History of the city of Hanau

The history of the city of Hanau begins with a moated castle of the same name, first mentioned in the 12th century , which was built on an island in the Kinzig river shortly before it flows into the Main .

Coat of arms of the city of Hanau

Beginnings

The Hanau City Palace before demolition. View of the medieval parts of the castle from the northwest. Lithograph by CW Woerishoffer, around 1828

Hanau castle and city around 1400.

The castle was initially owned by the Lords of Buchen . It was first mentioned in 1143 when Dammo von Hagenowe is mentioned as a witness in a document . The next year he called himself Dammo von Buchen again and had his son Arnold with him. By 1145 it appears 11 times as Dammo von Hanau. Arnold called himself Arnold von Buchen again, after which he appears for 17 years (21 times) as Arnold von Hanau.

Around 1166/8 a change of rule seems to have taken place. An aristocratic family appeared as an inheritance, which initially named itself after its ancestral castle Dorfelden , also with the name "Lords of Dorfelden-Hagenowe (Hanau)", but from 1191 after the castle Hanau.

The Lords of Hanau also very successfully expanded their territory in the area around Hanau in the period that followed. Sun acquired Reinhard I. of Hanau 1277 Bulau from the Archdiocese of Mainz .

A settlement developed around Hanau Castle. In the neighborhood there was another settlement, the Kinzdorf , which had its own parish church , which was also responsible for Hanau until the 15th century. At least three other localities in the Hanau urban area are documented that became deserted in the course of the late Middle Ages : Heilmannshausen , Helwigshausen and Mühlrode .

middle Ages

Rest of the city walls of the old town

Castle and expanded city of Hanau around 1550

On February 2, 1303 King Albrecht I granted the Hanau settlement market and town charter in accordance with Frankfurt town charter . This included the right to hold markets, to elect a council headed by two mayors , and freedom from serfdom (“ city ​​air makes you free ”). During this time, construction of the first city ​​wall began.

The city of Hanau soon replaced the neighboring Kinzdorf. The Marienkirche , first mentioned in 1317 , then a Maria Magdalenen Church , was initially a collegiate church and became the Hanau parish church in 1434.

The first Jewish community in Hanau was also destroyed in the plague pogroms of 1349 . On the other hand, King Charles IV already awarded Ulrich III in 1351 . from Hanau the Judenregal .

Between 1403 and 1419 the city was pledged to Kurmainz due to political and financial difficulties of Ulrich V. Presumably later, the story of the martial wine developed from it , which until the 19th century was served to the citizens of the old town on the evening before Martini .

Emperor Sigismund raised Reinhard II von Hanau to the rank of imperial count in 1429 . Reinhard II had the Marienkirche enlarged to include the late Gothic choir, which is still preserved today. With his death in 1451 it became the burial place of the Counts of Hanau .

The city of Hanau grew during this time and a suburb developed in the west, outside the first ring of the wall, in front of the Metzgertor, in the area of ​​today's Hospitalstrasse. This got its name from the Alt-Hanauer Hospital , which was also built there during this time. In 1470 this suburb received its own defense system, which leaned against the first city wall.

In 1484 the oldest old town hall, which we know of, was built on the corner of Metzgergasse / Old Town Market, the so-called playhouse . Found too small 50 years later, it was replaced by a new town hall in 1537–1538, today's goldsmith's house .

reformation

City view of Hanau from Abraham Saur's Theatrum Urbium , edition from 1610

The County of Hanau-Munzenberg soon joined the Reformation - initially in its Lutheran form. In 1528 Count Philipp II of Hanau-Münzenberg called the evangelical preacher Philipp Neunheller to Hanau. The process of the Reformation ran smoothly and only came under Count Philip III. to a first degree. In St. Mary's Church, which was initially still a Catholic, no more canons were appointed, so that the monastery went out and the church became Protestant.

