Hussar quarters
The Husarenquartier in Erftstadt - Lechenich was from 1765 to 1794 head-quarters of the first of Elector Clemens August laid down in 1751 Electoral Cologne police, a mounted state police, called "hussar company". From here, the hussar company was responsible for the entire part of the Electorate of Cologne , mainly on the left bank of the Rhine . After the French period the Husarenquartier to the relocation of the county government after was Euskirchen 1827 District Office .
Location and importance
The hussar quarter is located a few meters from the central market of the city of Lechenich on the Schloßstraße leading to the Landesburg . The historic building was erected in 1765 and, as a cultural monument, is one of its sights.
history
The population of the rural areas in Kurköln in the 18th century suffered from harassment, break-ins and robberies by wandering tramps and gangs . This was the reason for Elector Clemens August to set up a rural gendarmerie whose task was to guarantee security, peace and order in the archbishopric.
After the corresponding budget had been approved by the estates , the elector set up the mounted gendarmerie, also known as the hussar company , in 1751 . The line transferred Clemens August the at that time at his castle in Rösberg resident Colonel Jägermeister Clemens August Freiherr von und zu Weichs to Rösberg.
The hussars initially had two locations, these were Hersel and Hülchrath near Neuss . At the beginning of 1754 the standing quarters in Hersel were dissolved, in 1756 the standing quarters in Hülchrath and the hussars moved into the headquarters in Lechenich.
An electoral order instructed the officials and subordinates to give the hussars any support. This included: Providing information about suspicious persons or events, but also providing food and accommodation for man and mount. Due to the size of the area to be monitored, the deployed hussars often only returned to their quarters in Lechenich after a few days.
The hussar company consisted of recruited young men who had voluntarily entered the service of the elector. They were uniformed, armed and regularly paid, but they were not a military unit. Rather, they were the police subordinate to the estates. Her main task as a gendarme was to track down suspicious people, “thieves and beggars”, to arrest them in order to deliver them to the prison in the Lechenich area, a tower of the state castle, until they were tried by the local lay judges .
Ownership of the standing quarters
The house and the adjoining buildings were erected in 1765 by Colonel Hussar Szentivani, the commander of the Electorate of Cologne Hussar Company, and his wife, a born Countess von Wittgenstein. On July 25, 1765, the colonel rented the building, including the barn and stables, to the electoral cologne estates. The contract ran for 12 years at an annual interest rate of 80 Reichstalers for housing the hussar company. In 1767, Colonel Szentivani donated half of the house to his wife, the other half he bequeathed to the archbishopric, which after his death in 1769 acquired the other half of the house from his widow on a hereditary lease.
Use of the quarter
In the summer of 1765 the hussar company moved into the house as permanent quarters. It consisted of 32 people including the managers. Of these, 28 or 29 were simple hussars, the rest were non-commissioned officers or corporals. Men, officers and the commander lived together in the main building. The crew quarters were very simply furnished. The hussars used bed frames covered with mattresses or straw sacks as beds. The sanitary facilities, such as washing facilities or latrines, are likely to have been very simply equipped during this time. There are reports of visitations by representatives of the estates, who complained about a lot.
The Lechenich quarters of the hussars were used by them until the French revolutionary army invaded. In the autumn of 1794, 12 hussars were transferred to Vest Recklinghausen as a police force , where they, renamed Landdragoner in 1798 , served as rural police officers.
French gendarmerie building
The former hussar quarters were initially leased by the French administration. The buildings of the standing quarter were not affected by the sale during the secularization , as the French administration used them as a gendarmerie building. From 1800 a brigadier and three gendarmes and their families lived in the gendarmerie house . After 1815 the building was owned by the municipality.
Use in Prussian times
After the end of the French era , the house was from 1816 to 1827 the district office of the newly created Lechenich district, which emerged from the canton of Lechenich and the canton of Zülpich . Even now, the building retained its dual function as an office and residential building. The first two district councils of the district, district and district Bärsch Weichs, and the district secretary worked and lived in the building.
