Kopli kalmistu
The Kopli kalmistu (German: Friedhof Ziegelskoppel ) in Tallinn was Estonia 's largest Protestant German-Baltic cemetery and was in the suburb of Kopli ( Ziegelskoppel ). It comprised thousands of gravesites from Reval citizens and existed from the late 18th century until shortly after the Second World War , when it was completely leveled by the Red Army . Today the site is a publicly accessible cemetery park.
Origins
Until the 18th century, the Baltic Germans and other high-ranking people were buried in churches or associated cemeteries in Tallinn. In the 18th century, however, the need for burial places increased. In 1772 the Russian Empress Catherine the Great issued a decree that forbade the burial of citizens in churches and the adjacent cemeteries, regardless of their status or social affiliation. The reasons for the decree were a lack of space in the church graves and the risk that infectious diseases such as the plague could continue to spread through this practice. The plague last led to an uprising in Moscow in 1771. The decree also stipulated that new burial sites had to be created at least 100 sashes (about 213 meters) away from urban development; 300 Saschen were recommended for Tallinn.
With this in mind, the Ziegelskoppel cemetery outside of Reval was established and inaugurated on September 30, 1774. The first funeral was that of the Danish painter Hildebrand Hildebrandsen on October 18, 1774.
The cemetery served as a burial place for over 150 years; almost all Baltic Germans who died between 1790 and 1944 were buried there. By 1939, thousands of graves of the Reval citizens were built, including those of their better-known exponents.
development
The cemetery was divided into two parts from the beginning: the eastern part belonged to the Olai community , the western part to the Nikolaigemeinde .
In 1777 the first chapel was built, it was dedicated to Baron Tiesenhausen . In the course of time, more and more chapels were added and a whole necropolis was created : it comprised more than 30 chapels in Baroque and Classical style and thus had more chapels than any other place in Estonia.
In 1833 the cemetery was expanded both to the east and to the west. In 1837 an avenue was laid out from the central hill of the cemetery, which connected all parts of the cemetery. The numerous chapels were moved to this avenue and the redesigned cemetery was then consecrated again in 1842.
In the years 1868 and 1869, the cemetery was expanded again to the east and west. The Olai community now owned 5.7 hectares, the Nikolaigemeinde 4.33 hectares.
The cemetery was last enlarged in 1920, when an additional orthodox section was created at the south end . During the Estonian War of Freedom (1918–1920) the area was occupied by the Russian Army Northwest, an association of the White Army . From the end of 1919 to the spring of 1920, however, quite a few Russian soldiers succumbed to typhus . For the sake of her burial, the cemetery was expanded to include the southern part mentioned. A stone chapel was built according to the plans of the architect Aleksander Wladovsky . A granite-marble stone at the south entrance still reminds of those events today.
In the late 1930s, the cemetery was a well-kept place, Tallinn citizens came here to stroll and look at the chapels and tombstones.
Last funerals
At the end of 1939, many Baltic Germans followed the request of Nazi Germany to leave their homeland, as had been agreed between Germany and the Soviet Union in the German-Soviet non-aggression pact , and settled in what is now the Polish Wartheland . The number of burials in the Ziegelskoppel cemetery fell sharply. Until 1944, however, it was still used on a smaller scale to bury Germans who had stayed in Estonia.
In 1940 the Soviet Union occupied Estonia, which was then annexed to the Soviet Union as the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic . On July 1, 1941, the Soviet Central Committee decided to close the cemetery, as well as those of Kalamaja . Due to its strategic location on the Gulf of Finland , it was supposed to be destroyed to make way for war-relevant installations, but this destruction was postponed due to the events of the war.
During the German occupation, metal objects and concrete buildings were removed: the metal objects were melted down, the concrete buildings and their components were used to erect other structures, in particular a coastal wall at the Russalka monument . The cemetery area was rededicated as a cemetery park and only used to a limited extent for burials.
Destruction by Soviet troops after 1945
On September 22, 1944, the Red Army retook Tallinn.
Soon after the Second World War and the second occupation of the Baltic States by the Soviet Union, the suburb of Kopli was declared a military area due to its strategic location and closed to the public.
The cemetery was then leveled by the Red Army. The human remains were not reburied. The remaining tombstones were used to build walls and sidewalks in other parts of the city. Only the rows of trees along the paths have survived from the cemetery.
Current condition
There is now a public park on the site of the cemetery. It got its present form in the years from 2002 to 2006, according to the plans of Kersti Lootus . During the redesign, particular care was taken to maintain the existing network of paths in order to minimize damage to the ground that was used for the burial. The rows of trees along the former cemetery paths have also been preserved. Newly erected information boards and a water basin in the center of the park remind of the earlier importance of the place and its development. At the bottom of the pool, the silhouettes of people can be seen, in winter, when the water is turned off, they are even exposed. These silhouettes are meant to remind of those buried.
In addition, the old death books and some detailed area maps in the Tallinn City Archives provide information about the history of this place.
The cemetery in literature
The cemetery is the setting for several episodes in the volume of short stories The Death of Reval by the German-Baltic writer Werner Bergengruen .
Web links
Coordinates: 59 ° 27 ′ 44.1 ″ N , 24 ° 39 ′ 47.8 ″ E