Under Philip II, the construction of the second city ​​fortification according to the technical standard of the Renaissance began in 1528 , which enclosed the three wall systems that were built in the Middle Ages, that of the castle, that of the old town and that of the city expansion in the area of ​​Hospitalstrasse. The medieval wall had become too small in size and also offered insufficient technical protection against the emerging artillery . The new city fortifications received several bastions that made it possible to set up cannons. Its walls and earthworks were several meters thick. In addition, it was built in such a way that bullets rarely hit head-on and thus could cause less damage. A second city expansion now moved ahead of the first up to the Kinzig. It is still called “suburb” today. In 1556 the foundation stone was laid for a new stone bridge over the Kinzig. Until 1829 there was a wide gate tower on it, the Margarethenturm.

Philipp Ludwig II of Hanau-Munzenberg

Draft for the construction of Hanauer Neustadt in 1597

For Count Philipp Ludwig II. , Whose father died early, Count Johann VI. von Nassau-Dillenburg fulfilled the guardianship and finally married his mother, Juliana Countess von Stolberg . Philip Ludwig II came under strong Calvinist influence. As ruling sovereign he then made use of his right to determine the denomination of his territory (" cuius regio, eius religio "). The county of Hanau-Münzenberg was Calvinist and the medieval furnishings of the Marienkirche were largely removed.

The border between the Archdiocese of Mainz and the County of Hanau, drawn due to legal disputes on the occasion of the establishment of the new town of Hanau in 1597. To the left of the center of the picture the new town under construction.

Hanau - Excerpt from the Topographia Hassiae by Matthäus Merian 1655, the Neustadt on the right

Jewish cemetery, oldest part from the 17th century.

On June 1, 1597, Philipp Ludwig II signed a contract with Calvinist refugees from France and the Spanish Netherlands , the surrender of the Neustadt Hanau to settle in Hanau. The surrender was supplemented in 1604 by a transfix of the Neustadt Hanau . It is the founding act for Hanauer Neustadt . The count turned the construction site in front of the Hanau Altstadt available - against the resistance of the Archbishop of Mainz having the area as owed in Wildbann looked -, paid the infrastructure - especially the fortification -, tax benefits granted and political self-determination for the new township. The religious refugees from France and the Netherlands earlier in the imperial city of Frankfurt was not very well received and therefore had an interest to leave the jurisdiction of the Lutheran-dominated Frankfurt and to go to a Calvinist art without being too far from the Frankfurt exhibition space to remove. In addition, the Hanau Count was nowhere near as powerful as the wealthy city of Frankfurt and was therefore ready to make economic and political concessions. With the refugees, capital and ability to manufacture luxury goods came to the city, including cloth makers , trimmers (manufacturers of braids, ribbons, sashes and tassels), linen and fabric weavers, trouser and stocking knitters, hat makers , gold and silversmiths and painters , like Daniel Soreau .

The new town was built from the outset with its own, modern baroque fortifications, which were based on the fortifications of the old town. The planned layout of the city established a regular, chessboard-like road network that characterizes Hanauer Neustadt to this day and is now a listed building. The first houses in the new town were built in the year the capitulation was concluded. The inscription on the first house -  Zum Paradies in Paradiesgasse - has been preserved to this day. The Lossow house on the market was also built in 1597. In 1620 there were over 370 houses. Its own large double church (today: Walloon-Dutch Church ) was built until 1611 with one church room for the French-speaking and one for the Dutch- speaking congregation.

Both cities existed side by side until 1821. In addition to the spatial separation through the fortification between the old and new town, both towns had their own separate administrations and city councils, each with their own mayors. In the 1830s the military high court was canceled.

The first Jewish community in Hanaus was destroyed in the plague pogroms of 1349. In December 1603, Philip Ludwig II then issued a privilege to resettle a Jewish community. The Judengasse (today: Nordstraße ) was built between the old and new towns in the area of ​​the Zwinger of the old town fortifications . This community was directly subordinate to the count's administration, not one of the two city administrations of the old or new town of Hanau. During the " Fettmilch uprising " in Frankfurt in the summer of 1614, around 250 Jews from Frankfurt found temporary refuge in Hanau.

Thirty Years' War

Hanau - Excerpt from the Topographia Hassiae by Matthäus Merian 1655

Relief of the besieged fortress Hanau in the Theatrum Europaeum 1636.

