Photo Gallery Remembering Berlin Wall Victim
Chris Gueffroy was shot 10 times and killed by border guards when he tried to cross the Berlin Wall on the night of Feb. 5, 1989. The 20-year-old bartender was the last East German to be shot trying to cross the Wall.
Gueffroy's mother along with other family members and friends attended graveside services on February 23, 1989.
Chris Gueffroy's grave in Berlin's Treptow district is seen in this undated file photo.
The East German government tried to cover up Gueffroy's death but it eventually became public. Gueffroy's obituary stated that he had died in a "tragic accident." It wasn't difficult for readers to read between the lines and figure out that this meant a violent death at the Wall.
In this photograph from August 18, 1961, workers overseen by armed GDR policemen build the Berlin Wall.
The 24-year-old Günter Litfin was the first person to be shot at the Berlin Wall. He was shot while trying to swim across the Spree River in Berlin on August 24, 1961.
Seventeen-year-old Peter Fechter was shot while attempting to cross the Wall on August 17, 1962. Guards left him lying in the Death Strip for almost an hour while he bled to death.
By some estimates, more than 1,200 people died trying to cross the Wall. Crosses bearing the names of victims are seen here displayed on a fence in West Berlin in this August 1986 photo.
A similar memorial in 1991 included a cross for Chris Gueffroy.
Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, visitors come to the central memorial on Berlin's Bernauer Strasse to commemorate the victims.
