War memorials in the southwest Palatinate

In the southwest Palatinate there are several memorials for participants and victims of the wars of the last two centuries (see also war memorial ).

The history of mentality in the district of Südwestpfalz and the cities of Pirmasens and Zweibrücken has been shaped by the last three wars , which particularly affected this region because of its border location.

In the past, death in war was seen as an event of high moral value, which contemporaries and descendants had to face with awe and gratitude. This is difficult to understand today due to the fact that many no longer directly perceived the war as an event that affected them personally. To pursue the history of mentality on the basis of these monuments also means to make their own history the object of observation.

The history of the monument becomes a testimony to the times: its maintenance, relocation, reconstruction or even demolition prove the relationship of people to the monument and its original statement up to the present. The previously used designation " warrior memorials " seems to have been completely lost in today's colloquial language; today "the monument" is used.

It deals with monuments that are erected and / or maintained by public institutions; d. H. which are in the care or on the premises of municipalities or church institutions. Time is too far advanced for most monuments to be fully explored. Documents (e.g. council minutes, newspaper clippings) are no longer available, ' Oral History ' is no longer sufficiently effective due to the time that has now passed. The relics, if any, are, however, often productive in terms of their pictorial design and in their textual statements. Then, often astonishing, sometimes frightening connections between the “monument” and the mentality of those who had these works made clear.

Attempt a typology

The scope of the available material calls for an attempt to use the number of well over a hundred monuments from two centuries to a limited typology of the war memorial .

Different categories are available: time of construction or redesign, historical reference, text statements, symbolic language, ideological background and much more.

However, as soon as one delves more closely into the abundance of material, a very logical connection between the categories mentioned quickly emerges; a fact that is by no means surprising when one takes into account that these buildings reflect the spirit of their time of construction.

Monuments before the First World War

Hinterweidenthal

This small and historically first group of monuments is not worth dividing any further: They are those that refer to the Franco-Prussian War of 1870/71. They form a unit both in the time of their creation and in their design:

A typical feature is the obelisk or stele shape with a meaningful symbol. It should be noted that these are usually monuments, which are dedicated to the participants in the warlike events, which record the year of their death and which were mostly built by local "warrior & veteran associations". The close coincidence of the monument erection in Eppenbrunn (1908) and Niedersimten (1910) seems to indicate a kind of competition. Often these monuments are grouped together with objects from later times in memorial complexes or with the names of those who died in the two following wars. A special feature is the Hinterweidenthal memorial - it also names participants in the Schleswig War and the German War against Prussia - as well as a participant in the actions in China and a fallen man in Africa. The texts of these monuments are mostly kept briefly in the pathos of the successful "war of unification".

A monument from this period before the First World War deserves special mention: it is the Napoleons stone in the main cemetery in Zweibrücken , erected in October 1837: »The warriors of the city and the surrounding area who served under Napoleon's flags and returned home Zweibrücken dedicate this memorial to their comrades in the war who fell in the field of honor «. The monument is crowned by a Napoleonic cuirassier helmet, including the coat of arms; on three sides it bears the names of the presumed donors, sorted according to the date of their death.

Monuments in the interwar period (1919–39)

The group of monuments from this time can be summarized as a unit due to their chronological order. In terms of design and the intention to make a statement, there are hardly any major contradictions imaginable:

The field gray

There is the standard type of the upright "field gray" (mostly in granite or concrete) with considerable differences in gestures and attributes (thoughtful, mourning, praying with a flag or rifle, but also the fallen, struck down, dying).

Eppenbrunn
Crows Mountain
Thaleischweiler -Frogs
Höhmühlbach
Rumbach
Münchweiler / Rodalb
Fischbach near Dahn
Zweibrücken Napoleon's Stone

The warrior

Another type is the heroic, the warrior often exaggerated far into the mythical , characterized by clothing sometimes reduced to martial attributes (helmet, sword), accompanied by a rearing horse or saying goodbye to companion and rural life. Variants are the "heroes" of the neighboring monuments in Dietrichingen , Mauschbach and Hornbach integrated in pilasters . These three monuments are particularly striking in the joint implementation of the idea of the "heroic warrior".