At the beginning of the Thirty Years' War , the Calvinist County of Hanau stood on the side of the "Winter King" Friedrich V (1596–1632). Count Philipp Moritz von Hanau-Munzenberg was too weak to pursue an independent policy in this conflict. First on the imperial side, he handed over the fortress Hanau to Swedish cavalry regiments when King Gustav II Adolf of Sweden approached with his army. The king asked for eight companies of infantry and appointed Philip Moritz colonel. But in 1634 he traveled with most of his family via Metz to safe Holland. From 1630 to 1638, the Swedish army under the Scottish general Jakob von Ramsay used Hanau as a base to control the surrounding area from there. Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen processed the Swedish occupation of Hanau in his picaresque novel The adventurous Simplicissimus (Simplicius Simplicissimus).

House wall with sgraffito in memory of Grimmelshausen's picaresque novel Simplicius Simplicissimus . A remnant of the city wall in front.

From 1635 to 1636 Hanau was besieged unsuccessfully by imperial troops under General Lamboy . The Kinzdorf Church, which was the last remaining part of the Kinzdorf, was destroyed along with the surrounding cemetery. It has been archaeologically proven for the area where Westbahnhofstrasse and the street “Im Kinzdorf” meet.

The modern fortification system that had only been erected a few years earlier proved its worth during the siege. Thousands had fled from the surrounding villages into the city, the conditions were terrible. After nine months of siege, a relief army under Landgrave Wilhelm V of Hesse-Kassel (1627–1637) moved in June 1636 and liberated the city. Wilhelm V of Hessen-Kassel was married to a daughter of Count Philipp Ludwig II, Amalie Elisabeth . Since then, thanksgiving services have been held annually, from which the Lamboy Festival developed from 1800. In February 1638, the Swedes were expelled from Hanau by a military coup, supported by the Wetterau Imperial Counts College , and Count Philipp Moritz was reinstated in the government. General Ramsay had evidently hoped to rule the town and county.

South side with tower and entrance of St. John's Church, built in 1658 . Part of the medieval city wall was included in the construction at the bottom left.

In 1642 the last Count of Hanau-Munzenberg died. According to a contract of inheritance from 1610, the Hanau-Lichtenberger line now inherited. In Hanau-Lichtenberg ruled at that time the only nineteen years and after the then legal opinion underage Friedrich Casimir of Hanau-Lichtenberg . The war was still raging, the relationship to the last deceased Hanau-Munzenberg count was only extensive, so the assumption of power was by no means secure. Count Friedrich Casimir was brought to Hanau by his guardian, Baron Georg II von Fleckenstein-Dagstuhl, on secret routes and incognito . There he first had to contractually guarantee all sorts of concessions to the patriciate of the Neustadt before he could take power. This included, above all, freedom of religion for the Reformed denomination, because the County of Hanau-Lichtenberg had remained Lutheran and Count Friedrich Casimir was a Lutheran. Friedrich Casimir initially had Lutheran services held for himself and his court in the palace chapel. 1658–1662 a separate church was built for the Lutheran congregation (today: Alte Johanneskirche ), which is now also the burial place of the count's house. From then on it served as the parish church of the Lutheran parish and court church of the Count's House.

In 1643, with the help of Landgravine Amelia Elisabeth von Hessen-Kassel, it was possible to enforce Friedrich Casimir's claims against the Archbishop of Mainz. In return, Friedrich Casimir concluded an inheritance contract with the Landgravine, stating that, should the Hanau house die out, the county should fall to Hessen-Kassel . This happened in 1736.

The population development of Hanau, as the only city in the county of Hanau-Münzenberg that was spared from the looting by the military, rose steadily during and after the war:

• 1632: 1030 families
• 1707: 1805 families
• 1754: 11,424 inhabitants

Under the last Count of Hanau

Frankfurter Tor, east side

Philippsruhe Castle

Neustädter Rathaus with the Brothers Grimm Monument

On 5 March 1661 granted Count Friedrich Casimir, a privilege which in Hanau establishing the first German faience - factory led. In 1665 the building of the High State School was completed after many years of construction (on the northern edge of today's Freiheitsplatz, roughly in the area of ​​today's trade union building).

