Helene Bresslau

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Memorial plaque Albert- and Helene-Schweitzer-Bresslau-Baum in Basel, with photo of the Schweitzer couple

Helene Schweitzer (born Bresslau ; born January 25, 1879 in Berlin ; † June 1, 1957 in Zurich , buried in Lambaréné , Gabon ) was a teacher, nurse, orphanage inspector and one of the first women to study at the University of Strasbourg Attended lectures in art history . In addition, she became the wife of the Protestant theologian , organist , philosopher , doctor and pacifist Albert Schweitzer .

Life

Helene Schweitzer was born into a Jewish family as the daughter of the historian Harry Bresslau and his wife Caroline Isay. At the age of seven, she and her two brothers were evangelically baptized, while their parents were not baptized. Helene Bresslau attended the Charlottenschule in Berlin from 1885 to 1890 . In 1890 her father was appointed professor of medieval history at the Kaiser-Wilhelms-Universität in Strasbourg and the family moved with him. After finishing school, she attended the teachers' seminar, at that time the only form of higher education for girls. With a special permit, Helene Bresslau was able to take the exam as a teacher for secondary girls' schools at the age of 17 and then studied piano, singing and music theory at the Strasbourg Conservatory. After a six-month stay in Italy with her parents, she began studying art history and history in the spring of 1900.

In 1898 she met Albert Schweitzer for the first time at a wedding party. In 1902 the two began an intense friendship; she soon became Schweitzer's assistant in correcting his first books.

In 1902 she spent six months in Great Britain , where she worked as a teacher and educator and, together with a Russian friend, translated stories by Chekhov and Maxim Gorky into German. Back in Strasbourg, she was appointed voluntary orphan carer by the then head of the Strasbourg poor affairs department and later mayor Rudolf Schwander. In 1904 she completed a three-month nursing course in Stettin; in April 1905 she was employed as a full-time orphanage inspector at the Strasbourg Orphanage Office. In 1908 she founded a home for single mothers there.

After Schweitzer started studying medicine with the intention of working as a missionary doctor in Africa, Helene Bresslau began training as a nurse in the Bürgerhospital in Frankfurt am Main in 1909 .

On June 18, 1912, he married Albert Schweitzer in order to be able to go to Africa with him, where, from 1913, both set up the later famous hospital in Lambaréné . 1914 Helene were and Albert Schweitzer as German nationals after the outbreak of the First World War by the French colonial authorities arrested and transferred in 1917 to France in captivity. Due to the poor prison conditions, Helene Schweitzer fell ill; Serious tuberculosis broke out after the release from captivity and the birth of their daughter Rhena in 1922. Despite the illness, Helene Schweitzer supported the reconstruction of the hospital in Lambaréné, which was run by her husband, and actively helped in collecting donations. In 1929 she traveled to Lambaréné again, but had to end her stay in April 1930 due to severe attacks of fever. During a nine-month stay from August 1930 in the sanatorium of Dr. Max Gerson in Kassel managed to cure her tuberculosis disease.

In September 1932, before the National Socialists came to power in Germany, Helene Schweitzer and her daughter Rhena moved from Alsace to Lausanne in Switzerland, followed by a move to New York in 1937. Her eight-week promotional tour through the USA in October 1938 helped the Lambaréné Hospital to receive money and medication from the USA during the war.

In June 1940 Helene Schweitzer fled with her daughter and her family from Paris to the unoccupied south of France and in August 1941 she reached her husband in Lambaréné via Portugal and Angola . In September 1946 she returned to Europe and continued to support her husband's work for the hospital in Lambaréné. In 1949 she accompanied Albert Schweitzer to the USA for the commemorative speech on Goethe's 200th birthday and in 1954 to Oslo to receive the Nobel Peace Prize . Between 1956 and 1957 she visited the Lambaréné hospital for the last time. Helene Schweitzer died on June 1, 1957 in Zurich, her ashes were buried in Lambaréné.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Deutschlandfunk , February 4, 2014, Corinna Mühlstedt: ondemand-mp3.dradio.de: Im Schatten des Urwalddoktors: Helene Schweitzer ( Memento from February 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ): Interview with Monique Egli and Christiane Engel , granddaughters of Helene and Albert Schweitzer and daughters of Rhena Schweitzer-Miller (February 7, 2014)
  2. ↑ Verena Mühlstein: Helene Schweitzer Bresslau. A life for Lambarene. CH Beck, Munich 1998.
  3. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original dated November 8, 2011 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.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.schweitzer.org
  4. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original dated May 8, 2012 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.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.albert-schweitzer-weimar.de
personal data
SURNAME Bresslau, Helene
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schweitzer, Helene; Schweitzer-Bresslau, Helene
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German teacher, nurse and nurse, wife of Albert Schweitzer
DATE OF BIRTH January 25, 1879
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH June 1, 1957
Place of death Zurich , Switzerland