Horst Wessel Monument (Bielefeld)

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In the Westphalian city of Bielefeld , the birthplace of Horst Wessel , were in the era of National Socialism two memorials for the 1,930 killed SA built -Sturmführer. They followed the stylization of the person of Wessel as a " martyr of the movement" staged by the National Socialists .

Monument in the Teutoburg Forest

As early as the spring of 1933, the innkeeper Hugo Möller suggested that a memorial should be erected on the ridge path of the Teutoburg Forest for the pastor's son Wessel, who was born in Bielefeld in 1907. Via the local branch of the NSDAP , he applied to the city's magistrate to provide suitable land for such a project. The city supported the request and in May 1933 turned to its citizens with an appeal for donations.

Over the summer of 1933, a square was built not far from the Möllers inn, which was modeled on a Germanic Thingstätte and the center of which was a sandstone block weighing over 20 tons . According to a newspaper note, it was donated by the von Bodelschwingh institutions in Bethel. Accompanied by a parade of the SA, the stone was handed over to the public on October 8, 1933, the so-called Day of the National Song , one day before Wessel's 26th birthday, in the presence of Wessel's mother and sister.

Despite the absence of Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels , to whom the invention of the “Passion story” about Wessel goes back, the National Socialist leadership stylized the day as a high point of remembrance. The Gauleiter of Westphalia Alfred Meyer christened the section of the Teutoburg Forest in "Horst-Wessel-Höhe", on the same day Wessel's death room was declared a memorial in Berlin.

Monument in the city center

Six years later, another monument to Wessel was added in downtown Bielefeld. The sculptor Ernst Paul Hinckeldey , who lives in Berlin, created a larger than life bronze statue on today's Alfred-Bozi-Strasse . It showed a young man in SA uniform walking upright on a pedestal. It was inaugurated on June 14, 1939 on the occasion of the "Westphalia Tour of the Old Guard ", a meeting of early party members, by the Reich organizer Robert Ley .

But already during the Second World War the staged myth about Wessel lost its meaning. Initial wreath-laying ceremonies at the monument rarely took place later. The bronze monument was melted down in the last days of the war. The Horst-Wessel-Stein no longer existed in 1946.

literature

  • Wolfgang Emer: "Bielefeld's best son". The inauguration of the Horst Wessel Stone in 1933. In: Werner Freitag (Htsg.): The Third Reich in the festival. Leader myth, party mood and refusal in Westphalia 1933–1945. Verlag für Regionalgeschichte, Bielefeld 1997, ISBN 3-89534-200-9 , pp. 81–86.
  • Hans-Jörg Kühne: “Bad places”. Overlooked memorials of National Socialism in Bielefeld. In: Ravensberger Blätter. Issue 2, 2007, topic: Aspects of National Socialism in Bielefeld , ISSN  1866-041X , pp. 17–36.
  • Daniel Siemens: Nazi myth Horst Wessel. The singer of the master people. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , October 8, 2007.

Web links

Coordinates: 52 ° 1 ′ 22.4 "  N , 8 ° 31 ′ 45.2"  E