History of Elsterwerda
The history of Elsterwerda can be traced back to the Bronze Age . The oldest traces of human settlement from this period were found in Elsterwerda on the Black Elster and date from around 1200–1100 BC. After the Germanic tribes settled for a short time 1500 years ago, this area remained largely deserted and broken fragments only show settlement activities for the late Slavic period. At the end of the 12th or 13th century, Elsterwerda Castle seems to have been built to secure the river crossing and under its protection the steady Elsterwerda developed, which was subject to the lords seated at the castle and in Krauschütz. With the construction of the railway lines, the place developed from a former agricultural town into a traffic junction and industrial location that has existed to the present day.
Early history and the Middle Ages
Early history
The oldest traces of human settlement in Elsterwerda were found on the Black Elster and come from the late Bronze Age around 1200–1100 BC. Chr.
More than 1500 years ago, Germanic tribes settled in the area around today's city , who probably belonged to the Semnones tribe . From 1991–1994, during excavations on an area of approx. 3.8 hectares on the site of the eastern industrial park, remains of the settlement were discovered which prove this. The finds include a nave , north-facing post houses and west-facing pit houses . The Germanic tribes specialized in iron smelting and processed the lawn iron stone found in the area . This was evidenced by the excavation of a smelting field with almost 200 iron smelting furnaces , so-called racing fire furnaces, as well as coal kilns and work pits. The recovered finds are kept in the Brandenburg State Museum for Prehistory and Early History. The traces of the relatively short settlement of only a few decades extend into the time of the great migration of peoples . Thereafter, this area remained largely empty and broken fragments in the area of the Kalkberg as well as in the lowlands to the south only show settlement activities here for the late Slavic period.
Creation of Elsterwerda Castle
Around 1000, in the area east of the Elbe, which had been conquered shortly before by the emerging German Empire, there were military conflicts with the expanding Polish dukes and kings as well as the resident Slavic rulers. Several castles were newly founded or expanded. These probably also served to protect and control the military and trade routes that ran parallel to the Schwarzen Elster, such as the Sugar and Salt Route . Elsterwerda Castle seems to have been built in the late 12th and 13th centuries to secure the river crossing, a salt road coming from Halle / Leipzig and leading towards the edge of the town and an overland road that led from Großenhain towards Luckau and probably served as outworked base of the old castle waiting of Strehla and Boritz . Its construction is probably closely related to the castles in Saathain , Frauenhain and Tiefenau, which were also built at the time . Under the protection of the castle, an urban settlement developed north of the Elsterübergang in the 13th century.
In 1288 was the castle of Elsterwerda mentioned for the first time. Archaeological investigations in the foundation and in the basement of the castle in 1999 showed that it was once in the area of the courtyard of today's plant a dungeon have given a 140 square meter square base must, in the 12-13. Century was built. In size and shape it was similar to the still existing Lubwart Tower in Bad Liebenwerda . In addition, a curtain wall and a moat could be detected that surrounded the castle. The keep was probably demolished in the 15th century.
First documentary mention
On March 14, 1211 Elsterwerda was first mentioned in a document. It is the oldest document found so far that proves the city name, since in 1621 the Elsterwerda town hall and its documents fell victim to a devastating city fire. The certificate was issued by the Bishop of Meissen and records a donation that Heinrich von Strehla made to the Altzelle monastery . Fourth of the seven witnesses who signed this document is the priest Rudolfus sacertos de Elster Werden .
The corridor designation "Old City" to the west of the city and the extensive corridor suggest a relocation in the course of the urban development or the incorporation of neighboring village districts.