The Waldfischbach monument is particularly striking in this group: on a high stele stands a figure in a light robe with a sword, holding up a small parade shield. A dragon-like creature winds beneath her. The front of the monument bears the year 1914/18 and between them an EK, there is no text with lists of names. The architect and sculptor are named under the cover plate of the stele on the back.

Castle albums

The Burgalben monument offers another variant: on the name stele, a small male figure bends his right knee. The head is conspicuously proportioned: the middle part of the face is overemphasized, while the chin and forehead do not correspond to the usual dimensions. On the right, this figure is propping a sword with its point on the ground and kneeling, as it were, standing upright and looking straight ahead; on the left she is holding the helmet of the First World War.

Hornbach
Dahn
Dietrichingen
Waldfischbach
Wilgartswiesen

Without a statue

A variety of monuments without statues, e.g. Some figural accessories form another group. The name boards or text elements are often dominant here. Mostly it is about cuboid blocks with attached flame bowl or helmet or monoliths. A special example of this type can be found in Herschberg : A pilaster is crowned by a detailed coat of arms eagle and bears the dedication text in three lines.

Stambach cemetery

Althornbach

Pirmasens (Windsberg)

Lviv

"Unmilitary" monuments

Hauenstein before the old Catholic. church

Clausen town center so-called "Marhöfer Monument"

Few monuments form a separate group; Their characteristic is that the dominating statues are "unmilitary": On the one hand, it is a classic Pieta, larger than life on a sandstone substructure; any military or warlike accessories are missing. Another most remarkable monument of this type is in Hauenstein in front of the old Catholic. Church: A figure of Christ, opening the robe over the chest and presenting the lance wound, turns to a soldier lying on the ground, dying and bending over - a highly unusual mixture of religious and military, for contemporaries evidently linked by the motifs' sacrificial death 'and' Promise '- hardly comprehensible to us today. The monuments, which combine the Christian with the warlike, on the one hand reproduce the motif of the dragon slayer here mostly in the form of an angel (!), Or on the other hand depict the warlike rider dressed in Christian clothes. The military aspects of killing and winning (after 1918!) Are implemented here in a sublimated form - and today's observer asks himself how great the intellectual distance is to the monuments of the brown age.

Unpathetic text

A simple and non-pathetic text can only be found on a few monuments, for example in the form of a factual dedication: "Dedicated to the memory of our fallen by the municipality of Herschberg " or, in a factual short, "TO REMEMBER | TO OUR | FALLEN ", in a few cases with a slight religious reference and a certain hope for a peaceful future:" REMEMBER OUR DEAD AND PRAY THAT ALL WARS END ". However, it must be taken into account that a large number of World War I memorials may have 'lost' their original text in the course of their expansion to include World War II and the resulting changes to the plaques.

Hero pathos

Religious vocabulary

The last quoted text leads over to the monuments, which use the religious vocabulary of the New Testament with complete unabashedness : »NO ONE HAS A GREATER LOVE THAN THOSE WHO DEDICATED HIS LIFE FOR HIS FRIENDS JOH. XV.13 ”- at that time probably generally accepted in the tradition of the justification of the“ just war ”by the churches; This also becomes clear in the variation »I have the good fight | fought | 2. Tim.4,7 «.

But there are also examples that show that religion is not necessarily used for propaganda purposes in this context: How touching sounds that »Mother Comforter of the Sorrowful | Say a word of atonement for them «or the saying on the monument in Spirkelbach :» ALL THE FALLEN IN SEA AND LAND | HAVE FALLEN INTO GOD'S HAND «. Here it can be clearly seen that religion is seen as consolation - but without exaggerating the fallen in a blasphemous manner like Christ.

Monuments in the church area

In the cath. Parish church

Those monuments that are - like the one mentioned above in Schwanheim - in or directly next to churches occupy a special position. These are mostly name boards of fallen from the respective church district - d. H. the lists are filtered by denomination, so to speak. A good example of this are the largely Catholic neighboring communities of Kröppen and Vinningen with the joint Protestant parish and its church in Luthersbrunn, which lies in between. Both municipalities do not have 'old' monuments - the 'new' ones are, as is appropriate for municipalities, open to all fallen. The evangelical fallen are noted on two memorial plaques in Luthersbrunn, the Catholics from Kröppen on two plaques at the church in Kröppen.

