It is December 23, 1944, a dark evening.
From the Walpersberg, the exhausted forced laborers return to their camps on foot after their work shift. A column of Italian forced laborers is on its way across the Reichsstr. 88 to Kahla, to the Rosengarten camp. Among them is Mario Suardi, born on February 23, 1926. He comes from Predore, a small town in the province of Bergamo/ Lombardy.
Suddenly, the incomprehensible happens. A truck, driving from Grosseutersdorf to Kahla, rams Mario. He is thrown to the side. He succumbs to his severe head injuries at the scene of the accident.
His body is transferred to the University Hospital/Jena. Later, Mario is buried at the Nordfriedhof cemetery in Jena.
The long-standing good cooperation with the cemetery administration/Nordfriedhof Jena and on the basis of our research, we found relatives of Mario in 2019, with whom we are still in contact to this day.
The family had been looking for him since the end of the war, but never received any information about his whereabouts. Based on our extensive archive and international contacts, we were finally able to hand over the information/documents they have been looking for 75 years to Mario’s family.
Today, 23 December, the anniversary of his death, we have not forgotten Mario and, also on behalf of his family, remembered at his grave with a small ceremony.
