 Until the mid to late 19th century the majority of residents of Tallinn were Baltic Germans who had their own separate graveyards within the city walls until 1774, and their own separate cemeteries outside the city after that.Until its destruction the cemetery had thousands of graves standing of various historical figures from Estonia's history.Shortly after the Second World War and during the second occupation of Baltic states, the suburb of Kalamaja (due to its strategic position as a base for the Red Army on the Gulf of Finland) was turned into a restricted zone for the Soviet military and closed to the public.