The rule of the Köckeritze
From a document in the main state archive in Weimar from February 18, 1326 it can be concluded that the castle was fiefdom property of Heinrich von Köckritz (cf. Köckritz (noble family) ). Also on December 21, 1343 a Konrad von Köckeritz was named as Lord of Elsterwerda in a document. Shortly before the Hussite wars of sitting on Elsterwerda Ritter Kaspar went in 1414 from Köckritz on a long trip to Meissen, where the Margrave of Meissen Friedrich made it to the Council of Konstanz on Lake Constance accompanied, as a result of the heretical Prague Rector Jan Hus on 6th July 1415 was burned at the stake. The Zabeltitzer Köckritz of the then influential family in this area was Chancellor of the Meißner Margrave and in 1426 led the procession of the Saxon army to the battle of Aussig , where it was defeated in one of the greatest battles of the Hussite Wars and 21 followers of the Köckritze were killed.
The Elsterwerda deacon MGF Hamer reported in his Elsterwerdensia 1727 in 1727 that the city of Elsterwerda also had to suffer heavily from the Hussite Wars in 1429 and must have been larger and more important than the little town of Hayn, as Grossenhain was then still called, before that time.
The Köckritze also ruled Elsterwerda in the years to come. In the transition country between the Mark Meissen and Lower Lusatia , they succeeded in establishing a domain that was independent of the office. The villages of Krauschütz, Biehla, Kotschka, Plessa, Dreska, Kraupa, Kahla, Frauendorf, Hirschfeld, Frankenhain (probably the Franconian desert near Hirschfeld), Strauch, Merzdorf and a part of Großthiemig belonged to the late medieval rule of Elsterwerda. In 1530, these villages were still included in the Elsterwerda Care . The Köckritze later sank to the level of robber barons . After the kidnapping of the Hohenleip priest, Duke Georg of Saxony and his entourage appeared in Elsterwerda in 1509 and took the castle and the town, as there were signs that other nobles wanted to join the Köckritze breach of the peace . In 1512 he finally forced the Köckritze to sell their property in Elsterwerda to him and had the rule administered by a bailiff until 1528 in order to then incorporate it into the Hayner office .
Awarded city rights
In 1364 Elsterwerda was granted city rights. Three gates and a gate shut off the city from all traffic during the night, although it never had a city wall. Since the Black Elster flowed around the city in numerous arms and streams, similar to the landscape in the Spreewald , this offered safe protection as soon as the gates were closed. Agriculture, animal husbandry, fishing for fish and crab were the sources of food for the citizens. The craft was of little importance until the 18th century.
A parish church in Elsterwerda was mentioned in a copy book in 1311. Through the Peace of Tangermünde in 1312, the land between Ortrand and Mühlberg an Brandenburg and until 1367 Castle and Flecken Elsterwerda belonged to the diocese of Naumburg . After further territorial turmoil, around 1370 the dominions of Elsterwerda, Mühlberg, Würdenhain, Mückenberg and Ortrand fell to the Bohemian crown, but in 1423 they came back under the rule of Meissen in a fairly closed manner.
Modern times
Early modern times to the beginning of the 18th century
The first Protestant baptism took place in Elsterwerda around 1539 and in 1547, after the Reformation had been implemented, Magister Petrus Kezmann was appointed pastor in Elsterwerda. A boys 'and girls' school was also set up. In the same year Haubold von Maltitz (until 1567), who also acquired the manors Oelsnitz and Kotschka , was lord of Elsterwerda. He was followed by his brother Georg von Maltitz and, in 1586, Sigmund von Maltitz, electoral Saxon stable master and chief forest master of Annaburg .
Elsterwerda was almost completely cremated in a terrible conflagration in 1562. In the years that followed, the city fell victim to fire many more times. After the city suffered serious fire damage again in 1569, it asked for a remedy to allow a fair, which was also allowed for the Tuesday before Easter, after the other cities did not raise any objections. The first verifiable map of Elsterwerda was drawn in 1590. After Siegmund's death, the von Rohr family acquired the property on March 5, 1612. Under their influence, major construction projects took place in Elsterwerda. The chronicle reports another devastating fire in 1621, which raged through the arson of a maid on All Saints' Day and which in addition to the Elsterwerda town hall on the market also killed 44 houses. The church and its tower were badly damaged. The town hall on the market was not rebuilt and until 1866 the meetings of the city council took place in the apartments of the respective mayors. On August 16, 1631 there was another fire, which only burned down a number of houses and barns .