Further examples are the two memorial plaques from Großbundenbach (ev.), The groups of tablets from Hauenstein, Dahn and Clausen (cath.). Clausen has a very unusual document on this: a "memorial book" placed under the blackboard for the fallen of both wars. Above all, the pages produced by different hands over the years with entries on 'heroes' like Marseille or Mölders, on the persecution and extermination of Jews, with personal notes and death pictures is an extraordinary document: It shows that in the very different types of individual products Efforts to mentally cope with the intangible war events.

Monuments from the Nazi era

A special feature are the monuments that still - created after 1933 - evoke the spirit of the brown age not only through the shape of the figures and their gigantic size, but also partly through their texts: »YOU DIED THAT GERMANY LIVE« »EVER DEATH WAS VNSER LIVE SO BE THANKS TO VNSER LIVES EVRE'S DEATH «.

The monument in Wilgartswiesen (1938) depicts two soldiers on the side facing the town, one with a rifle, the other with a hand grenade, not static as in the three examples mentioned above, but relatively dynamic and also protruding more strongly from the surface. Today's (!) Text reads simply: »THE COMMUNITY WILGARTSWIESEN TO ITS FALLEN SONS. 1938 «.

It also seems particularly noteworthy that these monuments were "used" after the Second World War without any major concern for the victims of this war, even if the Mauschbach copy shows obvious traces of erasure on the reverse.

building

As a special case, the memorial chapel on the Häsel near Reifenberg should be mentioned in this section , the only monument in the form of a building, which is closely tied to religion through its design and function. That it also has a special rank due to its exposed location on one of the highest elevations of the Sickinger Höhe is only incidentally noted.

But also in ZW-Bubenhausen and in the neighboring ZW-Wattweiler “memorial halls” open on two or three sides were built in or near the cemetery.

Monuments after the Second World War

With regard to the monuments that commemorate the dead of the Second World War, some basic observations must be made:

Pirmasens (old cemetery)

** A very large part of the monuments to the Second World War are spatially and creatively based on buildings that can be assigned to the group just discussed; they are, so to speak, grafted on, built on, integrated.

- Another, roughly as large, part was built after the Second World War, but in turn includes the memorial function for the dead of the First World War, while the memorials originally set up for this purpose were removed.
- Only a very small number of the monuments that were erected after 1945 are based solely on the Second World War in terms of their origin and design.

The result is by no means a conclusive typology, as is possible with the monuments after the First World War, especially the two 'mixed forms' prevent any systematics. There is therefore only the possibility of first taking a closer look at the monuments originally related to the Second World War and using them to attempt to shed more light on the monument culture of this time. Following this, a few monuments will be selected which, so to speak, represent the commemoration in different ways `` across the war ''.

Monuments related only to World War II

A characteristic feature of all monuments of this type is that any military attribute is missing if one does not want to value a cross in a shape similar to that of the 'Iron Cross' as such. Likewise, in most cases there is no pictorial design in the form of statues. A certain compensation for this is often offered by the neighboring memorial for the First World War, possibly even in association with a monument for the participants in the 1870/71 war.

Some monuments of this group are designed as name plaques in churches, such as B. Hauenstein. For all the others, the function dominates: 'Documentation' in the form of name boards and as a 'place of worship' for the commemorative events on the day of national mourning that used to be common everywhere. The lyrics are extremely reserved, of course without any 'heroic' aftertaste and only very subtle in religious allusions. The already mentioned Hinterweidenthal monument to the victims of the Second World War may be considered typical of this group: large name field, above it a short text and crowned by a typical iron cross, next to it on a kind of speaker's platform three more crosses.