The Philippsruhe Palace was built since 1701 . In 1712 the first rooms were ready for occupancy, in 1714 it was finally completed. Count Philipp Reinhard also began building the Marstall on Schlossplatz (later: City Hall, now part of the Hanau Congress Park ). While the stables were being built, Count Johann Reinhard III began. In 1713 a north wing (prince's building) was added to the city palace, which emerged from the medieval castle. 1722–1733 the Frankfurter Tor and the Neustädter Rathaus were built as municipal buildings .

Johann Reinhard III died in 1736. Seventy as the last male representative of the Hanau Count House. Due to the inheritance contract of 1643, the Hanau-Münzenberg part of the state fell to Hesse-Kassel , due to the marriage of the only daughter of the last Hanau Count, Charlotte , with the Hereditary Prince Ludwig (VIII.) Of Hesse-Darmstadt, the Hanau-Lichtenberg share went there.

Residence town of a secondary school of Hessen-Kassel

Due to the Hessian Insurance Act of 1754, which was supposed to ensure by Landgrave Wilhelm VIII of Hesse-Kassel that his son, Friedrich II , who had converted to the Roman Catholic faith, received as little power as possible after he took office, the County of Hanau was given by the Hesse-Kassel ancestral lands separated and directly subordinated to the Hessian Hereditary Prince Wilhelm (IX.) , later Elector Wilhelm I, for whom his mother, Princess Maria of Great Britain , initially ruled as guardian until 1764.

Since Wilhelm VIII of Hessen-Kassel was on the side of Frederick the Great in the Seven Years' War , French troops occupied Hessen-Kassel and Hanau from 1759–1762. After the French withdrew, Princess Maria took up residence in Hanau and resided alternately in the City Palace and Philippsruhe Palace. She lived separately from her husband, Landgrave Friedrich II, who had converted to Catholicism. In Hanau, she had the prince's building of the city palace expanded with a horseshoe-shaped extension, the so-called Friedrichsbau. In World War II, both buildings were bombed and demolished after the war.

Hereditary Prince Wilhelm (IX) generously sponsored his residence city of Hanau. In 1765 he had the fortifications between the old and new towns torn down. Paradeplatz and Esplanade (today: Freiheitsplatz ) were built on this area , in 1768 the city ​​theater , in 1777 the armory with guard and also the Kollegienhaus (today: authority building). He founded the drawing academy in 1772 . It is one of the oldest still existing training centers for goldsmiths , silversmiths, engravers , metal sculptors and gem setters .

From 1776 to 1783 the Hereditary Prince rented a troop contingent from Hanau County, approx. 2,400 men, to his uncle, King George IV of Great Britain , for use in the American War of Independence (so-called soldier trade ). Among other things, the Wilhelmsbad spa complex - construction began in 1777 - was financed from the proceeds of this business , the iron-bearing spring of which was discovered as early as 1709. In 1781 the Comoedienhaus was opened in Wilhelmsbad.

Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm were born in Hanau in 1785 and 1786 .

Napoleonic Wars

Plan of the Battle of Hanau in 1813

The Nuremberg goal - after razing the baroque ramparts guarded two of these classical gatehouses the eastern entrance of the city.

In 1806 Hanau was occupied by French troops and came under their military administration. They razed the city's fortifications. From 1810 to 1813 Hanau belonged to the Napoleonic satellite state " Grand Duchy of Frankfurt ". After the Battle of the Nations near Leipzig , Napoléon Bonaparte was able to win his last victory on German soil against a 30,000-strong Bavarian-Austrian army under General Wrede in the Battle of Hanau on October 30 and 31, 1813 . General Wrede had occupied Hanau and tried to block Napoleon's way back to the Rhine. Blücher's army followed the French through Thuringia. In the battle of Hanau, however, the Bavarian artillery ran out of powder prematurely and had to withdraw. The next day the French penetrated Hanau. Wrede tried to drive the French out of town. The suburb was shot at by French artillery and Wrede wounded. The next morning the French moved on.