The Thirty Years War brought a lot of misery and looting by troops passing through for the entire area and the city of Elsterwerda. When Mayor Nagel tried to hide with the Elsterwerda citizens in the swampy terrain of the Schradenwald , Swedish troops are said to have suffered a fate similar to that of Mayor Borßdorff from Liebenwerda , who was seized in 1634 and dragged to death near Zeischa by horse . At that time (1640) half of the town belonged to Bernhard von Rohr, who was sitting in the castle. The other half was subject to Erasmus von Maltitz, who sat on the manor in Krauschütz.
On April 9, 1696, fire broke out again in the city and, with the exception of the church, the school, two breweries and a few small garden houses, the whole city burned, with many residents suffocating or burned. Large numbers of cattle also perished in the flames. Only 25 years later, 71 town houses and 39 barns fell victim to a city fire in 1721. One reason why so many properties were affected again was the way the houses were built, the walls and chimneys of which were presumably mainly made of wood and clay. They were covered with roofs made of straw and reeds. A fire could therefore spread very quickly. In 1700 the place had 120 houses and 825 inhabitants, 67 of whom were allowed to brew. In addition, Elsterwerda had to suffer from the regularly recurring summer and autumn floods of the surrounding Black Elster.
The time of August the Strong
After Woldemar von Löwendal , a grandson of the former King of Denmark and Norway, Friedrich III. , as well as the husband of Baroness Benedicta Margareta von Löwendal , who had acquired the property around 1708, he had large parts of the old castle torn down. A three-wing complex with short side wings opened to the east. This building project drove von Löwendal into financial ruin and on March 20, 1727 he had to sell the property including Krauschütz and Kotschka to King August the Strong , who made the castle a chamber property and gave it to his daughter-in-law Maria Josepha of Austria . Further construction work on the castle was carried out according to plans by Pöppelmann and it received its present form with a rococo tower and a clock. The castle was later given to Duke Karl von Kurland , who used it as a summer residence until his death in 1796. It remained under the administration of the Saxon electors until 1814.
In 1727, Poststrasse led through Elsterwerda to Doberlug and later to Berlin. In 1738 a post distance column was set up in Elsterwerda for this purpose. Around 1785 an embassy post ran twice a week on the Berlin-Elsterwerda-Dresden-Vienna mail route, which was later followed by a dragoon post and, in the 18th century, a carriage and express mail. The horses were stopped and unhitched in Elsterwerda at the Rautenkranz , at that time the most elegant inn in the city, and in the post office opposite, in which Elsterwerda town hall has been located since 1879.
In 1702, plans began to connect the Elbe and the Black Elster with a canal. It was supposed to satisfy the high demand for wood in the Dresden - Meißen area by means of rafts from the Niederlausitz forests, since the Ore Mountains were already largely exploited and the Bohemian wood was expensive. The Lower Lusatian forests, on the other hand, were largely untouched by this time. Therefore, under the direction of Johann Müller, the construction of the Elsterwerda-Grödel raft canal began in 1742 with great difficulty . This was opened on December 2, 1748. The logs came here through various ditches and the Schwarze Elster for lumberyard in Elsterwerda, was split into logs here and then on barges to Meissen and Dresden towed .
From the Seven Years' War to the Wars of Liberation
The Seven Years War , which began in 1756 , also had an impact on the Prussian-Saxon border area surrounding Elsterwerda. Troops passing through visited the area again and again and the Prussians tried to force young men from the occupied territories into their army by means of forced recruitment.
