Trinity cemetery in front of the Potsdamer Tor

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Trinity Cemetery on the forecourt of Potsdamer Bahnhof , around 1890

The Dreifaltigkeitsfriedhof in front of the Potsdamer Tor , often also referred to as the Dreifaltigkeitsfriedhof at Potsdamer Bahnhof , was a burial place of the Evangelical Berlin Dreifaltigkeitsgemeinde and existed from approx. 1740 to 1922. The cemetery was in front of the Potsdamer Tor in the area of ​​today's Berlin district Tiergarten . From around 1831 it was located on today's Stresemannstrasse and from 1838 directly on the Potsdamer Bahnhof , from 1872 even on its forecourt. In view of the rapid urban development in the area around Potsdamer Platz in the decades that followed, the cemetery at this location looked increasingly isolated and out of place. In 1909 it was closed and in 1922 it was leveled.

In the meanwhile common numbering of the Berlin Trinity cemeteries according to age, the cemetery in front of the Potsdamer Tor that has not been preserved is not taken into account.

history

The congregation of the Dreifaltigkeitskirche, which was built 1737–1739 on Mohrenstrasse in the enlarged Friedrichstadt , had been forbidden by the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm I to carry out burials in or on the church. This corresponded to the conviction that was developing at the time that cemeteries should be built outside the city limits for reasons of hygiene. Although there are indications that the congregation did not strictly adhere to the guidelines and that individual burials also took place at the church, there was an early need to secure terrain beyond the Berlin customs wall for the construction of cemeteries there. For this purpose, the Trinity Community acquired land in front of both Potsdamer and Hallesches Tor until 1742 . The chronological order is a bit uncertain. A commemorative publication, which appeared in 1839 to mark the centenary of the Trinity Church, claims that the cemetery in front of the Potsdamer Tor was the first in the community and was laid out in 1741/1742 during the reign of King Friedrich II . Other sources suggest that the burial site in front of Hallesches Tor, now known as Trinity Cemetery I, had been in use since 1737 and was thus the community's first cemetery.

In front of the Potsdamer Tor, the Trinity Community initially sought to locate its cemetery on the south side of today's Bellevuestrasse. After this was forbidden by the king - which one is unclear - a piece of land was bought instead further south on the Cölln Feldmark, which was surrounded by fields, meadows, gardens and small country houses. The parishioners accepted the cemetery opened there only hesitantly, however, it remained second choice compared to the one in front of the Hallesches Tor. The first documented burial in front of Potsdamer Tor did not take place until 1750, when Maria Elisabeth Baltzer (1685–1750), the wife of a brandy distiller, was buried there. In contrast, in front of Hallesches Tor, the cemetery area was first expanded in 1755 due to a lack of space. In 1793 the community leased most of the land in front of the Potsdamer Tor and only a small remainder remained designated as a burial site.

This Dreifaltigkeitsfriedhof had been on the newly laid out Hirschelstrasse since around 1831 (from 1867: Königgrätzer Strasse ; today: Stresemannstrasse). By 1838, the Potsdamer Bahnhof was built south of the cemetery as the first train station in Berlin. The proximity to a cemetery was "perceived as quite annoying" by the railway company from the start. The Dreifaltigkeitsgemeinde, for its part, complained about the depreciation of its property by the neighboring train station and was compensated for this with an annual payment of 40  thalers from the railway company. In fact, there was an enormous increase in the value of the site in the following decades. In addition, the parish demanded the financing of an enclosure for their burial place. The railway company agreed and provided the funds for the construction of a wall up to eight feet (around 2.5 m) high that surrounded the burial site from 1837.

Michail Glinka's grave slab is now in the Russian cemetery in Berlin-Tegel

Despite the location at a city train station, burials continued to take place in the Trinity Cemetery. In February 1857, the Russian composer Michail Ivanovich Glinka (1804–1857) was initially buried here. However, he was reburied in the Tikhvin cemetery in Saint Petersburg in May of the same year . His original grave slab from the Trinity Cemetery , which his teacher Siegfried Wilhelm Dehn commissioned, is now part of a memorial for Glinka in the Russian cemetery in Berlin-Tegel . The mineralogist Carl Karsten (1782-1853) and the Prussian Minister of State and Culture Friedrich Eichhorn (1779-1856) were also buried at Potsdamer Bahnhof after 1850. In 1907, which took place reburial of the remains of Eichhorn and his wife on the Trinity cemetery on Bergmannstrasse , the interim third burial place of the community. Later transfers from the cemetery in front of Potsdamer Tor are not known.