An exception is the plaque hanging in the Evangelical Church of Großbundenbach with a kind of stylized iron cross, dedication, biblical quote, without a list of names:

»THE FALLEN | AND MISSING | OF WORLD WAR II || IN GRATEFUL MEMORIES | THE COMMUNITY | GROSSBUNDENBACH || BE TRUE UNTIL DEATH | SO I WANT THE CROWN FOR YOU | GIVING OF LIFE - REV. 2.10. « Dahn occupies a special position : The 'memorial' consists of name plaques inside the memorial chapel on the military cemetery , which is also looked after by the 'Volksbund'. The board also shows the ranks of the fallen and missing and has the motto: »YOUR BROTHER WILL RISK JOH. 11.K.23.V«

Monuments that also point to previous wars

First of all, four examples should be picked out, which all have in common that they offer figurative representations of different characteristics: The completely redesigned Vinningen monument with statues is also dedicated to the First World War, as is Darstein ; Lug and Merzalben , on the other hand, represent a somewhat different type of representation (as a blackboard) :

Ruppertsweiler NEW presented
on the 2006 Memorial Day

Various monuments from the post-war period are strikingly simple: Often they are warning boards, the contents of which, however, are no longer accessible to many viewers in a few decades (Schwanheim, Ruppertsweiler, Donsieders). The memorials in Kröppen and Pirmasens are noticeable because, in addition to the First World War, they also include the Franco-German War of 1870/71 and also do not have any individual victim information in the form of name plaques.

The latest memorial for the victims of the two world wars was presented to the public on November 19, 2006 in the vestibule of the cemetery hall in Ruppertsweiler - an artistically designed name plaque.

Monuments that point beyond the Second World War

With increasing distance from the events of the brown era, the realization apparently germinated in some places that there were not only war victims in this epoch, but that fellow citizens had also been inflicted on the German side - and that these victims also deserved a mark of honor. Examples are Herschberg and Waldfischbach.

Another - at first rather curious-looking "extension" of the memorials can be found at the memorial in Erfweiler and in Dahn in the memorial chapel's name book: the unbiased observer in Dahn is initially surprised that the first name on the list dates back to 1938 is listed, the series then continues with the fallen in 1940. In Erfweiler, on the other hand, there is a name with the date of death 9-9-38 on the last name board as the last in the series. Since in both cases it is probably not an oversight - relatives would have protested against this "joke" and implemented a correction, there can only be one explanation: the two listed here are soldiers of the German Wehrmacht in connection with the construction work died on the Siegfried Line. The "extension" of the Second World War until 1947 on the memorial in Lemberg-Glashütte seems just as strange , presumably it refers to the fact that one of the named died late from the consequences of the war.

To a certain extent, those monuments that have their own list of “ displaced persons ” also belong in this category : Apparently, after the war, displaced persons from the areas east of the “Iron Curtain” who had settled in the respective communities achieved a kind of “posthumous naturalization” for their relatives . Eventually, commemorating this was no longer possible in their former home communities. A document of post-war history.

Monuments that extend those from a previous time

Darstein shows child, woman and man in a farewell posture and uses the term “victim”, which is also used on the monument in Lug, which also depicts a farewell scene. They have in common that the family relationship is worked out artistically and that the family members are also granted the 'status' of victims. On a granite wall, the center of which is a typical 'Christ Resurrectus' figure, Merzalben emphasizes the religious aspect of the promise, reinforced by the verse John 15:13, which is well known from earlier monuments. The name boards for the victims are largely in the background. The text speaks of "FATHERS AND SONS".

This group includes a considerable number of examples which - as already mentioned above - were, so to speak, grafted onto existing monuments, added to them, integrated into them. This is mostly about adding or inserting name boards of the victims of the Second World War. This combination, which is highly problematic in some cases, can be shown here using drastic examples:

In Dietrichingen, for example, the dead of the Second World War and their comrades from the First are put under the motto "VICTORY THEN". The same happens with the neighboring monuments of Hornbach and Mauschbach, where the memory of the dead of the Second World War is confronted with »IHR STARBET DASS | DEUTSCHLAND LIVE «or» EVER TOD WAS VNSER LEBEN SO BEFORE BEING | VNSER LEBEN EVRES TODES THANK «is expected.
In ZW-Oberauerbach , the lists of names of the two side parts, which until then had only been decorated with decorative elements during the Second World War, are carved - under the "old" texts of all things: »OUR BLOOD AND OUR LIFE | WE HAVE GIVEN FOR YOU «and» THE HEROES DEAD | THE PEOPLE IN NEED «.

