Südfriedhof (Herne)

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Cemetery and park

The Südfriedhof in Herne is a municipal cemetery that belongs to the Sodingen district. The cemetery has a total area of ​​around 31.34 hectares and with around 37,000 grave sites is currently the largest cemetery in the city of Herne. The south cemetery, built in 1905, houses a number of architecturally interesting tombs and is also one of the most important green spaces in the city.

location and size

A rough overview of the expansion stages

The almost rectangular area of ​​the south cemetery lies on a hill and slopes gently to the northeast and east. It extends from the west of Wiescherstraße , in the north - after its expansion - on the streets Am Hauptfriedhof and Auf dem Stennert , in the east on the Ostbachtal green corridor and the former Constantin mine railway and in the south on Landwehrweg . The main entrance is on Wiescherstraße , on the western part of the site, apart from this there are six other entrances. The originally marshy area with the field name Wiescherfeld was on the then important road from Herne via Hiltrop to Bochum. The young city of Herne decided to create its first municipal cemetery here in order to relieve the confessional cemeteries in the inner city area that had been used up until then and to guarantee the necessary expansion areas.

After several expansions - the last one in the early 1990s with the expansion of the inexpensive and low-cost burial chamber systems - in 164 departments, in addition to the pure burial areas, it comprises around 20 hectares of forest, meadow and path areas, making it the largest cemetery in Herne.

In terms of its horticultural design, the Herner Südfriedhof is a pure park cemetery with a dense population of trees and paved, wide, avenue-like paths. This makes it ideal for long walks in both summer and winter. The southern cemetery is also an important part of the Herner green belt: There it is located at the intersection of the park landscape from Gysenberg (Castroper Heights) over the former and now greened shaft 11 of the United Constantin der Große colliery and the Constantiner Forest, which from there to Bochum is continued.

history

Emergence

predecessor

The oldest burial place was around the old Dyonisius church in the middle of the village of what was then Hernes. It was used until 1850. Today Sodinger Strasse is located here . From January 22, 1841 to 1883, the first new Protestant cemetery on Kirchhofstrasse in Herne (0.96 hectares) was occupied, and was replaced by the second cemetery (1.79 hectares) on the same street (today Bergelmanns Hof ) from 1183 to August 1905 to become. The burial of the Catholic parishioners took place in the Catholic cemetery in Eickel until 1865 , from then on in the Catholic cemetery on what is now Glockenstrasse (3.25 hectares). Expanded in 1870, it was closed in 1891 due to overcrowding. The new Catholic cemetery on Mont-Cenis-Straße , which was occupied from 1891 to 1907, served as a replacement . Some hereditary tombs are still documented in the younger cemeteries. The Jewish community's cemetery has been in Herne-Baukau since 1879 . The Protestant cemeteries have been public green spaces since 1925, the first Catholic cemetery is built over with a kindergarten, the second also public green.

Creation and expansion

As early as 1900, the city of Herne on Wiescherstraße bought land by converting and exchanging land (total area in 1912: 12 hectares). The south cemetery was laid out in 1904 on a size of 0.375 hectares and opened for burials on August 1, 1905. In 1908 an adjoining sand pit of 0.5 hectares was purchased, filled with street and household waste and the cemetery and city nursery was established there. Until 1919 the dead were buried separately for each denomination. In 1920/1921 another 3.5 hectares were added and 12 hectares were acquired. In 1928 the main entrance was redesigned, and 1930-1932 a 3.5 hectare extension was set up in an easterly direction towards the Ostbachtal. The garden architect Ahrens was able to have this labor- intensive work carried out by the Reich Labor Service . Generous terraces were formed from quarry slabs, which shaped the sloping terrain towards the Ostbach. The labor service made the area accessible to the citizens in 1933/34 with the creation of ponds and paths. The main avenue was lengthened and a new avenue to the soldiers' graveyard was created. Other routes were generously developed as main and secondary connections. As an innovation, row graves were included in the terraces. The cemetery was only slightly damaged in the Second World War and was largely repaired in the years that followed. In 1946 it was expanded to include two new departments for election and row graves, and from 1948 work began on increasing the northern area in order to prepare for the expansion.

