Evangelical Church (wood)

The protestant church in wood

View inside the church

Organ loft

The Evangelical Church Holz in the district of the same name in the Saarland community of Heusweiler in the Saarbrücken regional association is a church of the Evangelical Church Community Wahlschied-Holz . The community is the parish of the Saar-West Evangelical Church in the Rhineland assigned. In the list of monuments of the Saarland, the church is a single monument listed.

history

The expansion of the Göttelborn mine in the second half of the 19th century led to an increased influx of miners to Holz and the surrounding villages. Many Protestant Christians were among the newcomers, so that a Protestant church community was founded in Holz in 1895, which a few years later had 1,500 members. With the somewhat older community in the neighboring village Wahlschied to the north, she was connected to the parish office.

The services for both parishes were held in electoral arbitration in a small church from the 18th century. A church building association was founded in Holz as early as 1890, with the aim of building a new church for wood and electoral arbitration. The plan was to build the new church, which was to replace the common place of worship in Wahlschied, in wood. The municipal council in electoral arbitration opposed this vehemently. As a result, there were massive disputes between Holz and electoral arbitration about the planned new church. In the end, all attempts to build a joint Protestant church for wood and election arbitration failed. As a result, a wooden church was built, which was supported by the Provincial Church and the Gustav-Adolf-Werk . Architect Heinrich Güth ( Saarbrücken ) was responsible for the construction plans. The foundation stone for the church building in wood took place on September 17th, 1899. The inauguration of the completed church took place on November 1st, 1900. The plans for the newly built Protestant church in Wahlschied between 1901 and 1903 also came from Güth.

The first restoration work on the church was carried out in 1930. The church survived the Second World War without major damage. Only the windows were destroyed.

In the years 1957 to 1961 a restoration took place under the architect Zieboldt (Heusweiler), during which the interior was given a simple white painting in 1960 and the furnishings were modernized.

In 1976 the parishes of Holz and Wahlschied were united to form the common parish Wahlschied-Holz with a common financial administration and a presbytery .

The last major restoration and reconstruction work took place in 1994. It was in the sanctuary , the altar pedestal removed. Furthermore, an attempt was made to reverse the changes made by the restoration measures from 1957 to 1961.

Architecture and equipment

The church building, erected as a hall church, is kept in the style of historicism , with architect Güth mainly using forms from the early Gothic . The building complex consists of a four-axis nave , which is closed in the east by a 4/8 choir, and in the west has a retracted organ house in which the main entrance portal is also located. A sacristy is also attached to the choir . The bell tower with a pyramid-shaped pointed helmet , in which dials of the tower clock are integrated on all four sides , stands at the side in front of the north-west corner of the nave. The masonry is mainly plastered, with the exception of individual ashlar details made of reddish sandstone , which thus contribute to the structure of the church building.

The interior is determined by a wooden ceiling pulled into the roof structure . The choir, which has four windows, is vaulted and has pointed end walls. The altar is set up in it. Parts of the altar and individual pews , which are arranged in two blocks to the left and right of a central aisle, still belong to the original furnishings. There is a wooden gallery above the entrance .

Further items of equipment are the altar cross and candlesticks from 1994. There are paintings on the ceiling that were rediscovered in 1994 during restoration work.

organ

The organ of the church was built in 1992 by Hugo Mayer Orgelbau from neighboring Heusweiler and installed in the gallery above the entrance. The pipes of the previous instrument were reused. It was a mechanical two-manual slider chests -Orgel ten registers, in which the pipes are clear of the table. The disposition is as follows:

I Hauptwerk C – g ³
1.	Principal	8th'
2.	Bourdon	8th'
3.	Octave	4 ′
4th	Mixture III	1 ¹ ⁄ ₃  ′

II Positive C-g ³
5.	Covered	8th'
6th	Reed flute	4 ′
7th	Fifth	2 ² ⁄ ₃  ′
8th.	Principal	2 ′
9.	third	1 ³ ⁄ ₅  ′
	tremolo

Pedal C – f ¹
10.	Sub bass	16 ′

Coupling : II / I, I / P, II / P

literature

Marschall, Kristine: Sacred buildings of classicism and historicism in Saarland . Institute for Regional Studies in Saarland, Saarbrücken 2002, ISBN 978-3-923877-40-9 , p. 666 .