Divided by the Berlin Wall: A Family’s Enduring Legacy of Separation

Germany splits

At least two generations on both Guetinger’s maternal and paternal sides hailed from Babenhausen, a small Bavarian market town of roughly 4,000 people in the 1960s. Surrounded by a historic castle, the town was once home to a prominent merchant family dating back to the Middle Ages.

Guetinger’s father, Ernst, was the youngest of three boys among five siblings. Hans was the eldest, followed by Erich, with a four-year age gap separating Ernst and Hans. Guetinger noted that this age difference significantly influenced his father’s and uncle’s relationship.

“My dad and Uncle Hans didn’t have a very close relationship because they grew up during wartime,” Guetinger explained. “When war broke out in 1939, Uncle Hans was drafted into service as a soldier.”

With soldiers in short supply, German boys aged 16 and 17 were conscripted as “Flakhelfer” to operate anti-aircraft guns or man the massive searchlights tracking enemy aircraft.

“My Uncle Erich fell within this age range and served in that capacity, but my father, being the youngest, did not have to serve,” Guetinger added.

Following Nazi Germany’s defeat in 1945, the nation was divided into occupation zones before formally splitting into two separate states in 1949.

Hans returned to Babenhausen, Bavaria, after the war seeking work as a shoemaker. However, employment was scarce, and he struggled to find steady work.

Amid these hardships, Hans’s homesick wife encouraged him to look for opportunities in the GDR, where she was from. They knew they would be welcomed, as the GDR was eager to attract individuals willing to go against the tide of those heading west—approximately 2.7 million people migrated to West Germany between 1949 and 1961 in search of better economic and employment prospects.

In 1958, Hans’s family relocated east to Brieskow-Finkenheerd, a village near the Polish border, where Hans began working at a power station that also provided their housing. The move allowed him to fully indulge his passion for hunting.

“He was incredibly happy hunting,” Guetinger recalled fondly. “In West Germany, hunting required owning land, but since the government owned all the land in the GDR, my uncle was permitted to hunt wherever he wished.”

Hans became so renowned for his hunting skills that high-ranking party officials would often request his services when they wanted to procure wild boar or swine for special occasions.

“The party had its own hunters, but they considered my uncle one of the best,” Guetinger remarked.

Meanwhile, Hans’s younger brother Ernst remained in Bavaria and became the father of Erich Guetinger in 1951.

During the 1950s, freedom of movement between the two German states remained largely unrestricted. However, starting in the 1960s, stricter controls were implemented. East Germans were generally restricted to traveling to the West only for urgent family matters, such as funerals or weddings.

In August 1961—65 years ago—the East German government began constructing the Berlin Wall, a 155-kilometer (96-mile) concrete barrier surrounding West Berlin that effectively isolated it within GDR territory and severed the capital.

Beyond Berlin, efforts to fortify the division led to the installation of barbed wire fences, motion detectors, watchtowers, and booby traps, alongside expanded powers for border guards to shoot and arrest escapees. Between 1961 and the wall’s fall in 1989, an estimated 75,000 individuals were imprisoned for attempting to flee.

Guetinger noted that in the early years of the division, contact with his uncle and his family was virtually non-existent.

“Eventually, we managed to send letters, but we shared very little in them because everyone knew the East German secret police, the Stasi, would meticulously screen the correspondence between families, often reading our letters,” he said.

Like many West German families, the Guetingers regularly sent Western goods to their relatives in the East.

“For Christmas, we prepared parcels filled with items we knew they would appreciate and find difficult to obtain, such as coffee and blue jeans,” Guetinger said.

“Blue jeans were especially highly sought after, and my cousins loved that style of clothing. Despite our efforts, there was always a risk that the parcels would never reach them,” he explained, noting that shipments were closely monitored.

Guetinger admits that it remains difficult to fully assess how the daily disruption caused by the division impacted his family’s sense of safety and unity.

“Even if my parents carried a heavy heart back then, they rarely spoke about it. Today, I must rely on other indicators to understand the impact. One key indicator is that my father and his elder brother made an effort to visit each other at the earliest possible opportunity.”

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