Forensic Investigation into the Namibian Genocide

The analysis was based upon a variety of material types gathered from public and private sources in Namibia and Germany. Among these are archival photographs, maps and documents covering the period of 1850 to 1950 from the Namibian National Archives, the Colonial Image Archive of Frankfurt University, the Rhenisch Mission Archive Wuppertal, Deutsche Kolonialschule Archive Kassel, the Überseemuseum Bremerhaven, the German Federal Archive. Current and historic maps, satellite and aerial images were sourced from Google Earth, Google Maps and the Namibian Surveyor General. Ground-level photographs were taken by the researchers during their site research in Namibia.

The team conducted field work in Namibia to inform our understanding of the contexts in which the investigation is carried out. To this end, sites of known and suspected sites of several camps and graves were visited, specifically Shark Island, Radford Bay and the former ‘Burenkamp’ in Lüderitz as well as the Swakopmund harbour and the graveyard. A series of non-invasive investigations at these sites too place comprising of a combination of forensic walkover survey, Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), UAV photogrammetry, and Global Positioning System (GPS) was used to locate potential burial locations and to map the below-ground evidence. 

The 2006 perimeter wall was constructed along the outer boundaries of a row of luxury houses that were already encroaching on the burial ground. Within a small survey area adjacent to the housing development, a small area with nineteen visible mounds were selected for investigation. GPR data produced subsoil signatures consistent with graves at each mound, confirming the likely presence of human remains. Additionally, the GPR revealed six more likely graves beneath the surface that were not associated with any visible mounds, suggesting that across the burial site, there may be more graves than the 2,500 mounds indicate. This data corroborates testimonies of local activists, that some grave mounds have been flattened during construction works, or afterwards, by residents. Despite appeals to the municipality, those activists claim that little more has been done to protect the mounds.

Some sources suggest that as many as 4,000 Herero and Nama inmates died on Shark Island. Yet, the final resting places of the vast majority of those victims is lost to time. Written sources and oral history both suggest that a significant number of bodies were not even buried but thrown directly into the sea. A South African traveller wrote in 1905 that he saw ‘corpses of women prisoners washed up on the beach between Lüderitzbucht and the cemetery’. Multiple descendants of the survivors and victims of the camp gave similar accounts. The waters around the island are thus very likely to be the resting place for many of the camp’s victims. Other victims were buried on land. Evidence points to multiple areas around Lüderitz as possible sites of burial. Some of them lie in the Sperrgebiet, the zone sealed-off for diamond mining since 1908. These very areas are now earmarked for a major ‘green hydrogen’ project, supported by the German government.

After investigation, areas of sand mounds were selected for survey. Among the sand mounds identified at this location, several have substantially larger dimensions than the rest. A further examination of the GPR data profiles has identified at least one feature very likely to be a mass grave. The unmarked graves identified at this location, exposed to the unrelenting elements, are in urgent need of protection and preservation.