Wittenoom, Australia was once home to 20,000 people in its mining heyday. The town has been named a World Heritage Site and will likely be preserved as a historical monument.ĥ. Since then, the blowing sand from surrounding deserts has made its way into the remaining buildings, which still house machinery and furniture. Once synthetic saltpeter was invented, the town began to decline and experienced a slow outpouring of residents until it finally lay empty in 1961. Humberstone, Chile was a booming town from the 1920s until the early 40s, enjoying the wealth and prosperity that came from mining and processing nitrate, also known as saltpeter. Its only residents are now birds, hyenas and other animals.Ĥ. Windswept sand has made its way into nearly every building in the town, which was once a diamond mining town and abandoned in 1956 as diamond demand declined and richer sources of diamonds were discovered in other areas. Kolmanskop is a small town located a few miles inland from the port of Laderitz in Namibia. Its ruins still stand today as a memorial to the dead and a reminder of the events that took place.ģ. ![]() The village was razed by the Germans afterward. The women and children, who had been held in a church, all perished when their attempt to escape was met by machine-gun fire. According to a survivor’s account, the men were herded into barns where they were shot in the legs so they would die more slowly. The Germans had initially intended to target nearby Oradour-sur-Vayres and mistakenly invaded Oradour-sur-Glane on June 10th 1944. During World War II, 642 residents were massacred by German soldiers as punishment for the French Resistance. The small village of Oradour-sur-Glane, France, is the setting of unspeakable horror. It was finally torn down in 1993 after a mutual decision was made by British and Chinese authorities, who had finally grown wary of the unsanitary, anarchic city and its out-of-control population.Ģ. It was a place where brothels, casinos, opium dens, cocaine parlors, food courts serving dog meat and secret factories ran unmolested by authorities. The buildings grew so tall that sunlight couldn’t reach the bottom levels and the entire city had to be illuminated with fluorescent lights. Its population flourished for decades, with residents building labyrinthine corridors above the street level, which was clogged with trash. ![]() Neither Britain nor China wanted responsibility for it, so it became its own lawless city. A former watchpost to protect the area against pirates, it was occupied by Japan during World War II and subsequently taken over by squatters after Japan’s surrender. The Kowloon Walled City was located just outside Hong Kong, China during British rule. For more deserted towns and other derelict places check out our collection of 100+ Abandoned Buildings, Places and Property.ġ. For more amazing abandoned places by region visit the WebUrbanist abandonments archive. These 20 abandoned cities of the world share an eerie, haunted quality that is part of what makes them so fascinating. There are many reasons why cities are abandoned some, like the ghost towns of the American West, have become tourist destinations while others have been condemned or simply forgotten.
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