Mehlauken Church
| Church Mehlauken (Church Liebenfelde (East Prussia)) Кирха Меляукена |
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|---|---|
 Church ruins with campanile (2014) |
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| Construction year: | 1843 to 1846 |
| Inauguration: | October 25, 1846 |
| Style elements : | Campanile |
| Client: | Protestant parish Mehlauken |
| Location: | 54 ° 50 '33 " N , 21 ° 31' 12.1" E |
| Address: | Center of Zalessye Kaliningrad , Russia |
| Purpose: | until 1945: Evangelical Lutheran parish church ; since 1993: Russian Orthodox ruin |
| Regional Church : | until 1945: Ecclesiastical Province of East Prussia , Evangelical Church of the Union ; now: Diocese of Kaliningrad and Baltijsk , Russian Orthodox Church |
The Mehlauken Church (Mehlauken was 1938-1946 Liebenfelde (East Prussia) ) was built in the 1840s with a free-standing bell tower. Until 1945 it was the parish church for the evangelical parish of the former East Prussian town known today as Salessje in today 's Kaliningrad Oblast ( Königsberg region (Prussia) ) in the Russian Federation . Today it is a ruin.
Geographical location
Today's Zalessje is located eleven kilometers southwest of Bolshakowo (Groß Skaisgirren , 1938 to 1946 Kreuzingen) and 31 kilometers east of the district town of Polessk (Labiau) on the Russian trunk road A 190 (former German Reichsstrasse 126 ). The village is a train station on the Kaliningrad – Sovetsk railway line (Königsberg – Tilsit) .
The current church ruins are located south of the main street in the area between the junctions of the side streets of Dalneje (Bittkallen , 1938 to 1946 Bitterfelde) and Wyssokoje (Popelken , 1938 to 1946 Markthausen) , and can be seen from afar through the free-standing church tower.
Church building
The Mehlauk church is an Italian -looking building with a campanile next to it . The church was in the reign of Friedrich Wilhelm III. designed and was a prototype for the building of the Friedenskirche in Potsdam . This was built in 1845, but only inaugurated in 1854. The Mehlauken Church was built between 1843 and 1846 under Friedrich Wilhelm IV and was inaugurated on October 25, 1846. On the occasion of a trip to Italy , the then crown prince was impressed by the basilica of San Clemente in Rome , he made sketches of a church he had designed and handed them over to Ludwig Persius , who received it after his death to August Stüler . Stüler used the basic idea for the construction of the Mehlauk Church, which looks very similar to the Potsdam Peace Church. The naves are even the same in detail, while the towers are different: the church tower in Mehlauken is stricter and more compact and not as high as the one in Potsdam.
The interior of the church in Mehlauken with flat, semicircular altar niches and side galleries looked friendly and bright. The altar had no top. The organ came from the workshop of August Terletzki in Elbing (today Polish: Elbląg). Two bells set the peal.
The church remained intact in World War II , but was then misused and used economically. Today it is one of the few remaining places of worship, some of which are still standing, but are increasingly falling into disrepair. In the early 1990s, the roof was repaired with German help and safety measures were carried out, but then the roofing of the aisles was damaged again and the structural condition of the remaining parts of the building was desolate. In 2014 the nave is a roofless ruin, with charred ceiling beams in the interior and trees growing on the ruins.
In 1993 the church was transferred to the Russian Orthodox Church , but the first building security measures were not followed by any further construction progress, although the church has been a listed building since 2007.
Church gable (2014)
Church interior (2014)
Parish
The parish of Mehlauken was only founded in 1841, separated from the Popelken church (1938 to 1946: Markthausen, today in Russian: Wyssokoje). At the same time, a first pastor's office was established, followed by a second in 1901, although auxiliary preachers had been doing their job since 1877 . The parish of Mehlauken (1938 to 1945: "Parish Liebenfelde") belonged to the parish of Labiau within the church province of East Prussia of the Church of the Old Prussian Union, with 7500 parishioners registered in a census in 1925 .
Due to the flight and displacement of the local population in connection with the Second World War, church life collapsed in what was then called Zalessye. The restrictive religious policy of the Soviet Union reinforced this situation. It was not until the 1990s that new Evangelical Lutheran congregations formed in the Kaliningrad Oblast , of which the one in Bolshakowo (Groß Skaisgirren , 1938 to 1946 Kreuzingen) is closest to Zalessye. It belongs to the church region of the Salzburg Church in Gussew (Gumbinnen) in the Kaliningrad provost of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of European Russia .
