the Journey

There are over 22,000 names on the name plaques of the Journey memorial wall symbolising the ruthlessness of the communist regime. These people never returned home. They were murdered or died due to inhuman living conditions in imprisonment or in forced banishment. Most of them are buried in graves without names.

The murder, imprisonment or deportation of tens of thousands of Estonian people in the 1940s and 1950s are crimes against humanity not subject to statutes of limitation. On 18 June 2002, the Riigikogu (Estonian Parliament) declared the Soviet Union’s communist regime, the state organs that employed violence to implement the regime, and their actions to be criminal.

Together with their dates of birth and death, the names of the Estonian people who were murdered or died in imprisonment or banishment for political reasons in the course of the terror are inscribed on the memorial wall. All persons who perished during the Soviet era, however, are not automatically treated as victims of communism on the Memorial (see the categories of persons not included in the Memorial siit).

The list of names of victims on the memorial wall is not final because research work on ascertaining information on the victims continues. The electronic database of victims of communism is continuously being updated as new information comes to light (see the list of names of victims of communism who perished that have been identified after the opening of the Memorial (on 23 August 2018)). The names of persons who perished will be periodically added to the memorial wall on additional plaques.
Changes made in the data concerning persons who are already inscribed on the Memorial’s memorial wall are reflected only in the electronic database. Changes will not be made on the memorial wall.