Hitler’s bunker now a car park but still a major tourist attraction

Hitler’s bunker – where it is alleged he committed suicide back in 1945 – is itself now buried under a Berlin car park.

A recreation of Hitler’s bunker at Madame Toussauds in Berlin. Image by Marcus Winter / CC BY-SA 2.0

As a way of trying to avoid Neo-Nazi worshippers, there are no public signs directing either locals or tourists to the dictator’s final resting place.

However a number of walking tours of the city take in the ordinary-looking car park where the underground cavern is pointed out verbally by tour guides and with word spreading, thousands have flocked to the site where once his underground shelter was situated. The Daily Express reported one tourist as seeing another dancing on the spot in the car park to fulfil her Jewish grandmother’s wish of dancing on the Nazi leader’s grave.

As World War II dragged toward a conclusion, Hitler spent more and more of his time down in his Berlin bunker.

Berlin Aug. 2, 1936  – a file photo shows Hitler on the grand stand in the Olympic Stadium watching the events on the field Europe. Image by PA Wire

It is claimed that he hadn’t see daylight for ten days on the day he killed himself. Reports say that after shooting himself, he was brought to the bunker’s exit and was cremated after being doused with petrol.

The bunker itself was destroyed by being blown up so that there was no trace left. However in that area of the city, the irony remains that opposite the car park there is a memorial to murdered Jews across Europe who died before, during and after the war.