Refugees in Schleswig-Holstein after the Second World War

Flight and expulsion of Germans during and after World War II
(demographic estimates)
Background
1944–50 flight and expulsion of Germans German–Soviet population transfers Potsdam Agreement
Wartime flight and evacuation
German evacuation East Prussia
Post-war flight and expulsion
Czechoslovakia Poland (incl. former German territories) Netherlands Romania
Later emigration
Refugees in Schleswig-Holstein Emigration from Poland
Other themes
Wolf children
v t e

The influx of refugees in Schleswig-Holstein after the Second World War was one of the biggest difficulties faced in Germany in the early post-war period. Per capita, the Province of Schleswig-Holstein of Prussia, later the state of Schleswig-Holstein, took in the second-most refugees and displaced persons from the former eastern territories of Germany between 1944 and 1947, second only to Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.^[1] This led to an economic and humanitarian crisis in the state throughout the late 1940s. The situation was only resolved in the 1950s as the Wirtschaftswunder (economic miracle) enabled physical reconstruction, raised living standards, and aided in integrating the hundreds of thousands of new residents.^[2]