Cemetery buildings

Cemetery chapel (around 1912)
Cemetery chapel (2009)

At the same time as the actual burial fields were laid out, plans for the associated cemetery structures, in particular those of the funeral hall and the gatehouses, were concretized. They too should not only serve their purpose, but also decorate the entrance area of ​​the new cemetery. For this purpose it was planned to erect the buildings in a style based on neo-classicism . However, it took several years from the opening of the cemetery to the completion of the buildings. The funeral hall at the end of the avenue of the main entrance was finally completed in 1909. The hall, which is still in use today, also included an office for the cemetery administration and corpse-laying cells from the start. The building's planner was the Herne city architect Karl Kurzreuther (1875–1961), who received a bonus for this construction.

The building itself is a one and a half story solid structure with a plastered facade. A portico-like porch with four Doric columns serves as the entrance area. Above that there is an architrave and a triangular gable with a standing oval stucco cartouche in the gable field. The building has a central projection on a wide, flat octagonal tower with a tent roof. The flatter parts of the building on the sides have large hipped roofs and ridge turrets. The southern wing of the building with offices and toilets has an open arcade. A fundamental renovation of the chapel was carried out in 1988/89, the painting was done by the artist Kai Wunderlich . The mourning hall was initially underutilized, as most of the funerals, as was largely the case at the beginning of the 20th century, took place directly from the house where they died. However, given the rapid population growth and the increasingly cramped living conditions , it seemed unreasonable for the deceased to be laid out at home for spatial and hygienic reasons, so the city administration decided in 1935 to forbid burials from the house where they died. Another reason was the long funeral procession that stretched along the main streets of Hernes to the south cemetery.

Other buildings that were built in the early days of the cemetery include a farm yard that was initially laid out in the northwestern area to the left of the main avenue of the original cemetery area.

Of the buildings erected in the early days of the Südfriedhof, the mourning hall and the gardener's house have been preserved. The original gatehouses were demolished in the 1990s after the company health insurance fund of the city of Herne had its home there for many years.

Tombs and monuments

Graves of famous personalities

In addition to locally important personalities, several artists, entrepreneurs and athletes who are well-known beyond the city limits of Hernes have found their final resting place in the Südfriedhof. The most famous people buried here are:

Cemeteries of honor

In the south cemetery you can also find war graves from both world wars, independent military cemeteries and honorary graves for mine accident victims.

  • Cemetery of honor for fallen German soldiers from both world wars , Section 16, 234 graves. A bronze eagle was erected on a stone base as a memorial in 1933. Wilhelm Hahn from Herne designed the monument, the bronze casting was carried out in Munich by the A. Brandstetter art foundry .
  • Cemetery of honor for civilian victims of the air war , Section 48, 240 graves. The graves of the 130 citizens who were killed in the heavy bombing attack on November 6, 1944 are also located here. Since 1968 a sculpture by the Dortmund sculptor Herbert Volwahsen has been commemorating all victims of war and tyranny .
  • Honorary cemetery for war dead from foreign countries , Dept. 13a and 14, 374 graves. The memorial erected on this site in 1989 bears the inscription:
As victims of the National Socialist war, at least 477 prisoners of war and forced laborers - men and women - mainly from the Soviet Union and Poland, rest here.
  • The memorial for the victims of the general strike against the Kapp Putsch of 1920 was dedicated to those who fell in March by the freely organized workers of Herne. Inscription: Fate has given you a spirit that always pushes forward unrestrained and a memorial plaque installed in 2008 for the victims of the anti-fascist resistance from the trade union movement .

  • First World War and Second World War military cemetery

  • Cemetery of honor for civilian victims of the air war

  • Prisoners of war and foreign workers from other nations

  • Memorial for the general strike against the Kapp Putsch

  • Memorial plaque for the anti-fascist resistance

Honor graves for victims of mining accidents

  • Memorial stone for the mine accident in 1922 at the Shamrock I / II colliery , Dept.
    A short circuit in an electric locomotive was the cause of the accident of November 23, 1922, which set the line expansion ablaze. Ten miners suffocated in the fire gases. In a cenotaph made of bricks, a bronze plaque commemorates this accident at the Shamrock colliery .
  • Memorial site for the mining accidents in 1959 and 1967 at the Shamrock I / II colliery , department.
    On July 29, 1959, a face demolition cost seven miners their lives, and a few weeks later on September 9, 1959, two miners died. In another accident on September 29, 1967, four miners died. This memorial was built as a reminder. On either side of a sculpture of a grieving miner, two bronze plaques remind of the dead.
    Text (panel 1 / left) In memory of the miners of the Shamrock I / II colliery who died on July 29, 1959 - Hibernia AG (panel 2 / right) In memory of the miners of the Shamrock I / II colliery who died on September 29, 1967 - Hibernia AG .