On October 10, 1757, the Austrian imperial count Andreas Hadik von Futak assembled his small corps in Elsterwerda, then Electoral Saxony . The city was the starting point of Hadik's famous Berlin hussar coup , in which he occupied the Prussian capital Berlin for one day on October 16, 1757 and collected around 200,000 thalers in contribution . Besides Hadik there were also Generals Paul Frhr. v. Babocsay , Graf Mittrovsky and General von Kleefeld were involved. They left on October 11th. As cover, von Kleefeld stayed behind with 1000 border guards, 240 cuirassiers, 300 hussars and 2 guns in Elsterwerda. Colonel Ferdinand Franz v. Ujházy , who secured the marching column with 300 hussars from his regiment, returned to Elsterwerda on October 22, 1757, while Hadik returned to safe terrain via Cottbus and Spremberg after the end of this military operation .
In 1791 the castle accommodated as guests, among others, King Friedrich Wilhelm II , the Crown Prince of Prussia and the Count of Artois, later King Charles X of France. Karl von Kurland died in 1796 and the castle remained under the administration of the Saxon electors until 1814.
During the Wars of Liberation in 1813, the area around Elsterwerda experienced enormous troop movements by French and Prussian war organizations, and so that year on July 20, Napoléon and his entourage went through Elsterwerda for a troop inspection in Luckau . Shortly before the Battle of the Nations near Leipzig , from September 28th to 30th, 1813, Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher's corps with 30,000 men camped in Elsterwerda and Kotschka. At about the same time, at the end of September, the corps of Generals Dobschütz and Tauentzien , also with 30,000 men, took quarters for ten days in nearby Liebenwerda. A short time later, on October 9, 1813, Blücher moved into his headquarters near Leipzig and completely defeated Marshal Marmont near Möckern in the Battle of Leipzig on October 16 .
Younger story
The division of Saxony and the beginning of industrialization
As a result of the provisions of the Congress of Vienna in 1815, Elsterwerda came from the Kingdom of Saxony to the Merseburg administrative district of the Prussian province of Saxony and the Liebenwerda district was established. In October 1851, the Prussian Provincial School College commissioned the Ministry of Culture to set up a seminar in Elsterwerda Castle. The approval was given on April 6, 1852, but the building permit was not granted until 1856. In the autumn of 1857, the renovation work was completed and on January 6, 1858 the handover to the seminar administration took place. On November 13, 1857, the Royal Prussian Teachers' College was opened with 19 pupils, thus establishing Elsterwerda's reputation as a school town.
In 1852, construction work began at Zeischa to regulate the Black Elster. The river got its current bed by 1861 and was diked with dams. In Elsterwerda the trenches and rivers that flowed through and around the city were largely filled in. New streets and residential areas were built in their place. At first, the sailing ships of Count von Einsiedel , who operated an ironworks in Mückenberg and a hammer mill in Gröditz, still operated on the river . To make the Black Elster navigable, a lock was built in Plessa in 1853. The increasing siltation of the river made shipping unprofitable and stopped after about twenty years. On January 4, 1880, one of the Elster dams and the Elsterwerda market square broke, and the adjacent streets were 1.5 m deep under water.
On June 1, 1874, the Upper Lusatian Railway was handed over from Kohlfurt via Biehla to Falkenberg (later Wittenberg). One year later, on January 2, 1875, the first groundbreaking for the Elsterwerda-Riesa Railway was done, and the first train was already running on October 15. On June 17th, the train service from Dresden to Berlin started . The Elsterwerda railway junction was created, which had a major impact on life in the village. In the following years the railway developed into one of the strongest commercial enterprises in the city and due to the favorable railway connections several industrial companies settled in Elsterwerda and Biehla, which was also noticeable in the increasing population development.
In 1879, today's town hall in Hauptstrasse was bought. Before that, the building of today's hotel "Weißes Roß" was used as the town hall. The post office at Markt 3 was handed over in the same year and was later located in Langestrasse and from 1905–1999 in Elsterstrasse 20. Elsterwerda citizens founded the volunteer fire brigade in 1881 and the first syringe house was built in 1888. After many renovations and extensions, the devices were housed on Burgstrasse.