In Kurhessen

After the withdrawal of the French troops, Hanau became part of the re-established state of Kurhessen . Elector Wilhelm I returned from exile. He tried to restore the conditions from the time before the French invasion, to reverse every change and alienated the middle classes and all those who had made careers in the last 7 years. There were bourgeois counter-reactions, around 1817 the establishment of the first gymnastics club in Hanau.

In 1818, 59 Reformed and 22 Lutheran pastors as well as numerous church elders from the former County of Hanau united their parishes to form a Uniate Church in the “ Hanau Union ” . It was - in contrast to the " Evangelical Church of the Old Prussian Union " - a church association "from below". It was certainly also due to economic constraints, but only succeeded because the theological differences between Reformed and Lutherans had in the meantime - also in the course of the Enlightenment  - abraded. The union is also called the “ bookbinding union” because - for economic reasons - the Heidelberg Catechism and Luther's Catechism were simply bound together in one book and it was left to the faithful to choose which one to use. Only the Walloon-Dutch community did not join the union and remained - to this day - an independent Reformed community.

Since the churches in Hanau could no longer be named after the denominations, ie “Reformed Church” or “Lutheran Church”, they had to be given new names. The former Reformed Church, the Maria Magdalena Collegiate Church of the Middle Ages, was named after the late Landgravine Maria: Marienkirche.

In 1821 the old town of Hanau and the new town of Hanau, which was founded in 1597, were merged into one town as part of an administrative reform in the state of Hesse.

In 1829, Elector Wilhelm II had the medieval castle, part of the Hanau City Palace, torn down in order to get a better view of the palace park from the newer parts of the palace.

Revolution and the Bourgeois Age

Hanau was a center of the democratic movement in Germany in the 19th century . In 1830 and 1848, important revolutionary impulses emanated from here (popularly: "Hanau riots "). In 1830 there was a rebellion in Hanau against the neo-absolutism of the elector, which culminated in the storming of the Mainzollamt by citizens of Hanau. The rioters were later called in for criminal service and had to dig drainage ditches in what is now the port area (" Am Krawallgraben "). The goal of the bourgeoisie was a modern constitution. In the course of the revolution, the elector was forced to grant this, but was soon canceled again.

In 1832, as a result of the Hambach Festival, a political folk festival with around 8,000 to 10,000 participants took place in Wilhelmsbad , the so-called Wilhelmsbad Festival .

Hanau subsequently became a stronghold of civil emancipation in the electoral state. The revolutionary gymnastics movement gained a foothold here, the Hanau gymnastics community was founded in 1837, the Hanau History Association was founded in 1844 and the first German gymnastics day took place in the Walloon Church in Hanau in 1848 . At the same time the German Gymnastics Federation was founded. The keynote speaker was Friedrich Ludwig Jahn , who was with his friend August Schärttner in Hanau during this time . A plaque commemorates the event on the Wallonia Church.

With the opening of the Frankfurt – Hanau line on September 10, 1848 by the Frankfurt-Hanauer Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft (FHE), Hanau was connected to the newly emerging railway network. The FHE station was roughly where the Hanau Westbahnhof is located today . In the following decades, more routes were added and the city developed into a railway junction:

• Main-Spessart-Bahn , Hanau - Aschaffenburg - Bavaria
• Frankfurt-Bebraer Eisenbahn , (east direction): Kinzigtalbahn , Hanau - Fulda - Göttingen
• Frankfurt-Bebraer Eisenbahn (westward direction): Offenbach am Main - Frankfurt am Main (today: Südmainische S-Bahn )
• Railway line Friedberg – Hanau to Friedberg
• Odenwaldbahn to Babenhausen - Groß-Umstadt Wiebelsbach - Erbach - Eberbach

The bad economic conditions led to the March Revolution in 1848 . In February 1848, a Hanau deputation ultimately demanded that the Elector re-grant the constitution of 1830. Elector Friedrich Wilhelm gave in to the revolutionary pressure, but then actually abdicated and left the business of government to his son, Elector Wilhelm II.