After the district administration was moved to Euskirchen in 1827, the community rented the house to the descendants of Jakob Cahen. According to an entry in the log book of the municipality of Lechenich, the house was sold in 1847. Remnants of a poster announcing the auction were found during the restoration in 1980 under the plaster of the outer wall.
Former stables
Fountain at the back
Previous kitchen drain
Rear terrain
Building description
The house and grounds of the hussar quarter are opposite the choir side of the old parish church of St. Kilian . Starting at Schloßstraße, the property extends as a narrow strip along the Steinstraße to the east. Compared to a site plan from 1800, there were other old buildings on the area in addition to the house and the horse stables with associated storage rooms. What remains of this development is today's broadside hotel-restaurant on the street front as well as the longitudinal wing of the former stables built on the south side of the property (now often referred to as the “old barn”), which have recently been used as offices after their renovation . The remaining area became a parking lot and a small area for outdoor catering at the rear of the hussar quarter.
The hussar quarter is a rectangular, two-story brick building with a slate-covered , hipped mansard roof . The building, which is whitewashed in oxide red according to the oldest documented color of the house, is structured by windows set in sandstone and has an entrance on the front and back. The windows of the mostly free-standing building were kept in their former lattice shape after its extensive restoration . The preserved historical substance of the house, which has been completely gutted and rebuilt, is a barrel-vaulted cellar below the right-hand part of the building . A pouring stone has been left in the masonry on the left side of the ground floor on the wall of the house facing Steinstrasse. It is said to have been the former drain of the kitchen located there with its stone sink.
Tables and benches in the rear outdoor dining area are grouped around a recently built fountain. The bronze of a horse was applied to its column capital. However, it is not reminiscent of the horses of the mounted hussar company, but of the breeding of draft horses in Lechenich, which was run by the Kretz family. This is also the owner of the property.
Todays use
Until May 2017, the Hussar Quarter was run as a restaurant by Herbert Brockel . It was awarded one star by the Michelin Guide and was rated as the best restaurant in the Rhein-Erft district by the restaurant critic Joachim Römer in Römers Restaurant Report Cologne and the surrounding area 2007. It is ranked 18th in the nationwide Gastrotel best list. In 2015, it was rated with one star in the Michelin Guide, 17 points in Gault Millau and with Service Man, Varta Tip and 3 Diamond Tip in the Varta Guide.
Individual evidence
- ↑ HSTAD Kurköln II 3290 and 3291
- ↑ HSTAD Kurköln XIII 664 pp. 31-32
- ^ Archive Gracht file No. 10, Husarenkompanie (Landgendarmerie), published in Stommel: Sources for the history of the city of Erftstadt, No. 2942
- ↑ Archiv Gracht File No. 10, published in Stommel, Sources V No. 2920
- ^ A. Reiche: From the armed houseman to the police , p. 279
- ^ Karl Stommel, lists of residents from 1799 to 1801 p. 329
- ↑ According to the register excerpt from the domain liquidation office from 1822 on the gendarmerie building in Lechenich, the house had been given up for gendarmerie services and in 1822 belonged to the municipality.
- ↑ HSTAD Renteien Cologne / Aachen No. 855
- ↑ Bormann, Heimat an der Erft, pages 245–246
- ^ Frank Kretzschmar: Mills, buildings and hidden corners in the Rhein-Erft district , p. 9697
- ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 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.
literature
- Frank Kretzschmar: Mills, buildings and hidden corners in the Rhein-Erft district . JP Bachem publishing house, Cologne 2004. ISBN 3-7616-1834-4
- A. Reiche: From armed househusband to police officers . Jülich 1997. ISBN 3-930808072
- K. and H. Stommel: Sources on the history of the city of Erftstadt . Vol. 5. Erftstadt 1998. ISBN 3-9805019-2-2
- Karl Stommel : The French population lists from Erftstadt from 1799 to 1801 . Erftstadt 1988.
- H. and C. Bormann: Home on the Erft . Erftstadt 1992. ISBN 3-9802650-3-X
Web links
Coordinates: 50 ° 48 ′ 2.3 ″ N , 6 ° 46 ′ 2.5 ″ E