Mayor Christian Wilhelm von Bittag died in 1882 at the age of 61 and the city announced the mayor's position again in June 1882. Since the small town was still economically undeveloped, the new mayor could only be offered a monthly salary of 87.50 marks, free accommodation and the use of a house garden. In July the decision was made in favor of the then 28-year-old court clerk Karl Wilhelm Albert Wilde, who was introduced to his office on September 18, 1882 and who had a strong influence on the development of the city in the period that followed. In October of the same year, he passed a resolution in the city council to introduce the previously missing street lighting in Elsterwerda. After his inauguration, a number of small businesses settled in Elsterwerda by the turn of the century, as the young mayor paid special attention to the city's favorable traffic situation and was able to inspire industrial companies to use them to their advantage. The old farming town became more modern and Elsterwerda, as well as its population, grew steadily. The families of factory workers and railway workers were constantly relocating, which at times led to a housing shortage. In 1900 all households received electricity and in December 1901 65-candle lamps lit the streets of Elsterwerda.
In the following year, an arsonist caused unrest in Elsterwerda, who set fires in nine different places over six nights and whose flames fell victim to several sheds and barns. It was only after long efforts and night time patrols that the alleged perpetrators, August Hurras, succeeded in arresting a dismissed police intestine. He was later sentenced to five years in prison before the jury court in Torgau .
On April 1, 1905, the city's first kindergarten was opened. One year later, in 1906, the first water was released through the new water pipeline in Elsterwerda. On this occasion, Mayor Wilde inaugurated a fountain on the market, which was later called the Mayor Wilde fountain and which has been lost since the market square was redesigned in 1967. The ten municipal wells equipped with handle pumps were removed in April 1907. After two twelve-year terms of office, the city council elected Wilde as mayor for life in the same year. In 1912 the first 110 kV high voltage line in Europe was built, which led from Lauchhammer over the Elsterdamm to Elsterwerda and further along the Elsterwerda-Grödel raft canal via Gröditz to Riesa . Some of the foundations of that time can still be seen today along the canal, see the 110 kV Lauchhammer-Riesa line .
The time from the First World War to the end of the Second World War
The First World War put an end to the city's further development for the time being. Numerous citizens were called up for military service. The planned construction of a small railway from Mühlberg via Liebenwerda, Elsterwerda and the Schradendörfer to Ortrand, estimated at 2,800,000 marks, was put on hold and later never implemented. Mayor Albert Wilde died on October 16, 1919. An eight-day railroad strike in 1922 almost completely paralyzed rail traffic. After the war, the memorial fountain at the castle was inaugurated to commemorate the fallen soldiers of the teachers' college in 1922 and the Heldentor at the old Elsterwerda cemetery in 1924 in honor of the fallen citizens of Elsterwerda. On September 26, 1924, the scanned Zeppelin - airship LZ 126 the city and on the same day by was Friedrich von Delius constructed first overburden conveyor bridge in the world put into Plessa in operation. Athletes from Elsterwerda were also at the 1st Workers' Olympiad in Vienna in 1928.
The Elsterwerda-born lawyer Wilhelm Bünger , formerly a member of the DVP , state minister in Saxony and not a supporter of the new regime, led the case of the Berlin Reichstag fire in 1933 as presiding judge . Except for a local branch of the NSDAP , there was no special centralization of Nazi giants in the city. The swimming pool was built in the Holzhof sports and leisure center in 1934. In 1935 two tennis courts followed and later a soccer field was built. On the night of August 1, 1936, relay runners carried the Olympic flame through Elsterwerda to Berlin, where the 1936 Olympic Games began on the same day. The dairy cooperative was founded on April 1st of the same year. On July 26, 1937, the racing driver and former pupil of the Elsterwerda secondary school Ernst von Delius in Bonn succumbed to the serious injuries he had sustained the day before in a collision at the Nürburgring . In the early and mid-1930s, he made headlines as a promising young driver. When he died he was one of the best racing drivers in the world.
