Development of the Memorial

From 1956 onwards, the barracks site was again being used as a base by the Austrian armed forces. At the same time, the area around the former crematorium had been at risk of falling into decay since the immediate post-war period. In 1948, this development had prompted the formation of the Lower Austrian Concentration Camp Association. The organisation of former French prisoners also criticised the poor condition of the building. During one of their early ‘pilgrimages’ in 1949, the Amicale had erected a memorial plaque.

On 2 July 1950 the land on which the crematorium building stood ­was handed over to the care of the City of Melk –probably in large part thanks to an The plaque in memory of the French concentration camp victims that is affixed to the Melk crematorium chimney was unveiled in autumn 1949. It was designed by the architect Wilhelm Schütte. Photo: ZHZ Melk, 2022.intervention by the French high commissioner Marie Émile Antoine Béthouart. The Lower Austrian Concentration Camp Association began maintenance work in 1951 and erected an initial Austrian memorial plaque. In 1962 the area was officially declared a public site of commemoration, registered as a memorial and transferred to the responsibility of the Federal Ministry of the Interior. Over the following years, both the exterior space and the crematorium area became the site for a number of additional national and individual memorial plaques. Today, responsibility for the Melk Memorial falls to the Mauthausen Memorial.