Voting Monument (Allenstein)
The Voting Monument in Allenstein was a patriotic memorial, which commemorated the eleven southern districts of East Prussia in the German Reich after the referendum of 1920 . It was built in 1923 in the park in Jakobsberg, a suburb of Allenstein, about one kilometer north of the train station.
In 1920 Allenstein was the seat of the German and the Inter-Allied Commission (see Allenstein voting area ). After the clear result of the vote, the eleven East Prussian districts were returned to the German Reich on August 18, 1920 in Allenstein. To commemorate the historic success, the voting monument was erected in Jakobsberg City Park in 1928. The Berlin architects Walter and Johannes Krüger designed it. The park was named after the mayor of Allenstein at the time, Georg Zülch , Georg-Zülch-Platz.
With the coats of arms of the district cities, the eleven pillars of the round monument stood for the eleven Masurian voting circles . The slogan and the result of the vote were recorded on the inside of the yokes : "Home in danger - this country remains German" and "The votes in southern East Prussia: 363,209 for Germany - 7,980 for Poland."
On the four sides of the altar stone in the middle stood people and fatherland - self-determination - unity and justice and freedom - home .
Together with the voting memorial in Marienburg and the Tannenberg memorial in Hohenstein, the memorial is one of the patriotic memorials in East Prussia between the world wars . The monument was demolished in 1945 by the Polish administration and replaced by the Polish monument “Heroes in the struggle for national and social liberation in Warmia and Mazury ”.
literature
- Max Worgitzki, Adolf Eichler, Wilhelm Freiherr von Gayl : History of the vote in East Prussia. The struggle for Warmia and Mazury. Leipzig 1921.
- Dolores Balduhn: where was the day? In: memories of a lost world: East Prussia. Frieling, Berlin 2008, ISBN 3-8280-2552-8 .
- Ernst Weichbrodt: Self-determination for all Germans. 1920/1980. Our yes to Germany. On the 60th anniversary of the referendum in East and West Prussia on July 11, 1920. Landsmannschaft Ostpreußen, Hamburg 1980.
Web links
- Website from Warmia-Masuria on the voting memorial ( Memento from December 28, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
- History of Allenstein in Ostpreussen.net
- 1920 - 100 years of voting in the Allenstein voting area
- In the days before the referendum in 1920 - reports from the Ermländische Zeitung.
- Adolf Eichler (until 1925 General Manager of the Olsztyn Home Service): What was achieved by the home clubs in the East Prussian voting area.
- Report on the background to the referendum (pp. 20-21) (PDF; 5.7 MB)
Coordinates: 53 ° 47 '39.2 " N , 20 ° 28' 50.7" E