Kortau. A Haunting Walk

I frequently visit Olsztyn. It's a city in North-Eastern Poland, a regional capital, but its history is complicated. It wasn't always a Polish city. Even its name is derived from German: Allenstein, meaning Stone over the river Alle (nowadays known as Łyna). One sunny morning in mid-March, I went for a walk around Kortowo, or Kortau, as it was called in German. The district houses a university complex, quite possibly the most famous one in Poland, largely due to its yearly musical festivals, but also to picturesque surroundings, including a lake and vast forests.

The buildings in Kortowo are mostly made from red brick. I'm not a historian, so it's hard for me to tell which ones are modern additions to the university campus, but its core was built in the late 19th century. In 1886, a mental institution was established there. It was known by the name Provinzial Heil- und Pflegeanstalt für geisteskranke Kortau bei Allenstein (provincial medical and care facility for the mentally ill in Kortau near Olsztyn). According to the maps from 1913, the institution included over ten buildings, with wards for men and women, a separate house for the administrator, a heating facility, a chapel, a few administrative buildings, a park, a cemetery, and even a sewage system. The hospital was no less than a self-contained town.

However, the district's history isn't all about student parties or medicine's development; it's much darker than that.

Before WW1, the Kortau asylum prospered and contributed to the development of psychiatry. In place of confinement and isolation, the patients lived in open wards and led a peaceful life. The war changed everything. In 1914, the complex was repurposed as a hospital for wounded soldiers returning from the front. The asylum's patients were murdered. After the war, the complex reassumed its previous role as a medical facility for the mentally ill.

The 1930s and the rule of the Third Reich brought no improvement. The patients underwent sterilisation, were murdered or subjected to cruel experiments, such as exposure to toxic gases or stabbing with newly developed bayonet types. Women were abused sexually, and dead bodies were frequently dismembered.

Finally, in 1945, the Soviet army marched through the place. The Russian soldiers were barbaric: they destroyed a large part of the facility and brutally murdered staff and patients alike. Hundreds of bodies were discovered in the 50s, when the university campus was being expanded.

Modern Kortowo, while joyful and full of life, still holds countless dark mysteries. No one knows what happened in a nearby house, where many doctors were found hanged. The building is now dubbed The Hangmen's House. Several notable disappearances boggle historians' minds. I wonder if we'll ever uncover Kortowo's horrific secrets?