It is well known that Dénia welcomed several of the criminals who fled to avoid prosecution after the fall of the Nazi dictatorship. And not only our municipality or the Levantine coast, but there were many points in Spain that chose Hitler's ex-officers to hide from justice. Therefore, it is normal that among the graves of the neighbors of many villages can be found the remains of those responsible for authentic atrocities.
The Twitter user @Albersicambias has made a thread collecting several photographs and stories of cemeteries where the fled Nazis rest. Among them, the presence of Dénia stands out, in which he emphasizes the sympathy that processed these neighbors for years with such a bloody past.
Gerhard Bremer: the criminal that the City Council tried to bury with honors
One of these criminals was the former Waffen-SS officer Gerhard Bremer, who participated in the Nazi invasion of Poland. After serving several years in prison, in 1954 he moved to Dénia with his wife and created a luxury resort called the Bremers Park Bungalows, where, according to the author of the thread, he organized spectacular parties full of dianenses and German personalities. "Even the municipal band participated in them, he wore his SS uniform.", comments @Albersicambias. Apparently, these parties took place until 1980.
After his death, in 1989, he was buried in Dénia at a funeral that the City Council tried to do with honors, according to the author. The mayor at the time would have proposed to the municipal band to play in said act of honor, which refused to participate.
Anton Galler: responsible for the shooting of 560 people (adults and children)
Also among the tombstones is the Hauptsturmführer Anton Galler, the main responsible for the Santa Ana de Stazzema Massacre. On August 12 of 1944, in the Italian town of Stazzema, Galler led the execution after surrounding 560 in the town square, mostly women and children.
A bureaucratic error allowed him to flee to Dénia, where he quietly rested without being retaliated against for the atrocities committed until 1995, being buried in the cemetery along with the rest of the Dianenses.
In October of 2021 premiered in cinemas throughout Spain The substitute, a film by Óscar Aibar based on the events recounted here.
Beeindruckend wie linke Schreiberlinge und Salonmarxisten ihr Halbwissen über ihre vermeintlichen Verbrecher und Mörder niederschreiben. Es ist ebenso gelogen wie billige Propaganda. Gerhard Bremer war weder ein Mörder noch Verbrecher. Die Behauptung dessen dieser „Journalisten“ entlarvt sie als selbst als schäbige Verbrecher. Jeglicher Beweis bleiben diese Figuren schuldig. Dazu die geheuchelten Kommentare ausgerechnet von Seiten der Englander, welche sich damals wie heute als Kriegstreiber profileren.
I keep thinking that it is immature at this point not to conserve and take care of these places and their stories. Manipulate or destroy indicates to me that there is a problem of personal maturity or with the biography itself. Any mature person interested in the history of humanity and its environment would be grateful to find a link with history in a place that allows them to develop their own identity, learn, compare, locate themselves. I am struck by the lack of maturity of the people. It is not about hating "monsters" in a personal way, it is about historical and social contexts that link Denia with the most well-known history of Europe and that is still fascinating. History must be preserved and known, not destroyed and manipulated.
What distinguishes us from the people of yesteryear is basically the time, as humans we are not different and we have a lot in common. It is also obviously because of this that many find it more pleasant to demonize and erase from memory or "eliminate" so as not to see their own human potentialities in it. Maintaining and caring for is a matter of culture, education and maturity.
I keep thinking that it is immature at this point not to conserve and take care of these places and their stories. Manipulate or destroy indicates to me that there is a problem of personal maturity or with the biography itself. Any mature person interested in the history of humanity and its environment would be grateful to find a link with history in a place that allows them to develop their own identity, learn, compare, locate themselves. I am struck by the lack of maturity of the people. It is not about hating "monsters" in a personal way, it is about historical and social contexts that link Denia with the most well-known history of Europe and that is still fascinating. History must be preserved and known, not destroyed and manipulated.
Diese Nazis kamen an die Costa Blana, weil General Franco, der ja ein Freund von Hitler war, diesen Nazis Aufenthalt und Schutz versprach. Die Spanier welche diese Nazis unterstützten waren alles Anhänger von Franco, von denen is heute noch viele gibt. Der Cumbre in Javea war bekanntlich ein Refugium von Franco. Noch heute gibt is the old date of the Villen von ehemaligen Ministern und Generälen die damals das Land oder die Villen von Franco geschenkt bekamen.