With the beginning of the Second World War , citizens of Elsterwerda were also called up for military service. Elsterwerda companies had to change their production. Soon prisoners of war were also working here, who had to replace the workers called up. Up to 70 prisoners of war from France and the Soviet Union were employed in the stoneware alone . Also from the POW camp Stalag IV-B of the Wehrmacht near Muhlberg were for inmates forced labor committed in Elsterwerda.
The first direct effects of the Second World War hit the city on May 7, 1944. Railway trains and the area around the town were affected by the low-flying attacks. After a low-flying attack on April 16, 1945, a major attack by 137 American B-17 bombers on the city followed on April 19, dropping a total of 304.8 tons of bombs. An ammunition train standing in the station was hit, the explosions of which caused severe damage on the railway site and in the city center. Within just under an hour, 20 residential buildings and most of the businesses in Elsterwerda were destroyed. The bombing attack, which was primarily aimed at the urban railway systems, killed 27 people. On April 22, 1945 the Red Army entered Elsterwerda. At around 5:30 a.m., the Wehrmacht blew up the steel arch bridge over the Black Elster, which was inaugurated on August 24, 1898. It was the only road connection to Grossenhain, Dresden and Riesa. The force of the explosion destroyed buildings in the immediate vicinity of the bridge and individual pieces of iron flew far into the city. In April 1945 there were a total of around 75 dead, most of them civilians, who either committed suicide for fear of the Red Army marching in or offered bitter resistance.
The post-war and GDR times
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After the occupation of the city in the Soviet city commander was a town commander in the building of today's Hotel "European court" and in the District Court set up a coordination and collecting point for Polish citizens. This was the contact point for Polish citizens who had to work in Elsterwerda and the surrounding area during the war. They were registered, given medical care and housed in the city. For this purpose, entire streets in the city were cordoned off with wooden cladding and checked by armed guards. Only after twelve weeks could the evacuated residents of these streets return to their apartments and land. A short time after the Red Army marched in, the town was set on fire, which destroyed an entire business district on the market and the Café Vaterland, which was also located there . In addition, many refugees and war returnees came to Elsterwerda at this time, who also had to be cared for and housed. In 1946, at the end of the war, the Elsterwerda doctor Dr. med. Reinhold Hinkel was no longer able to provide the city with medical supplies on his property in Berliner Straße, and the building of the former local court built by Friedrich Jage in 1911 was converted and furnished into a municipal hospital.
Production in the largely destroyed factories found it difficult to get going because there was a lack of electricity, material and machines. Many of the still intact machines were dismantled and shipped to the Soviet Union as reparations. While the factory was being rebuilt, the first company owners were expropriated by the Soviet military administration.
On October 1, 1945, the school at the Elsterwerda City School at the Elsterschloss began with 12 teachers and 743 students. The other schools soon followed, even if not all of the resettled children were able to attend them immediately because they lacked clothes and shoes.
After the founding of the GDR on October 7, 1949, there was a popular uprising on June 17, 1953 . While 800 workers stopped work in the steelworks in the neighboring Saxon community of Gröditz and the workforce from other companies joined them, things remained quiet in Elsterwerda. But here, too, a curfew and a ban on gatherings were imposed. The Red Army marched through the city streets again.
After the land reform of 1945, there were further reforms in agriculture and by the spring of 1960, agricultural production cooperatives were established in the urban area . In addition, Elsterwerda handicrafts also merged into so-called production cooperatives of the craft during this time .
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In 1961, the city celebrated its 750th anniversary during the festival week from June 24th to July 2nd, 1961. It was the biggest festival the city had ever put on its feet. Preparations for it began as early as June 1959 and on June 1, 1960 the archivist became rector a. D. Paul Müller hired part-time full-time as head of the organizing committee for the 750th anniversary celebration by the city council. The opening of the festivities took place on the market square, while the fairground was on the castle grounds. A wide variety of events took place here, such as choir and dais concerts, other cultural events and operetta performances. Sports events and competitions could mainly be found on the wood yard area and in all parts of the village there were dance events and concerts. The festival plaque was the ticket for the events. The highlight of the festival week was a two kilometer long parade on Sunday, June 25th through the city center to Krauschütz. About 30,000 people lined the roadsides as spectators.
