The Museum of Danish Resistance 1940-1945

Museet for Danmarks Frihedskamp 1940-1945

Former Danish resistance fighters founded the Freedom Museum (»The Museum of Danish Resistance 1940-1945«) in 1957 in Copenhagen. It has since been located in a building constructed specially for this purpose.

History

Denmark was occupied by the German Wehrmacht in April 1940. Following this, a coalition - encompassing all major political parties - was formed and it began cooperating with the occupying forces. Their aim was to avoid a strict occupational regime by pursuing a policy of limited cooperation.
Eventually, however, opposition towards cooperation with the German Reich began to grow. Communist and conservative-nationalist groups began appealing in the illegal press for acts of resistance. Since 1942, a connection to the British »Special Operations Executive« had been forged. It supplied Danish resistance fighters with weapons and agents who trained them in sabotage techniques. In 1943, the government resigned in the wake of riots in several Danish cities, upon which the German occupiers declared a state of emergency.
When the Danish resistance found out about the planned deportation of Danish Jews, they initiated a large-scale rescue operation. They managed to save a large majority of the Jews living in Denmark.
There was an increasing number of sabotage acts undertaken by the resistance from the spring of 1943. The occupying forces countered these with arrests, deportations and executions of Danish resistance fighters and civilians.
Danish resistance fighters active in the underground or in exile in Sweden organised an underground army and their own police troops. These helped secure public order after the liberation in May 1945.

Copenhagen, 2005, Self-made armoured vehicle of the resistance movement, now the emblem of the Museum, Stiftung Denkmal

Victims

The Museum is also a memorial to the Danish resistance fighters who were arrested under German occupation, deported to German concentration camps or executed. It additionally supplies information on the fate of the approximately 480 Jews who were deported - and many murdered - by the occupying forces.
In all, around 6,300 Danish citizens died due to the war between 1940 and 1945.

At the start of the German occupation in April 1940 there were 7,500 Jews living in Denmark, of whom 1,500 were refugees. The government in Copenhagen saw no choice but to cooperate with the German occupying forces and sections of the population also collaborated. However, the German occupiers assured the Danes that they would refrain from attacks on the Jewish population. The number of Danish volunteers in the Waffen SS was initially much greater than the number of Danish resistance fighters. A quarter of these volunteers were members of the German-speaking minority in North Schleswig. The Danish underground movement increasingly gained strength from spring 1943 onwards. Strikes and acts of sabotage led to tension between Danes and Germans. Faced with fresh demands from the occupation administration, the Danish government resigned in August 1943. Werner Best (1903–1989), German Plenipotentiary in Denmark, declared a state of emergency and proposed to the leaders in Berlin that the Danish Jews be deported. The Danes became aware of these plans. With broad support from the population, 7,000 Danish Jews subsequently managed to escape to Sweden between September and November 1943. Around 480 Jews who were unable to flee were arrested by German police and deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto. 52 of them did not survive. A total of 116 Jews died as a result of the German occupation. From 1944 onwards, members of the resistance were deported primarily via the Frøslev detention camp in southern Denmark to the German concentration camps at Neuengamme, Sachsenhausen, Dachau and Ravensbrück. Around 900 Danish resistance fighters were executed, lost their lives during acts of sabotage, raids or targeted killings, or died in German camps. Around 6,300 Danes out of a then population of around four million died as a result of the war. For a long time, Danish memory of the Second World War was dominated by the resistance and a unilateral hostility towards the Germans. This is still reflected in the culture of remembrance. The main sites of memory are the »Frihedsmuseet« (Liberation Museum) in Copenhagen, founded in 1957 and dedicated to the resistance; the museum established in 1965 on the site of the former Fröslee detention camp; and the national Memorial Park to the »The Fallen Danish Resistance Fighters« in Ryvangen, inaugurated in 1950. Holocaust remembrance was initially a matter for the Jewish community, but attitudes changed in the 1970s as a result of international interest in the rescue of the Danish Jews. The culture and politics of remembrance in Denmark continue to be characterised by conflicting attitudes towards resistance and collaboration.

Remembrance

The leaders of the Danish resistance began making plans for an exhibition even before the war had come to an end. An exhibition, which was opened in the summer of 1945 in the former headquarters of the Danish National Socialist militia, contained information on operations undertaken by the resistance.
In 1957, a permanent exhibit was opened in the Freedom Museum, which was constructed by architect Hans Hansen. The current presentation has been open to the public since 1995. Central themes of the exhibition are the development of the resistance movement, its actions, as well as its entrenchment in society.
The exhibition also tells the story of the successful rescue operation in which 7,000 Jews from Denmark were smuggled into Sweden via the Baltic Sea. Moreover, it disperses the myth according to which the King of Denmark wore a yellow star out of solidarity with the Jews. The collected objects and documents were donated by private individuals and former members of resistance groups. The Museum is part of the Danish National Museum.
Due to a fire in 2013 the museum is temporarily closed. It is due to re-open in a new building at the same site at the end of 2019.

Possibilities

Exhibitions, guided tours for school groups and individual groups, archive containing documents on the history of the Danish resistance movement, publication series, database on members of the resistance movement (http://modstand.natmus.dk/)

Open

Open daily 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. From September to April closed on Mondays.
Closed on December 24, 25 and 31.

Contact

http://www.frihedsmuseet.dk

fogf@natmus.dk

+45 (0)41 206 080

Esplanaden 13
DK-1263 København

Copenhagen, 1941, Propaganda poster, Nationalmuseet

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