In 1849, Hanauer Turner under August Schärttner also took part in the third Baden uprising , the Baden May uprising , which ended on June 21 of the same year with the defeat of the rebels in the battle near Waghäusel . Before that, they won a victory for the revolution in the battle near Hirschhorn am Neckar : On June 14, they successfully defended Hirschhorn Castle against Bavarian , Hessian and Mecklenburg associations .

In Prussia

After the Battle of Königgrätz in the German War of 1866 , Prussian troops moved into Hanau on July 16, 1866. The Free City of Frankfurt , the Duchy of Nassau and Kurhessen with Hanau became part of the Kingdom of Prussia .

In 1873 the Main Bridge between Hanau and Steinheim was completed together with the Frankfurt-Bebraer Eisenbahn , the southern Main Railway connection between Hanau and Frankfurt. From 1886 Hanau formed its own urban district.

On March 23, 1893, the 1st Hanau Football Club 1893 was founded in the “Mohr” restaurant on Krämerstrasse . In addition to VfB Stuttgart , which was founded in the same year, it is the oldest football club in southern Germany.

The composer Paul Hindemith was born in Hanau in 1895 .

In 1896 the Brothers Grimm National Monument was erected on Neustädter Markt and in 1897 a memorial for its founder, Count Philipp Ludwig II of Hanau-Münzenberg, on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of the Neustadt Hanau. It is now located south of the Dutch-Walloon Church.

In the middle of 1908, Hanauer Straßenbahn AG , founded on March 28, 1907, began operations on a route network of 5.2 km, initially with two lines. The Hanau tram ran until 1945.

Hanau had had a permanent garrison since the Thirty Years' War . With the establishment of the empire in 1871 , Hanau became increasingly important as a military location. In the same year, the “Royal Prussian Powder Factory Hanau” was founded in Bulau in what is now the Wolfgang district , and started operations in 1876/77 (today Wolfgang Industrial Park ). Along with Hanau's rise to an industrial city , two Prussian railroad regiments (2nd railroad brigade ) and a railroad replacement park were relocated to Hanau from 1910 onwards . At the beginning of the First World War in 1914, there were also infantry and cavalry in addition to the railroad troops - around 7,000 soldiers in total. Between 1914 and 1918 around 170,000 recruits from all units were trained in Hanau and sent to the fronts.

The last 100 years

Memorial inscription for the Jewish community Hanau in the valley of the communities in Yad Vashem

Avro Lancaster of the British Royal Air Force dropping the bomb.

Commemorative plaque for the victims in an air raid shelter caused by the bombing of March 19, 1945 in the memorial complex on the main cemetery in Hanau.

The First World War ended in Hanau with the November Revolution . A workers 'and soldiers' council was formed. Socialists occupied the district building. It was not until 1919 that government troops brought Hanau back under government power. Then a representative democracy was introduced in the Weimar Republic, in the Free State of Prussia and also in Hanau. There was a city council elected in free elections to elect the magistrate. With the Allied occupation of the Rhineland , the city was occupied by French troops in 1920.

In 1933, when the National Socialists came to power (→  Hitler government ), the democratic city administration also ended. Hanau had had a Jewish community since 1604 . In 1933 about 600 Jews lived in Hanau. During the November pogroms in 1938 ("Reichskristallnacht") the old synagogue burned down. The people covered by the Nuremberg Race Laws were deported from Germany before and during World War II and murdered in the Holocaust .

The old town hall was rededicated to the German goldsmith's house under the Nazi mayor Walter Junker in 1942.

In the aerial warfare of the Second World War , Hanau was often the target of air raids (see: List of air raids on Hanau in the Second World War ). After the two most serious, the air raid on Hanau on January 6, 1945 , in which the old town was largely destroyed, and the air raid on Hanau on March 19, 1945 , ten days before the invasion of US troops, the entire city center was destroyed. The city was hit like hardly any other city in what would later become Hesse . There were only seven houses left in the city center. The population, in 1938 there were 40,000 people (including 300 Jews), fell to less than 10,000. Hanau lost many of its most important cultural monuments and the city center lost its medieval face.