Forecourt and reception building of Potsdamer Bahnhof, on the left the Dreifaltigkeitsfriedhof, around 1900

In the years 1868–1872, the Potsdam train station was extensively rebuilt. A new reception building then rose just a few meters from the Holy Trinity cemetery and was "pushed forward as far as the Noli me tangere of the churchyard would allow". The cemetery was now on the newly laid out station forecourt, the left half of which it occupied almost entirely. One of the consequences of this was that the access to the train station could not be led past the entrance portal, but only at a right angle. In addition, the trees in the Holy Trinity cemetery had a massive impact on the facade of the new reception building.

In general, the cemetery now seemed increasingly isolated and out of place in the hustle and bustle around Potsdamer Platz. However, it was not closed until 1909. The Royal Railway Directorate in Berlin then acquired the property for the considerable price of 600,000  marks (adjusted for purchasing power in today's currency: around 3.54 million euros). In 1914, she announced an architectural competition for the uniform redesign of the station forecourt, which gave the architects plenty of scope for design proposals. Significantly, however, a key requirement was to ensure that the view of the reception building, especially from Potsdamer Platz, should not be impaired as much in the future. Due to the First World War , the competition was not concluded until 1919. All of the award-winning and many more of the 78 submitted designs provided for flanking porches of the reception building, which would also have built over the cemetery area.

None of this was ultimately realized. In 1922 it was limited to putting down the cemetery wall, leveling the grave sites and converting the cemetery grounds into a simply designed green area. Some valuable historical cast iron grave monuments have been secured, but no reburial work has taken place.

Buried personalities

Potsdamer Platz around 1920; top right - in front of the Vaterland House and Potsdamer Bahnhof - the Trinity Cemetery shortly before it is leveled

Well-known personalities who were buried in the Dreifaltigkeitsfriedhof in front of the Potsdamer Tor include:

literature

  • Hans-Jürgen Mende : Former cemetery of the Trinity congregation at the former Potsdamer Bahnhof (Protestant). In the S. Lexicon of Berlin burial sites . Pharus-Plan, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-86514-206-1 , pp. 152–153.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Hans-Jürgen Mende : Lexicon of Berlin burial places . Pharus-Plan, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-86514-206-1 , pp. 72, 152–153, 223.
  2. ^ History of the Trinity Church in Berlin. Dedicated to the members of this church congregation for the church's 100th anniversary celebrations by the preaching of the same and the church college . Decker, Berlin 1839, p. 17.
  3. ^ Mende: Lexicon of Berlin burial sites. P. 223.
  4. ^ A b Mende: Lexicon of Berlin burial places. Pp. 152-153.
  5. ↑ Artur Fürst: The world on rails. A representation of the facilities and operations on the long-distance railways. Along with a history of the railway . Langen, Munich 1918. Reprint: Salzwasser-Verlag, Paderborn 2013, ISBN 978-3-86195-515-3 , p. 113.
  6. ↑ Prince: The world on rails. P. 113.
  7. ↑ Süddeutsche Musik-Zeitung . 6th year, No. 10, March 9, 1957, p. 1. Kurt Pomplun : Berlin houses. Stories and history . Hessling, Berlin 1971, ISBN 3-7769-0119-5 , p. 99. Detlef Gojowy: German-Russian music relationships. In: Dittmar Dahlmann, Wilfried Potthoff (Ed.): Germany and Russia . Aspects of cultural and scientific relationships in the 19th and early 20th centuries . Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2004, ISBN 3-447-05035-7 , pp. 191–236, here p. 194. Mende: Lexicon Berlin burial sites. P. 1006. In many depictions there is confusion about Glinka's original burial place. The Russian cemetery in Berlin-Tegel, the Trinity Cemetery I in front of the Hallesches Tor and even the Luisenstadt cemetery on the Südstern are mistakenly identified as places of Berlin burial.
  8. ↑ a b Alexander Rüdell : The competition for preliminary designs for a redesign of the forecourt at Potsdam Central Station in Berlin. In: Zentralblatt der Bauverwaltung . Vol. 39, Nos. 99 and 103, December 6 and 20, 1919, ISSN  0372-8021 , pp. 592-593 and 613-616, here: p. 592.
  9. ^ A b Mende: Lexicon of Berlin burial places. P. 152.
  10. ↑ Zentralblatt der Bauverwaltung ( ISSN  0372-8021 ), 34th year 1914, No. 31 (from April 18, 1914), p. 247. Rüdell: The competition for preliminary designs for a redesign of the forecourt at Potsdam Central Station in Berlin. P. 593.
  11. ^ Rüdell: The competition for preliminary designs for a redesign of the forecourt at Potsdam Central Station in Berlin. Pp. 613-616.

Coordinates: 52 ° 30 ′ 30 ″  N , 13 ° 22 ′ 36 ″  E