It is far from assuming that the designers of such monstrosities act consciously; Thoughtlessness and economic interests may have been responsible for this: Why shouldn't the monument that already existed simply be 'continued'?

In comparison with this, Saalstadt pulls itself out of the affair admirably by adding the old text »DEN HELDEN | FROM 1914-18 | THANK YOU «-» AND YOUR | BROTHERS AND | SONS OF | 1939-45 TO | MEMORY".

Zweibrücken-Niederauerbach 1914/18
addition to the base after 1945

In Zweibrücken-Niederauerbach, however, something absolutely unusual happened to the monument from the First World War after the Second War: before the new memorial for the victims of the Second World War was erected, it bears the appeal: "Never again war!"

Representation of women through the ages

The aspect of depicting women on “warriors” or “war victims” memorials is worth considering separately. Although the material from our environment does not offer many examples, the few monuments still existing today with depictions of women show a remarkable change.

"Germania" at the Zweibrücken main cemetery

On the memorials to the “War of Unification” 1870/71, the woman can only be depicted as an allegorical figure: either as the goddess of victory with a weapon in her hand - as on the destroyed monument in Pirmasens - or as a grieving allegory of peace - as in Zweibrücken. The few images that have come down to us from the Pirmasens monument statue reveal a certain relationship to the goddess of victory of the Niederwald monument.

The so-called "Germania" in Zweibrücken, on the other hand, is almost reminiscent of a protective cloak Madonna: She wears a crenellated wreath wrapped in laurel and the left hand, just protruding from the opening cloak, holds a sword in its sheath with the point directed downwards. With her head bowed slightly, her gaze falls over the downward-stretching bundle of laurels in her right hand and the coffin underneath into nothing - or to the memorial crosses at her feet. The right hem of the coat covers part of the coffin - not a monument to victory, but deep mourning.

Three monuments after the First World War show fully sculptural female figures: the one already discussed in more detail in Schmalenberg , PS-Erlenbrunn closely related to it and then Thaleischweiler .

Two other monuments also show female figures as relief images and should be mentioned at least briefly:

In Hinterweidenthal , a woman in a classic pleated robe sits on a kind of throne chair, her head leaning forward in her right hand. The recourse to the ancient mourning motif is reinforced by an amphora standing under the chair .

The Wilgartswieser Monument points to the - the church facing - side the classic Aryan farmers companion: With a firm handshake and an open look she adopted her with the flag and equipped (helmet, uniform) which pulling companions - the plow back to change. After all, a very clear statement about the burden placed on women by the war: that of the “breadwinner”, usually assigned to the man.

The few monuments erected after the Second World War that contain figurative parts of non-religious significance depict the woman, not the man who fell victim to the war.

The other monuments, on the other hand, show the woman as the part of the family left behind who has to bear responsibility for the following generation: Children are always part of the motif, mostly girls - emphasizing the defenselessness.

Summary

Various statements can be made that emerge clearly in the overall view, but this does not mean that these generalizing statements can in principle be applied to each individual monument:

The monuments are - sorted according to their time of origin - more and more anonymous: The monuments commemorating the 1870/71 war record the names of the participants; if the community had no casualties to complain about, even only these, Hinterweidenthal also mentions the names of participants in colonial military ventures. In contrast, a number of monuments that were built relatively late after the Second World War have no names whatsoever.
In the same way, the message of the monuments changes: First of all, the pride of a successful military action dominates, which brought about the valued goal of the political unity of Germany.

