Dänholm

Dänholm
	Aerial photo of Dänholm Island (2011)
Waters	Baltic Sea
Geographical location	54 ° 18 '33 " N , 13 ° 7' 15" E Coordinates: 54 ° 18 '33 " N , 13 ° 7' 15" E
surface	95 ha
Residents	123 ; 129 inhabitants / km²
main place	Dänholm

Sternschanze

Main building of the Naval Museum

Nautineum on the Dänholm

The Dänholm is an island of the German Baltic coast in the Strelasund between Stralsund and Rügen and belongs to the Hanseatic city of Stralsund . The island is separated into a larger and a smaller part by an artificial harbor. The Ziegelgraben Bridge connects the Dänholm with the mainland, the Rügen dam bridge with the island of Rügen.

The Dänholm was used militarily for a long time and is considered the birthplace of the Prussian Navy . Today is on the Dänholm u. a. the naval museum on the history of the German navy as a branch of the Stralsund Museum , the main customs office in Stralsund and a branch of the Stralsund marine museum , the Nautineum . The Dänholm also has a sailing harbor.

history

In the Middle Ages, the Danes used the natural harbor between what is now Dänholm and the mainland as the starting point for several conquests.

The island was used for agriculture by tenants until the 17th century, and until then it was probably only sparsely overgrown with trees. Today, little remains of its agricultural and horticultural use.

By the imperial troops of Wallenstein , Dänholm was recognized as a strategically important island; all ports in the Baltic Sea should be secured and fortified. Fortifications were built on the Dänholm. When Stralsund refused to accept the imperial troops for winter camp at the end of 1628, the city was besieged from then on; With the help of Danish and Swedish troops, the Stralsunders managed to repel Wallenstein. The price for support was an alliance treaty with the King of Sweden. After the ratification of the treaty, the Swedes began to build the fortifications on the Dänholm. A star-shaped jump was built in the north of the island. This was probably designed as a wall-ditch fortification.

In 1678 Stralsund, now part of Sweden, was besieged by Brandenburgers and Danes. The Swedes evacuated Dänholm without a fight and withdrew to the north, so that the island was occupied by the Brandenburgers and on October 10, 1678 it could be used for heavy bombardment of the city, which caused numerous serious damage to the city.

After the Swedes returned, the fortifications were expanded. Nevertheless, the city was conquered and occupied by Danish, Prussian and Saxon troops in the Northern War in 1715. However, Sweden got the city back a few years later.

A plan from the beginning of the 19th century shows the pentagonal ski jumping hill in the north of the not yet divided island; in the middle of the island there are fields and kitchen gardens, in the east and south fortifications and also in the south of the island a swampy depression. A few years later a harbor was built in this marshy valley; he separated the island into the big and the small Danholm.

The French besieged the city in 1807 and took Dänholm. The ski jumps on the island as well as the Stralsund city fortifications were razed and removed.

After the Congress of Vienna , Stralsund became part of Prussia; on June 7, 1815, the city was handed over. New fortifications were built on Dänholm. The facility called Sternschanze for the sea-side defense of the city was built in earthworks at the location of the dismantled Swedish facility. The floor plan of this complex is square, an inner and an outer corridor are separated by a ditch. This includes two buildings and casemates .

The gardens of the old inn - the former lease house - were renewed in 1837. The Stralsunders used the inn until the island was sold to the Prussian War Ministry in 1849. After that the building served as a laboratory; in 1867 it was demolished. A parade house was built in its place by the Prussian Navy. This house is still preserved today and is used as a vehicle house.

In 1849 the Prussian War Ministry decided to set up a naval depot on Dänholm. In 1850 the construction of a port began in the depression in the southern part of the island. For the time being, this only had an entrance from the east. Gunboat sheds, guard buildings and houses were also built. With the excavation for the port and the foundations, walls were built on the south bank. Casemates and gun emplacements were later built into these walls. Steam cannon boats were stationed in 1860. Other military facilities such as a forge, crane systems, coal sheds and a laboratory were built. The port received an additional entrance to the west, with which the island was divided; a wooden bascule bridge connected the two differently sized parts. The paths on the island were designed as avenues with chestnut , ash and maple trees , the Sternschanze was planted with trees and green spaces were created between the buildings. In 1871 Wilhelm I gave the order to close the naval depot. After some structural changes, the facilities were used by an infantry regiment from then on. From 1873 the city was then decongested.

