Bereza. The Red Barracks.

On the M 1 highway between Brest and Baranovichi there is a small small town of Bereza. There are several buildings called the "Red Barracks" in the city center. 

These are the buildings of the military barracks of the times of the Russian Empire, which were built in the 1870s. The barracks were built of bricks from the Catholic church and the Kartesian monastery, which are located very close. The Church of the Holy Cross and the Kartesian monastery were considered one of the largest in the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

The architectural complex was built in the 17th – 18th centuries at the expense of the Sapieha magnates. In the church there was a crypt with the graves of the Sapiehs. The monastery complex included numerous religious and outbuildings: a hospital, a pharmacy, a library, residential buildings and monks' cells. The entire area was surrounded by a Castle wall with defensive towers. The foundation of the monastery took place in 1648, and Kazimir Lev Sapieha (1609-1656) was present, who was later buried in the monastery's church. The monastery had large land holdings, was engaged in trade and production. He sold beer, wine and vodka, salt, bread and honey. There were sawmills, brick factories, mills, wineries, and taverns.

 During the Russian Empire, after the anti–Russian uprising of 1830-1831, the monastery was closed and some buildings were used as military barracks. Locals sometimes refer to the term not as barracks ("kazarmy"), but as "kashary". After the subsequent anti–Russian uprising of 1863-1864, the buildings of the church and monastery began to be dismantled and new barracks built from them.

 To this day, several buildings of the then barracks have been preserved, which were built of red brick and therefore nicknamed the "Red Barracks". The buildings are three-storeyed, built in an eclectic style with Art Nouveau elements.

 During the First World War, the barracks housed a German military hospital. During the time of the Polish state, there was a river fleet school in the buildings for several years. And from 1934 to 1939, the barracks were turned over to a concentration camp for political prisoners, through which thousands of prisoners of various nationalities passed.

Various social and commercial institutions are now located in the "Red Barracks".

The ruins of the former monastery of the Carthusians are under restoration. A memorial sign has been erected on the site of the former concentration camp.