during the Nazi period, and during World War II hundreds of prisoners of war and also women and children were used as forced labor there. In 1943, the Ravensbrück concentration camp extended to Malchow, and during the next two years many inmates, including numerous Hungarian Jewish women, lost their lives there under appalling conditions.

After the war, Soviet Occupation authorities accused some 30 teen-aged Malchow residents of anti-Soviet activities, and 12 of these eventually