All that remains of Kharkiv’s 200-year-old prison castle is a pair of buildings tucked away in a park at the intersection of Zbroiarska, and Slov’yans’ka Blagovischenska Streets.

The prison was built in 1822–1823 based on a design by the court architect Louis Charlemagne-Bode and was demolished in the mid-1960s.

The most interesting feature is the imposing three-story building, which appears to be about the same age as the castle.

Its cornices visually resemble those on the castle’s towers, which no longer exist, as seen in old photographs.

According to some reports, after the prison was closed, the building housed industrial facilities.

The building is now abandoned.

From 1893 to 1903, the prison “fortress” served as a transit prison through which convicts were sent to Sakhalin Island. After 1917, it became a prison run by the OGPU-NKVD. During the German occupation in World War II, the site housed the Stalag 364 concentration camp, where approximately 30,000 people perished.