest

A haunting memorial to those who lost their lives to the Nazi regime lies hidden in the woods.

Madona, Latvia

Added By
Lelde Benke-Lungevica
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This eerie memorial is a reminder of the atrocities committed on this site.   leldebenke / Atlas Obscura User
This eerie memorial is a reminder of the atrocities committed on this site.   leldebenke / Atlas Obscura User
This unsettling memorial remembers the victims of a mass shooting.   leldebenke / Atlas Obscura User
Sculptor Gvido Buls created this memorial so that people would never forget what happened here.   leldebenke / Atlas Obscura User
The stillness of the pine forests invites visitors to stop and remember those who were murdered here.   leldebenke / Atlas Obscura User
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About

Today, the beautiful Smecere Forest is the site of a popular cross-country skiing trail, and BMX track. People flock here from Latvia and abroad to train and compete, giving the place a positive energy. However, the forest has a dark past. In 1941, when the Nazi troops arrived in Latvia, and the local Jewish population began to be arrested and annihilated, it was the site of a mass shooting. Approximately 700 hearts stopped beating here. 

After the war, the area was marked with a monument to commemorate the "Soviet people who had died in the hands of German occupants and bourgeois nationalists," but this monument did not survive.

The striking granite monument seen here today in the shape of a skull is the work of sculptor Gvido Buls and was erected in 1993 when Latvia had regained its independence from the Soviet Union. Next to it, the memorial stone states that this is a place to remember the residents of Madona and surroundings who were killed in the summer of 1941 following the arrival of the Nazi soldiers. 

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Nazis World War Ii Memorials

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Walk to the location from the car park of the Smeceres sils sports complex, or central Madona.

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leldebenke

Published

December 4, 2024

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  • http://memorialplaces.lu.lv/memorial-places/vidzeme/madona-municipality-the-smecere-pine-forest/
Memorial in Smecere Pine Forest
Madona, 4801
Latvia
56.835827, 26.195354

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Photo of Latvia

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