Harju Street

Harju Street is one of the oldest of the town and used to be a narrow medieval street with houses on both sides. It was drastically changed when the largest of the bombings of Tallinn on World War II, known as March bombing, occurred in March 1944. A heavy damage was inflicted by 300 aircraft dropping over 3000 bombs, 17oo of them explosive and 1300 incendiary. While military damage was not major, the city centre remained largely in ruins and large part of the wooden suburbs were burnt down. The destroyed public buildings included Estonia Theatre, St. Nicholas Church, the city synagogue, four cinemas, and the Tallinn City Archives. Prior to the raid the Soviet saboteurs had blown up the pumping station and so there was not enough water for putting out the fires that followed. According to the official report, 757 people were killed and 25,000 people were left without shelter in the early spring cold. After clearing away the ruins, most of the area was kept as a park but two huge Soviet buildings were also added. The outline of the original layout can be seen in darker colour of the pavement.