Meeting of the Descendants of the Second World War Concentration Camp Inmates

Considering the tragic fate of our people during World War II and the intention to mark eight decades since the end of this conflict in Europe, the National Museum Kraljevo is organizing a program dedicated to the fates of military and civilian prisoners, entitled “Remember Me, Descendant!” on Friday, May 9th, 2025, starting at 6 p.m.

Following the short April War and the capitulation of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, a significant portion of its soldiers—those who were unable to evade capture – were forcibly taken to various camps across what was then Germany, which in the spring of 1941 stretched from Norway in the north to the Mediterranean shores. In the later years of the war, to support agriculture and industry in the Third Reich, as labor shortages became severe due to wartime destruction, members of our people were deported beyond their homeland as civilian prisoners.

The goal of our project—of which the scheduled Victory Day program is just the beginning—is to document the names, testimonies, and memories of civilian and military prisoners through conversations with their descendants, preserving their stories from oblivion. Research of this kind, which has previously been conducted at our institution, is invaluable, as it provides insight into the lives of our ancestors from the moment they were captured and transported into the unknown, into how labor and existence were organized in camps or, in the case of civilian prisoners, on agricultural estates and in factories. Equally significant is the collection and documentation of letters, photographs, and items related to the destinies of our forcibly taken compatriots. These documents can shed light on the prisoners’ daily lives, the challenges they faced, the general living conditions during wartime, and the circumstances of their liberation and return home.

The program consists of two parts. The first includes two brief lectures reviewing the circumstances before and during the short April War, as well as the situation in occupied Serbia and Kraljevo after the capitulation. The second, far more important part, is dedicated to discussions with the descendants of our taken compatriots and the recording of their testimonies.

We take this opportunity to invite all our fellow citizens, the descendants of military and civilian prisoners, to take part in our program and share their memories of their ancestors and their destinies with us.