All bridges near Hanau were blown up in order to hinder the enemy advance. From March 28, 1945, the 4th US Armored Division built a bridgehead over the Main and continued its advance towards Giessen .

During the reconstruction of the city, the ruins of the city palace, the armory and the city theater were demolished against great opposition from the population and key associations such as the Hanau History Association, as well as most of the remaining remains of the medieval city fortifications. The surrounding wall of the Walloon half of the Walloon-Dutch double church is a ruin and memorial to this day. The cityscape of Hanau has changed radically as a result.

With the establishment of the state of Greater Hesse on September 19, 1945 through Proclamation No. 2 of the American military government , Hanau, which previously belonged to the Free State of Prussia, became part of Hesse .

The area around Hanau belonged to the American zone of occupation and became one of the largest bases of the US Army in Europe . At the height of the Cold War , around 30,000 military and civilians were active at the Hanau site in the military facilities of the Wolfgang district and the Hanau AAF (US Army Airfield) near Erlensee . The last US troops left Hanau in 2008. (see also " Fulda Gap " and foreign military bases in Germany ).

On December 31, 1971, Mittelbuchen became and in the Hessian territorial reform , which came into force on July 1, 1974, Großauheim (with Wolfgang and Hohe Tanne) as well as Klein-Auheim and Steinheim became districts of Hanau. Großauheim and Wolfgang tried to avoid incorporation into Hanau through their union in 1972.

In the early morning of October 5, 1991 , a hydrogen tank exploded on the premises of the Heraeus Quarzglas company after a hairline crack had formed due to the temperature change during filling and emptying of the tank . The pressure wave of the explosion destroyed numerous buildings on the factory premises and, in a wide area, window panes and roofs. Hydrogen tanks of the same design were shut down worldwide as a result of the accident and the design guidelines were revised.

From 1994 to 2003 Margret Härtel ( CDU ) was the first woman in the office of Lord Mayor of Hanau . She was voted out of office on May 11, 2003 after a political scandal. Claus Kaminsky ( SPD ) has been Lord Mayor since 2004 .

In 2002 Hanau hosted the second Hessian State Garden Show , which helped the city with the amphitheater to have a regularly used open-air stage.

On January 1, 2014, the previously independent evangelical parishes of the Marienkirche , the Johanneskirche , the Christ Church and the Kreuzkirche merged to form the Evangelical City Parish of Hanau .

→ Main article: Attack in Hanau 2020

On February 19, 2020, a 43-year-old German from Hanau shot and killed nine people with immigrant backgrounds at various locations in the city, then his mother and himself. He acted for racist motives, as his “Manifesto” stated.