The Russian Orthodox Church has also been gaining a foothold in Kaliningrad Oblast since the 1990s . New church buildings are being built in many places. The former Protestant church in Zalessje was transferred to her, but no building measures are currently taking place to restore the church ruins. Zalessje lies within the jurisdiction of the Diocese of Kaliningrad and Baltiysk with its seat in Kaliningrad (Königsberg) .
Parish locations (until 1945)
By 1945, the Mehlauken parish had 30 villages and places to live:
| Surname | Change name 1938–1946 | Russian name |
|---|---|---|
| Scrape off | Ehlertfelde | Krasnocholmskoye |
| Alexen | from 1930: Grotfeld | Alexandrowka |
| Alt Sternberg | Podlipnoye | |
| Dominatrix | Oak, Labiau district | |
| Escherwald | ||
| Friedrichsdorf, Labiau district | Podlipnoye | |
| Geduhnlauken | Memorials | |
| Big Elxnupönen | Alder Flow | Novoselye |
| Big Stumbragirren | from 1929: Auerwalde | |
| Kermuschienen | Forstreutershof | |
| Klein Elxnupönen | Kleinerlenfließ | Blischneje |
| Little Stumbragirren | from 1930: Auerfelde | Novoye Khmelovko |
| Lappienen | Daudertshöfen | |
| Löwenberg | ||
| Lowenthal | ||
| Luschninken | Friedrichsmühle | Polevoi |
| Mehlauken | Liebenfelde (East Pr.) | Zalessye |
| Minchenwalde | Lindenhorst (East Pr.) | Selenovo |
| Neuendorf, Labiau district | ||
| Panzerlauken | Panzerfelde | Oktyabrskoye |
| Paschwirgsten | Frets | |
| Piplin | Timber Harbor | |
| Peck | Gorky | |
| Dimming the formwork table | Neuwiese | Novoselskoye |
| Shamrocks | Kornhöfe | Winogradnoye |
| Schillgallen | Heiderode | Sadovoye |
| Schmallenberg | Uglowoje | |
| Schmilgienen | Kornfelde (East Pr.) | Kazhtanovo |
| Uszballen, 1936–1938: Uschballen | Mühlenau | Krasnaya Polyana |
| Schwarzlauken | Kleindaudertshöfen |
Pastor (1841–1945)
Between 1841 and 1945 officiated as Protestant clergy in Mehlauken:
- Franz Otto Leopold Unruh, 1841–1855
- Franz Ludwig Hermann Herzog, until 1862
- Daniel Albert Th. Hoffheinz, until 1870
- August Adolf Ansat, 1870–1877
- Ludwig Leopold Marchand, 1877–1878
- Julius Theodor Dengel, 1877–1889
- Fritz Penschuck, 1890–1917
- Hermann L. Richard Geelhaar, 1895–1896
- Leopold Gustav Eugen Otto, 1896–1897
- Johannes Gerß, 1898–1900
- Hermann KG Schnöberg,
1900–1910 - Heinrich Borowski, 1911–1913
- Franz Adomat, 1918–1925
- Erich Kürschner , 1920–1928
- Otto Tautorus, 1926–1932
- Ernst Schmittat, 1931–1935
- Johannes Kühler, 1932–1937
- Werner Ehlert, 1936–1945
- Jörg Heinrich Rohe, 1944–1945
Church records
Only the years 1841 to 1843 (baptisms, weddings, burials) have been preserved from the church records . They are kept at the German Central Office for Genealogy in Leipzig .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Walther Hubatsch , History of the Protestant Church in East Prussia , Volume 2: Pictures of East Prussian Churches , Göttingen, 1968, pages 60 to 61, Fig. 198
- ↑ Salessje - Mehlauken / Liebenfelde at ostpreussen.net - with current pictures of the church
- ↑ Patrick Plew, The Mehlauken Church - with current photo
- ↑ Кирха Меляукена - The Mehlauken Church at prussia39.ru - with historical and current photos
- ↑ a b Walther Hubatsch, History of the Protestant Church in East Prussia , Volume 3: Documents , Göttingen, 1968, page 93
- ↑ Evangelical Lutheran Provosty Kaliningrad ( Memento of the original dated August 29, 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.
- ↑ Friedwald Moeller, Old Prussian Protestant Pastor's Book from the Reformation to the Expulsion in 1945 , Hamburg, 1968, page 93
- ↑ a b c d Unruh († 1880), Herzog († 1862), Hoffheinz († 1898) and Penschuck († 1949) were members of the Corps Littuania .
