Hans-Joachim Wolf

Hans-Joachim Wolf was born on 8 August 1947 and lived with his parents, a petrol station attendant and a shop assistant, in Berlin-Friedrichshain. In September 1964 he began an apprenticeship at the cable works in Köpenick. His mother later thought he might have been driven to flee because he was refused the apprenticeship he wanted as a radio and telecommunications technician, despite good school reports, because he was not involved in the state youth organisations. His sister, four years older, remembered him as very sociable and cheerful, with many friendships kept up in person and by letter, and on good and open terms with his parents.

He told his parents he thought life was better in the West but never spoke of escaping; he probably wanted to protect them from the Stasi and to spare them worry, since his sister had fled to West Berlin in 1961 and still suffered health problems as a result. Only to his grandmother did he hint at a possible route. On 9 December 1963 he had been caught at Friedrichstrasse station trying to reach West Berlin by train, but was evidently believed when he said he had boarded the wrong train, as he was not prosecuted. In November 1964 his mother saw him sorting his belongings and burning letters from friends in West Berlin.

On the morning of 25 November 1964 he left home for vocational school but never arrived. Instead he took a room at the Hotel Adlon near the Brandenburg Gate, apparently considering a descent by rope, and his worried parents reported him missing that night. The next day he decided against this presumed plan. That evening he made his way through the "Silberlinde" allotments in Treptow and climbed a barbed wire fence of about 2.5 metres on the southern bank of the Britzer Zweig Canal.

At 6:30 p.m., in darkness and a temperature of four degrees, he jumped into the canal. Border guards nearby saw him and fired without warning. He called out to them to stop shooting, abandoning his attempt, but they continued, firing 61 shots. One struck him in the chest and killed him. On the West Berlin side, police closed the nearby Sonnenallee crossing for half an hour because of the shooting.

Two days later his parents were told that he had accidentally drowned while crossing the border. They were not told where, not allowed to see his body, and not permitted a large memorial service. He was cremated at Baumschulenweg and his urn buried in the Parochial Cemetery in Friedrichshain. His parents did not believe the account: he was a good swimmer, and his father found blood on the watch returned to them. His sister, by then in Munich, reported the case in February 1965 but withdrew her statement for fear of consequences for her parents.

What happened was clarified only in 1994, when the guards were tried in Berlin. Proceedings against one ended when he died in March 1996; in September that year the court gave the other a suspended sentence of one year and four months for manslaughter. His parents had died by then.

Read more

• The Children Who Died at the Berlin Wall

Also died on the sector border between Berlin-Neukölln and Berlin-Treptow

• Georg Feldhahn 19 December 1961
• Heinz Jercha 27 March 1962
• Wolfgang Glöde 11 June 1962
• Horst Kutscher 15 January 1963
• Siegfried Widera 8 September 1963
• Dieter Berger 13 December 1963
• Walter Hayn 27 February 1964
• Erich Kühn 3 December 1965
• Jörg Hartmann 14 March 1966
• Lothar Schleusener 14 March 1966
• Michael Kollender 25 April 1966
• Max Sahmland 27 January 1967
• Gerald Thiem 7 August 1970
• Christian Peter Friese 25 December 1970
• Werner Kühl 24 July 1971
• Johannes Sprenger 10 May 1974
• Manfred Mäder 21 November 1986
• René Gross 21 November 1986
• Lutz Schmidt 12 February 1987
• Chris Gueffroy 5 February 1989

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. Lydia Dollmann, “Hans-Joachim Wolf”, 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

• Wikipedia (Deutsch)

Image credits

• Memorial panel on Chris-Gueffroy-Allee in Berlin-Baumschulenweg for Hans-Joachim Wolf, Werner Kühl and Chris Gueffroy, photographed in 2014. OTFW, Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons.
• Second memorial panel on Chris-Gueffroy-Allee in Berlin-Baumschulenweg, whose text tells of Hans-Joachim Wolf, Werner Kühl and Chris Gueffroy, photographed in 2014. OTFW, Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons.

Cite this page

“Hans-Joachim Wolf”, Victims of the Berlin Wall, Berlin Experiences. https://victimsofthewall.com/victims/wolf-hans-joachim/

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.