From 1920 the Dänholm was used again by the Navy. The Imperial Navy took over the barracks. After 1935 the island became an important part of the plans to expand the navy. Between 1934 and 193? Five barracks and a farm building were built around a parade ground. From 1936, the Rügen dam connected the island with the island of Rügen and the mainland. For the construction of the Rügen dam, the northern outer walls of the Sternschanze were torn down on Dänholm. A new part of the island was created north of the Rügen dam due to the erosion.

After the Second World War, many facilities were destroyed and initially used for civilian purposes. They were used to accommodate refugees. The former parade ground was converted into a park in 1949. From 1956, the military again used the island. First the National People's Army , from 1960 its subdivision, the People's Navy of the German Democratic Republic . New plants were built. The park continued to serve as such, but was only accessible to military personnel. The eastern outer walls of the Sternschanze were demolished and a technical base was built at the same location.

After the fall of the Wall (GDR) , the German Navy initially used the area. She cleared the facility on March 31, 1991.

On July 26, 1992, the Danish Navy Museum opened in the old complex as a branch of the Stralsund Cultural History Museum ; exhibitions on the history of the German Navy are shown here. On June 1, 1999, the Nautineum opened as a branch of the German Maritime Museum on the old barrel yard of the Stralsund Waterways and Shipping Office .

For the new Rügen Bridge, numerous concrete pillars were built next to the old Rügen dam. The buildings on the island are used partly for residential purposes and partly for commercial purposes. The technical relief organization maintains a base. The harbor and the pier are used by sailing boats.

Surname

The first known mention of the island under the name Dänholm (literally: "insulam nostram dictam Deneholm" ) can be found in an entry from March 28, 1288 in the oldest Stralsund town book. From two documents with almost the same content, one from Prince of Rügen Wizlaw I (from the year 1240), which calls one insulam strale , and the other from Prince Rügen Wizlaw III. (from the year 1314), in which the deneholme is mentioned, among others Otto Fock concluded that "Strale" is identical with Dänholm and that Strale is the island's earlier name. The equation of the island of Strale (or Strela), which was last mentioned in a document in 1240, has been widely accepted since then, but there is no evidence of this in historical tradition. It can just as well be assumed that "insulam strale" stands for "island in Strela [sund]" and that the small island was later given its own name. According to Fock, the name “Dänholm” indicates its use as a Danish anchorage. Chroniclers of the 16th century like Thomas Kantzow spread the thesis that the name of Dänholm comes from a battle of the Stralsunders against a Danish fleet, for example the sea battle at Dänholm in 1429; this thesis was refuted by historians of later epochs with reference to the documentary mentions from the 13th century. Also, according to Kantzow, the aforementioned sea battle did not take place off Stralsund, but in the Peene River , where there is also an island called Dänholm .

Trivia

On their LP "Niebülldrama" the Hamburg punk band Ludger sang a "Mittach aufm Dänholm".

literature

Hanseatic City of Stralsund (Ed.): Historical gardens and cemeteries in the Hanseatic city of Stralsund. Issue 14/2006: The island of Dänholm. , Stralsund 2006.

Web links

Commons : Dänholm - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Wikisource: Der Dänholm zu Stralsund - legend about the origins of names - sources and full texts

Urban area Dänholm on the website of the Hanseatic City of Stralsund

Individual evidence

^ F. Fabricius (ed.): The oldest Stralsund city book (1270-1310) . Weber, Berlin 1872, municipal revenue register from 1278 with supplements, p. 29 , entry no. 146 .
↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Otto Heinrich Friedrich Fock : Rügensch-Pomeranian stories from seven centuries . Volume II. Stralsund and Greifswald in the century of foundation . Veit, Leipzig 1862, p. 56-57 .
^ Karl Gustav Fabricius : Documents on the history of the Principality of Rügen under the indigenous princes, with explanatory texts . Volume II (including book of documents, booklet 1) . Schneider, Berlin 1859, p. 19 [213] .
↑ Karl Gustav Fabricius (ed.): Documents on the history of the Principality of Rügen under the native princes, with explanatory texts . Volume IV, Section 2 (in it, book of documents, volume 3) . Weber, Berlin 1869, p. II-30-II-31 .
↑ Hans-Dieter Berlekamp: Problems of the early history of Stralsund . In: Kulturhistorisches Museum Stralsund, Stralsund City Archives, Greifswald State Archives, Greifswald City Museum, Greifswald City Archives (ed.): Greifswald-Stralsunder Yearbook . tape 4 . Petermänken, Schwerin 1964, p. 31–44, here p. 31 .
^ ^A ^b Gustav Kratz : The cities of the province of Pomerania. Outline of their history, mostly according to documents . Berlin 1865, p. 465 .