Victims of the Wall

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Paul Stretz

1935–1966

Paul Stretz, a 31-year-old warehouse worker living in West Berlin, was shot dead by East German border guards on 29 April 1966 while swimming in the Spandauer Schifffahrts Canal near Invaliden Cemetery.

A canal with a sloping stone embankment runs into the distance; on the left a red-brick wall with small pointed pillars, a lawn and large buildings, with bare shrubs along the bank.
The Berlin-Spandau Shipping Canal at the Invaliden Cemetery, looking south, 2006. Paul Stretz was shot in the canal near the cemetery on 29 April 1966. Photo: Lienhard Schulz, CC BY 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons

Paul Stretz was born on 28 February 1935 in Luitpoldshöhe in Bavaria and lived with his wife in Ottensoos, near Nuremberg. In October 1960 the couple lost their first daughter, Karin, when she was three months old. In November 1961, shortly before their second daughter was born, his wife left him because of his drinking. The divorce was settled in January 1966.

He stayed on in Ottensoos for a while without keeping in touch with his family, then moved to West Berlin, where he had no permanent home. His last job was as a warehouse worker for a haulage firm. On 29 April 1966, a hot day, he was working with colleagues beside the Spandauer Schifffahrts Canal, where the border followed the West Berlin embankment, so that the water itself belonged to the East.

He had been drinking beer and was noticeably drunk when, at about 3:30 p.m., he decided to go for a swim. His colleagues, watching from above, warned him that the canal belonged to East Berlin and that swimming there could cost him his life, but he took off his clothes and swam a few metres out, as far as the middle; a customs official also tried, without success, to get him to come back. Several witnesses recorded his last words: never mind the snipers, the water was lovely and warm.

Struggling against the current on his way back, he came into view of two guards in a watchtower about 250 metres away, who took him for an East German fugitive about to reach the West. He could not have heard any warning. They opened fire, and two more soldiers on patrol joined in from the bank. In all, 176 bullets were fired, some striking the West Berlin side, including a window of the Reichstag building. Paul Stretz was hit four times; he died at once and sank. East German divers recovered his body at about 11:15 that night and took it to the Charité for an autopsy.

His death and the shooting on the Spreebogen, in what had once been the heart of the city, drew West Berlin police, firefighters, customs officers and British military police to the scene and attracted wide political and media attention. West Berliners protested, and a placard was put up where he died. The East Berlin press, by contrast, described the incident as a provocation against East Germany's border.

Although East German authorities had learned his name from western newspapers, Paul Stretz was buried in early May 1966 as an unknown dead man at the municipal cemetery in Berlin-Marzahn. All his mother's attempts to have his remains brought home failed. Only in 1997 did the Berlin Regional Court give the guards who shot him suspended sentences of one year in prison.

Also died on the sector border between Berlin-Mitte and Berlin-Tiergarten

Sources

This profile is a summary written for this site. Every fact in it is taken from source 1, which also gives the full account with archival references.

  1. Martin Ahrends/Udo Baron, “Paul Stretz”, biography in Chronik der Mauer, Federal Agency for Civic Education, Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam and Deutschlandradio. Accessed 23 September 2026. Read online. Basis for every fact in this profile, including the dates and place of death.
  2. German version of the same biography. Accessed 23 September 2026. Read online.
  3. Hans-Hermann Hertle and Maria Nooke (eds.), The Victims at the Berlin Wall, 1961–1989: A Biographical Handbook. Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam and Berlin Wall Foundation, Berlin 2011. The printed handbook from which the online biography is taken.
  4. Hans-Hermann Hertle and Maria Nooke, “140 Victims at the Berlin Wall, 1961–1989” (list), Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam and Berlin Wall Foundation, August 2017. PDF. Used to cross-check names and dates.
  5. Hans-Hermann Hertle and Maria Nooke, “The Victims at the Berlin Wall, 1961–1989: Findings of a Research Project”, August 2017. PDF. Source of the classification into escapees, people with no intent to escape, and border soldiers.

Further reading

Image credits

  • The Berlin-Spandau Shipping Canal at the Invaliden Cemetery, looking south, 2006. Paul Stretz was shot in the canal near the cemetery on 29 April 1966.. Lienhard Schulz, CC BY 2.5, Wikimedia Commons.

Cite this page

“Paul Stretz”, Victims of the Berlin Wall, Berlin Experiences. https://victimsofthewall.com/victims/stretz-paul/

Map

The pin position is based on the place of death described in source 1. Base map © OpenStreetMap contributors; course of the Wall in 1989 from Geoportal Berlin (dl-de/zero-2.0). Accessed 23 September 2026.