The DEFA children's film Destination Erfurt by Heinz Fischer in 1962 attracted a lot of attention . a. Members of the Elsterwerda sports advertising group were. The script for the film was written by the writer and former Elsterwerda student Klaus Beuchler , together with Fred Rodrian . In addition to the actors from the city, the director Heinz Fischer and Klaus Beuchler also came to the Elsterwerda premiere in the city cinema on June 7, 1962.
In the following years the city and its businesses continued to grow. Apartment blocks with 440 apartments were built in Elsterwerda-West between 1961 and 1969, and further apartment blocks were built here by the end of the 1980s. On September 1, 1968, a new school was inaugurated there, which was named Johannes Dieckmann on September 27, 1969 and in 1973 a large department store was built in the immediate vicinity with the so-called Blue Wonder , which was demolished in July 1991 and later replaced it new shopping opportunities arose.
The rapidly growing volume of traffic in Elsterwerda and the simultaneous increase in freight traffic on the Dresden-Berlin railway line led to more and more problems in the 1970s, as the vehicles that crossed the city had to pass two railway barriers. Long waiting times of up to three quarters of an hour on the Berlin route were the result, and it became necessary to build a bridge. The connected new road led past the districts of Biehla and Elsterwerda-West. Both were released on June 30, 1978 and the level crossing on the Berlin route could be closed.
On April 15, 1980, the small gallery in downtown Elsterwerda was handed over to the Kulturbund . It should become an artistic focal point in the city. The naming, small gallery "Hans Nadler" , took place on May 22, 1982.
In the 1980s, problems arose in Elsterwerda due to the general poor economic situation in the GDR. The resident companies had to struggle with a lack of labor, a lack of foreign exchange and therefore, in turn, with a lack of modernization. The range of goods was no longer sufficient for everyone and there were often long queues for deliveries to the shops or goods were only sold to “good friends” behind the counter. The waiting time for an order for a car was 12-15 years before delivery. Dissatisfaction spread. During the turnaround time in 1989 drove many Elsterwerdaer to the Monday demonstrations in Leipzig and when on 9 November 1989 opened the borders, long queues formed in front of the town hall in order to get the coveted stamp in the passport in order to West Germany or West Berlin go to can. On November 16, 1989, the first people began to take to the streets in Elsterwerda as well. 350 citizens gathered in the market and then a march with the slogan “We are the people” marched through the streets of the city. In the following period there was a festive service every day at 7 p.m. in the town church and on November 23, 500 citizens had already gathered on the market square.
Recent past
In the period after the fall of the Wall there were radical changes in general life in the city. The shops were filled with goods from the Federal Republic and people had the previously much-missed freedom of movement. After the reunification, many companies in the city and the surrounding area went bankrupt and closed. Elsterwerda station lost its importance as a traffic junction. Unemployment spread in the city and many citizens went to the west of Germany to earn their living there. But new businesses also emerged and the planning and implementation of the East industrial area began in the fields in the east of Elsterwerda. The eastern industrial park is now almost 100 percent full.
In the 1990s there were a number of major fires in Elsterwerda. After a butcher's shop on Elsterwerdaer Promenade had been destroyed by fire, on April 6, 1995, the newly renovated town hall caught fire. The building suffered considerable damage from the fire and the subsequent extinguishing work. The complete renovation only took place in 1993/1994. The town hall was followed in September 1997 by the fire in the VÖWA, a company in the West industrial area, which produced polyurethane panels from recycled material for the car, furniture and construction industries, where there was also major property damage and on November 20, 1997 there was a fire disaster on the Elsterwerda train station . One firefighter was killed in the subsequent extinguishing work and another later died in hospital. Other firefighters were seriously injured and had to have their burn injuries treated in hospitals. Fortunately, the city got off relatively lightly from the catastrophe, because the locomotive shed of the railway depot, in the direction of which the greatest force of the explosions went, acted like a protective shield in front of the adjacent residential area in Elsterwerda-West.