As an English person I have very fond memories of Denia. I knew nothing about this sad part of its history. One thing I do know is, that we can't change the past. Only we must learn valuable lessons for the future.
War is war. But even when the war was over, Gerhard Bremer took over by force a part of the Dénia Campsite and was very cruel to the owners. This was totally unnecessary, but showed his post war cruelty even in peace time.
A very bad man !!!
because they have never rescued the corpses of the people murdered in the avenc de les plans I think they deserve a place like the cemetery to rest in peace postscript the relatives have nothing to say I write it with the utmost respect and understanding historical memory
Tendentious article. Absolutely biased and loaded with hate. It does not provide evidence. Gerd Bremer was a young German soldier who distinguished himself in a war with honor and bravery. He had the misfortune to be on the losing side and Ryan soldiers tried him, like millions of others, through propaganda and manipulation. American, British, or Soviet atrocities were never prosecuted. The Germans do. And Gerd Bremer never participated in them. Like so many millions of other German citizens. Rest in peace.
losers are always guilty history is always written by the winners of gerd bremer no one has endorsed anything but charlatanism provide documents or evidence and then judge
War is war. But even when the war was over, Gerhard Bremer took over by force a part of the Dénia Campsite and was very cruel to the owners. This was totally unnecessary, but showed his post war cruelty even in peace time.
A very bad man !!!
Shame on You! It is often the same defensive argumentation about the innocence of the Nazi criminals engulfed against their will in a war… Shame on You again.
It is ashamed that these Nazi murderers remain one more day in our cemetery.
Franconeti was a murderer and they took him under a canopy with all the honors and the reds made authentic massacres of all those who did not think how they see the differences because there is not both sides they did the same fascist terror and communist and anarchist terror I only pretend not to never forget
national and foreign assassins all lived like a king and the only thing that interested was that they spent the money here the rest was past I met a few
The German Socialist Party (Nazis) committed atrocities like the Russian and Chinese Communist Party. Even today the Spanish socialist party is allied with parties like Bildu that kidnap, torture and murder defenseless children, women and men and justify and encourage attacks and attacks on the Jewish people.
Amen.
Entweder verwechselt du absichtlich die SPD mit der NSDAP oder du hast im Geschichtsunterricht nicht aufgepasst. Die SPD gab es ach schon vor dem 2 Weltkrieg…und wurde zur Zeit der Nationalsozialistischen Partei Deutschlands verboten…weil sie mitden Nazis am Hut hatten.
Where does honor or heroism reside in murdering unarmed women, children and men subjected, tortured and enslaved? There is no honor there, there is no heroism but there is a serious mental problem in believing that such acts worthy of the deepest sadistic barbarism are acceptable if they are carried out under the cover of a political or religious or pseudo-moralist ideology. There is nothing, just a group of people who believed above all using brute force. As much as some want to make up or disguise it, there is nothing else. Desires of greatness imposed on you. By the way, when are these remains going to be unearthed and cremated in Bavaria? Let them take them away.
Denia was a refuge for Nazi criminals with the approval of the authorities of the time.
We don't have to be proud of this.
Rather embarrassed… ..
Rather they should feel grateful because it connects them with the history of Europe and provides them with interesting places to educate themselves. Whoever wants to eliminate or allow these places to disappear apparently has a problem with his personal biography and lacks maturity. All history must be documented and not manipulated and if someone has places and stories to show, that is enviable. It is part of the identity of Europe and of the place, you only learn from mistakes, it is something that I think that, for example, communism does not want in order to dominate and manipulate the masses. Remains and memories of history should never be destroyed because they allow the identities of peoples and countries to be defined. It puzzles me that people attend school and read and there is so much information today and continue to identify places and stories with "monsters" without understanding that it is about the history of society as such and of the human, it is not something personal for which he does not have a pending psychological issue with himself. It is an enormous opportunity for human development to take care of and maintain these places and it is still a matter of maturity.
In full agreement with the article, I do not stop thinking that Dénia is a welcoming place that, in the same way, lived with these "characters" anonymous heroes, as is the case of Ana Estela Walrant, a Belgian subject settled in Dénia since 1946 and who was a hero in the Second World War saving many lives. (Mrs. Estela told me countless stories that make my hair stand on end and that, one day, I will publish. She told me that history cannot be rewritten, that Spanish is a people full of picaresque and that the Law is there to fulfill it.
Great idea to publish them. All the best