literature

• Heinrich Bott : The old town of Hanau. Building history, house directory, pictures. A memorial book for the 650th anniversary of the old town of Hanau . Hanau 1953.
• Heinrich Bott: Foundation and beginnings of the new town of Hanau. 1596-1620 . 2 volumes. Hanau:
  • The founding of the Neustadt Hanau = Hanauer Geschichtsblätter 22 (1970)
  • The beginnings of Neustadt Hanau = Hanauer Geschichtsblätter 23 (1971)
• Erhard Bus , Martin Hoppe : The Thirty Years War in Hanau and the surrounding area. (= Hanauer Geschichtsblätter 45). Hanau 2011, ISBN 978-3-935395-15-9 .
• Reinhard Dietrich : The state constitution in Hanau (= Hanau history sheets 34). Hanau 1996, ISBN 3-9801933-6-5 .
• Reinhard Dietrich: The abdication of Ulrich V. von Hanau - causes and consequences. In: Hanauer Geschichtsblätter. 31. Hanau 1993.
• Peter Gbiorczyk: The Revolution 1848/49 and the Hanauer Land. Hammersbach 1999, ISBN 3-88654-488-5 . (2nd version 2012)
• Hanau History Association 1844 e. V .: Hanau in the Napoleonic era = Hanauer Geschichtsblätter 47. Hanau, undated [approx. 2015]. ISBN 978-3-935395-21-3
• Hard frit Krause: Hanau in the revolution 1918/19. In: Stadtzeit (1998). History magazine on the occasion of the 150 years of revolution and gymnastics movement Hanau 1848–1998, pp. 233–241.
• Fried Lübbecke : Hanau. City and county . Cologne 1951
• Anton Merk: Grinding the fortifications. In: Stadtzeit (1998). History magazine on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the revolution and gymnastics movement in Hanau 1848–1998, p. 22f.
• Monika Ilona Pfeifer, Monica Kinggreen: Jews from Hanau 1933–1945 - disenfranchisement, persecution, deportation . Ed. Evangelical working group “Christians - Jews” Hanau in cooperation with the city of Hanau, cocon-Verlag, Hanau 1998, ISBN 3-928100-64-5 .
• Günter Rauch: The union of the old town and the new town. In: City time. (1998). History magazine on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the revolution and gymnastics movement Hanau 1848–1998, pp. 25–27.
• Richard Schaffer-Hartmann: The destruction of the toll in Hanau - The Hanau riots. In: Stadtzeit (1998). History magazine on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the revolution and gymnastics movement Hanau 1848–1998, pp. 58–66.
• Hans See : The socio-structural development problems of the city of Hanau up to the revolution of 1848. In: Stadtzeit (1998). History magazine on the occasion of the 150 years of revolution and gymnastics movement in Hanau 1848–1998, pp. 35–45.
• Hellmut Seier: Hanau and Kurhessen in the mirror of the Vormärz and its historical awareness. For the 150th anniversary of the Hanau History Association. In: Hessisches Jahrbuch für Landesgeschichte. 45: 129-162 (1985).
• Reinhard Suchier : Genealogy of the Hanauer count house. In: Festschrift of the Hanau History Association for its 50th anniversary celebration on August 27, 1894 . Hanau 1894.
• Ernst Julius Zimmermann : Hanau city and country. 3. Edition. Hanau 1919. (reprinted 1978)

Web links

• Hanau History Association 1844 e. V.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Günter Rauch: "Tammo de Hagenouwa". When the name Hanau was first mentioned in a document 850 years ago. In: New Magazine for Hanau History 1993, p. 4 ff .; Peter Acht : Mainz document book. Volume 2: The documents from the death of Archbishop Adalbert I (1137) to the death of Konrad (1200). Darmstadt, publishing house of the Historical Association for Hesse 1971, No. 37.
2. ↑ In the years 1632, 1707 and 1754 the number of inhabitants in the county of Hanau was determined. The figures are reproduced here after Erhard Bus: The consequences of the great war - the west of the county of Hanau-Munzenberg after the Peace of Westphalia. In: Hanauer Geschichtsverein 1844 : The Thirty Years War in Hanau and the surrounding area (= Hanauer Geschichtsblätter 45). 2011, ISBN 978-3-935395-15-9 , pp. 277-320 (289ff.)
3. ↑ See: Seier.
4. ↑ Monika Ilona Pfeifer, Monica Kinggreen: Hanauer Jews 1933-1945 - disenfranchisement, persecution, deportation . Ed. Evangelical working group “Christians - Jews” Hanau in cooperation with the city of Hanau, cocon-Verlag, Hanau 1998, ISBN 3-928100-64-5 , p. 84.
5. ↑ Hans-Günter Stahl: The aerial warfare over the Hanau area 1939-1945 = Hanauer Geschichtsblätter 48. Hanau 2015. ISBN 978-3-935395-22-1
6. ↑ hanau.de Historical development of Hanau with city districts on www.hanau.de (pdf, 26 kB)
7. ^ "Advance of the Allies and capture of Darmstadt by the US Army, March 25, 1945". Contemporary history in Hessen. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
8. ↑ p. 373.
9. ^ Federal Statistical Office (ed.): Historical municipality directory for the Federal Republic of Germany. Name, border and key number changes for municipalities, counties and administrative districts from May 27, 1970 to December 31, 1982 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart / Mainz 1983, ISBN 3-17-003263-1 , p. 345 .
10. ↑ Rolf Brüning: With steam on the north-south route between Main and Fulda = color picture rarities from the Dr. Rolf Brüning 9. Hövelhof 2014, p. 14.