Dionysius Church (Bremerhaven-Lehe)
The Dionysius Church (also called Old Church ) in Lehe (Bremerhaven) on the corner of Lange Strasse / Poststrasse and Eisenbahnstrasse is an Evangelical Lutheran parish church.
history
The old church
A first fortified church is said to have been built around 1200 (other sources around 1100) and, according to Dehio, in the first half of the 13th century in Lehe. It was first mentioned in a document in 1310.
At first the parish church was dedicated to St. James Major . A Dionysius altar was added around 1250. Both saints adorn the oldest existing church seal from 1350. The present namesake of the church Dionysius of Paris was a missionary in Gaul in the 3rd century, first bishop of Paris and Christian martyr. In the immediate vicinity there are the churches in Langen- Debstedt and in Bremerhaven- Wulsdorf , which are consecrated to St. Dionysius. The name can probably be traced back to the Debstedter Church (around 1200). A memorial stone from 1887 in Dionysiusstrasse with the inscription "Grave of St. Dionysius" commemorates the saint who, according to legend, was beheaded here. In fact, however, he died a martyr in Paris around 250, according to legend in Montmartre .
The church was initially a single-nave construction from the late Romanesque period with a free-standing, northern bell tower or bell house. The nave was vaulted with bricks in the Gothic style . The windows were also Gothic in shape. The choir was added a little later. According to various sources, the church should have been around 26 × 8.5 meters.
Since 1477 Dionysius has been the sole patron saint of the church. In 1530 the Reformation came to Lehe through two Luther students. From 1607 to 1625 the church was partly in the Reformed faith , because the Reformed Bremen, as the protective power, determined religious affiliation. After the Archbishopric of Bremen fell to the Swedish city of Bremen-Verden in 1648 , Sweden decided in 1685 to share it with the Lutherans every Sunday.
The churchyard was also a burial place until 1792. Fires in 1796 and on June 28, 1801 destroyed the old church.
New building after 1802
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The reconstruction of the church after the fire took place from 1802 to 1803 in the style of Romanesque and classicism on the old floor plan according to plans by Lieutenant Colonel Müller from Stade , at that time the seat of the administration and general diocese of Bremen-Verden . The result was a simple interior and exterior plastered building with an interior flat ceiling. From the old church, the rising wall of granite blocks remained in the tower up to a height of nine meters and in the nave up to two meters. The remains of the tower were given a helmet , and the ship had six high, rectangular windows on each side and a gable roof. After the reformed renunciation, the Lutherans took over the church completely in 1803. In 1868 the tower was raised again. In 1887 a memorial stone with the inscription Tomb of St. Dionysius was erected.
Interior
The interior from 1803 has been preserved. Two narrow galleries extend almost over the entire sides. The pulpit is made of wood. The church has a chalice and a paten (bowl) from around 1400, both made of richly decorated, embossed, gilded silver with engraved leaf ornamentation. A chalice from 1455 has a six-pass foot . The oblate box is from 1691, two altar candlesticks from the 17th century.
Reconstruction, renovation and inventory
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During the renovation in 1909, the tower portal, church portal and the four side doors were renewed in the neoclassical style and the sacristy was added. Today there is only one preserved tombstone on the south side of the church.
In 1927 the three bells of the church were ceremoniously lowered. In 1975 and 2005 the church was completely renovated. The church has been a listed building since 1978. In 1981 Franz Rotter created the bronze sculpture "Seeker of God". It is a gift from the couple Gertrud and Hartwig Burgdorff to mark the 300th anniversary of their old privileged pharmacy (1980). Hartwig Burgdorff was chairman of the church council for a long time.
The community hall has been for sale since January 2013.
Catharina Bohlen grave monument
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Next to the old church is the grave monument for Catharina Bohlen, who died in 1807 . The church book says: “On July 2nd, Catharina Bohlen from Schiffdorf, a widow, was buried with a parent. Died on June 29th, aged 82 years and 2 months. " One of the four sides of the base bears July 21st, 1807 as the date of death. The other three inscriptions are:
HER GRATEFUL SON, HER LIFE WAS SEEDING FOR RIGHT AND DUTY,
HER DUST RESTS ON HOPE
In the meantime, the grave monument stood in the cemetery in Schiffdorf . In 1917, several Leh citizens wrote a request to the magistrate to return the grave monument to its original location as a sign of the former cemetery around the old church:
“Most of the residents no longer know that Lehes' first burial place was the courtyard of the Dionysius Church. From the first Christian period to 1826, i.e. for about 1000 years, almost all of the Leh residents were sunk into the crypt for their final resting place. ... Here sleep the old teachers who can tell us about the introduction of Christianity, about the building of the church and the dikes, about the eternal struggle with the sea and the people, about the hardship brought about by the weather and disease the fire swallowed up their belongings. … Unfortunately, after the construction of the new cemetery, when the graves of the old cemetery were leveled, the monuments that tell us their names were removed and used for other purposes. But we have an urgent wish, yes, we consider it our sacred duty to faithfully preserve this solemn place of remembrance and also to mark it as such. ... Now we have the good opportunity to highlight the churchyard again as a remarkable place, because we have discovered another memorial stone that was once safely here. ... She is the great-grandmother of the envoy Krupp von Bohlen and Halbach in Essen, who after his discovery wanted the stone to be taken to Schiffdorf, the burial place of her husband Hinrich Bohlen, but now also our plan to put it back in its original place, considers to be justified. ... We ask the magistrate to transfer the Catharina Bohlen's stone, which is also characteristic of the time of its manufacture, to the installation in the old churchyard, where it would act as a real sight and mark the venerable burial place as such. The undersigned are responsible for the costs. "
The application was signed, among others, by the teachers H. Schröder , Dr. Menzel and Dr. Capelle , the pharmacist Ranke , the bookseller Brüning and Dr. J. Bohls , G. Friese and Georg E. Bohlen .
literature
- Hermann Schröder: The "old" Dionysius Church in Lehe . Unterweser newspaper of December 20, 1909.
- Georg Dehio: Handbook of the German art monuments - Bremen / Lower Saxony . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich and Berlin 1977, ISBN 3-422-00348-7 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Dieter Riemer: Counts and gentlemen in the ore monastery of Bremen in the mirror of the history of Lehes. P. 309 ff. Bremerhaven 1995.
- ↑ Monument database of the LfD Bremen
- ↑ Heiner Schröder, Heiko Ricken: History from Schiffdorf ( Memento from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ An old grave monument next to the church (jb)
Coordinates: 53 ° 34 ′ 0 " N , 8 ° 35 ′ 33.9" E