Remembrance after the First World War could not be designed in this simplicity: the war, in which one had entered with a clear conscience and also with the blessing of the Church, had ended in a terrible defeat that threatened the existence of Germany after the unimaginable losses of the machine war. In one way or another, the monuments had to take on the task of legitimizing this war with all its victims, even afterwards. To show the bereaved that the war was, so to speak, rightly lost, that would have brought the politically and socially ruling class to the highest degree in disrepute - after all, all Reichstag parties in 1914 approved the war. Consequently, the dominant motif is the simple soldier, or, to put it drastically, the “front pig”: grieving, depressed, praying, protecting himself from civilians, dying. Today's texts on these monuments are (with a few exceptions) only of little help in fathoming the spirit of the monument donors: the probability that they were changed in some monuments on the occasion of the expansion of meaning after the Second World War is not fundamentally obvious to assign; in any case, however, the frequency of the term “victim” outweighs that of the “hero”. The fact that religion also had to serve to subsequently justify dying in an alleged “defensive war” - but in reality to “place in the sun” - is shown by the repeated quotations from John 15:13 or a text such as: “SEID THE | DEEDS OF YOUR | FATHERS REMEMBER WHICH THESE | IN YOUR TIME | ACHIEVED | I.MARK 2.51 ».

The monuments created after the Second World War, which for the most part also had to act as memorials for the victims of the First War - including at the celebrations for “Memorial Day” - are for the most part faceless - not to say without character.

The message is often very simple: 'There were wars in which people were killed. Don't forget them. ' As an increase, it just seems permissible: 'Learn from it so that something like this doesn't happen again.' Only the monument in Kleinsteinhausen clearly appeals: "YOUR VICTIMS - OUR OBLIGATION - KEEP PEACE".

Many of these monuments are not only without figural design, a large number also do without name boards. Are the signs of frugality financial, emotional, or spiritual? Nevertheless, the omission of the name plaques is to a certain extent understandable if the monument was built many years after the end of the war - after all, who of the living still had a personal connection to the victims? But it should also be considered:

Doesn't the anonymous nature of the monuments depersonalize the horror of war and move it into an indefinite distance?

A kind of special case are those monuments that were simply “topped up” on the basis of existing ones to commemorate the First World War. As stated above, many a highly questionable “monument” was created here (see p. 3–14).

In terms of the history of mentality, however, these monuments in particular are witnesses of inestimable value: They show quite clearly that dutiful “commemoration” to be organized leads to results that at best appear meaningless, if not absurd, for the following generations.

The city of Speyer demonstrates how simply and effectively those responsible can proceed in order to make it easier for future generations to understand with its excellently restored monument to the First World War in the pedestrian zone. a. carries the text typical of the time: "GERMANY MUST LIVE EVEN IF WE HAVE TO DIE". A small, stylish additional board informs: “The fountain was erected in 1930 as a memorial for those who fell in the First World War. The inscriptions and reliefs are an expression of the zeitgeist of that time. "

The war of 1870/71 was an event of high national and political value, a departure into a common positive future, everyone involved had contributed to the emergence of this new German Empire and was worthy of admiration and the commemorations at these monuments created an identity for the people German nation that has just become a state.

The shock of the never admitted defeat of 1918 made the fallen victims or heroes of at least tragic greatness, depending on their political point of view - always with the claim of everlasting memory and to preserve the state community traumatized by defeat, occupation, loss of territory and increasing internal contradictions .

The guilt, which was only grudgingly and by no means admitted by everyone after 1945, made it difficult to deal with one's own victims, who in an indefinite way were also perpetrators, but in death then got into a strange intermediate state that eluded a rational and emotional grasp, and the produced more and more meaningless, automated and ultimately obsolete 'remembrance'.

This closes the circle: monuments spanning more than a hundred years - ostensibly always related to the same event - clearly show the change that this event has undergone in the perception of contemporaries. And the monuments themselves are also subject to this change in perception.

literature

Lurz, Meinhold: War memorials in Germany. (6 volumes), Heidelberg 1985–1987
Koselleck, Reinhart: War memorials as identity foundations for survivors. In Odo Marquard, Karl-Heinz Stierle (Ed.): Identity. Munich 1979
Koselleck, Reinhart / Jeismann, Michael (ed.): The political death cult. War memorials in modern times. Munich 1994.
Kappenberg, Jürgen: warrior memorials. Monuments in the West Palatinate for participants and victims of the wars of the last two centuries - an overview of the history of mentality. In communications from the historical association of the Palatinate. 104th volume. Speyer 2006, p. 342ff.

Web links

Commons : War memorials in Landkreis Südwestpfalz - Collection of images, videos and audio files