Comprehensive construction work to beautify the market square began in February 2007. As a result, the Elsterbrunnen was demolished on April 19, 2007 and the first construction phase was handed over in December 2007 with a newly designed Elsterbrunnen.
Literature (selection)
- Eberhard Matthes, Werner Galle: Elsterwerda in old views . 2nd Edition. European Library, 1998, ISBN 90-288-5344-8 .
- Luise Grundmann, Dietrich Hanspach: The Schraden . Ed .: Institute for Regional Geography Leipzig and the Saxon Academy of Sciences in Leipzig. Böhlau, Cologne 2005, ISBN 3-412-10900-2 .
- Margarete Noack: Elsterwerda - When the chimneys were still smoking: Photo documents from the years 1949–1989 . Leipziger Verlagsgesellschaft, Leipzig 2004, ISBN 3-910143-14-8 .
- Albert Deroche: On Stranger Paths. From Albert Deroche's diary. The years 1895-1919 . Ed .: Michael Goebel. Wagner, Gelnhausen 2007, ISBN 978-3-86683-159-9 .
- Home calendar for the Bad Liebenwerda district . Bad Liebenwerda (local history book series since 1912).
Web links
- The history of the city of Elsterwerda on the local homepage
Notes and individual references
The main sources were Elsterwerda in old views by Eberhardt Matthes and Werner Galle, Elsterwerda - When the chimneys were still smoking by Margarete Noack, as well as various articles in the book series Heimatkalender for the Bad Liebenwerda district published in Liebenwerda since 1912 .
- ↑ Town.
- ↑ Luise Grundmann, Dietrich Hanspach (ed.): Der Schraden. A regional study in the Elsterwerda, Lauchhammer, Hirschfeld and Ortrand area . Böhlau, Cologne / Weimar / Vienna 2001, ISBN 3-412-10900-2 , pp. 82-83 .
- ↑ City of Elsterwerda (ed.): Where Teutons once settled - excavations in the industrial area east in Elsterwerda . (Flyer).
- ^ Bernd Müller: Castle and Castle Elsterwerda . In: Home calendar for the old district of Bad Liebenwerda, the Mückenberger Ländchen, outskirts on Schraden and Uebigau-Falkenberg . Gräser-Verlag, Großenhain 2000, ISBN 3-932913-16-7 , p. 51-55 .
- ↑ Rudolf Matthies: Hussites in our home area . In: Home calendar for the Bad Liebenwerda district . 1965, p. 100-105 .
- ↑ Dr. Dietrich Hanspach: How big was Elsterwerda in the Middle Ages? In: Home calendar of the Bad Liebenwerda district . 1993, p. 54-57 .
- ^ Matthias Donath : Castles between Elbe and Elster . Meissen 2007.
- ↑ kuk-wehrmacht.de ( Memento of the original from January 2, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .
- ↑ Die Schwarze Elster , free local history supplement to the Liebenwerdaer Kreisblatt , article: “Schloß Elsterwerda”, No. 122, March 17, 1910.
- ↑ Wolfgang Eckelmann, Michael Ziehlke: Chronicle of the City of Bad Liebenwerda , Ed .: Association for City Marketing and Economy Bad Liebenwerda e. V., Bad Liebenwerda, 2006.
- ↑ Flyer: 600 Years of Krauschütz-1406-2006.
- ↑ Werner Stang with the assistance of Kurt Arlt (Ed.): Brandenburg in 1945 - Studies . Brandenburg State Center for Political Education, Potsdam 1995, p. 30/31 .
- ↑ Project “17. June 1953 ", 17juni53.de (PDF; 57 kB).
- ↑ History of Elsterwerda. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .
- ↑ Klaus Beuchler . In: Two thousand and one lexicon of international film .
- ↑ Construction projects in Elsterwerda ( Memento of the original from July 21, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .
Coordinates: 51 ° 27 ' N , 13 ° 32' E