  • Mine accident in 1922

  • Mine accidents in 1959 and 1967

Some family graves worth seeing

The oldest and mostly architecturally most elaborate graves in the Herner Südfriedhof can be found in the original part of the cemetery. Representative family graves are mostly located directly on the main and circular routes, while simple row graves were created in the rear corridor areas from the start. If you enter the south cemetery from the main entrance and walk along the main path in the direction of the cemetery chapel, you will see some tombs typical of historicism on the sides , for example the Schulte-Hilrop tomb built as a Doric temple on the right side of the main path and the one in Art Nouveau style Grave of the Cremer family.

Schulte-Hiltrop grave complex
  • Schulte-Hiltrop grave site , Dept. 3
    The     Schulte-Hiltrop family , who lived in neighboring Hiltrop and originally belonged to the municipality of Herne, came from a prosperous farming family. The layout of the crypt as a Greek mortuary temple takes up or anticipates the mourning hall in its version. The complex, consisting of a crypt, some graves and the original Art Nouveau grille, which the family continues to occupy, has been a listed building since 2000 . The oldest person buried there is Hildegard Schulte-Hiltrop (born September 14, 1891, † September 30, 1892) , who was subsequently reburied here .
Tombstone Cremer
  • Gravesite of the Friedrich Cremer family , Dept. 2
    Friedrich Cremer (* January 22, 1836; † February 24, 1920) was an important member of the Herne community and its self-government in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. As head of the rural community from 1872 to 1897 and alderman of the magistrate of the young city, he played a key role in its development. This was ensured not least by his many years of work as a member of the state parliament in the provincial state parliament for the district of Bochum (to which Herne belonged), as a member of the district committee of the Arnsberg district government and as an appraiser for the district courts of Bochum, Dortmund and Essen as well as the higher regional courts of Hamm and Düsseldorf.
    The grave site is no longer occupied. The gravestone, which has been a listed building since 2000, has been preserved.
The Flottmann family crypt
  • Flottmann grave complex
    At the end of the main east axis is the grave of the Flottmann family. The newly created crypt in a prominent place, including older tombstones, reflects the economic importance of your company.
    Since 1982 the now rather simple and only representative crypt because of its enormous size has adorned the memorial for the fallen members of the Flottmann-Werke from 1955. It originally stood on the grounds of the Flottmann-Werke and was made by the sculptor Wilhelm Wulff (1891–1980 ). Driven from sheet bronze, it shows a grieving miner who leans on the company's most important product, the Flottmann hammer . As a talking sculpture, it shows what brought the Flottmann family to respect and wealth.
Gessmann and Hoenig grave complex
  • Grave site Gessmann and Hoenig , Dept.
    Eduard Gessmann (* July 8, 1877; † November 7, 1923) was an important entrepreneur in Herne who was known as a manufacturer and further developer of patented wire ropes for hoist cages . As the founder of the Herner wire rope factory and the Herner stove factory, he has supported the city's industrial boom for decades.
    Otto Hoenig (born January 4, 1870, † January 2, 1938) was the imperial mountain ridge and was responsible for the safety of miners underground. He turned down a call to the central Prussian ministerial bureaucracy in Berlin in favor of his work in Herne. During the occupation of the     Ruhr , he ordered the tunnels to be flooded in order to actively fight against the occupying forces.
Velsen grave complex
  • Velsen's grave
    Otto von Velsen (1869–1945) was a mining clerk and entrepreneur. After retiring from the civil service, on August 1, 1917, he became the successor of the Lindner mountain council (see below), a member of the board and general director of the mining company Hibernia / Shamrock in Herne and, since 1926, general director of the mining company Recklinghausen. He held both posts until October 1, 1936. In 1918 and 1919 he was a member of the Westphalian provincial state parliament and city ​​councilor for the city of Herne. As long-time president of the Bochum Chamber of Commerce and Industry and as chairman of the Reich Coal Council - a body set up by the state in which employers and trade union representatives negotiate subsidies and prices - he became known beyond his actual work, and there were other supervisory board mandates. From 1920 until his death he was chairman of the Association for Combating Common Diseases in the Ruhr Coal Area eV based in Gelsenkirchen.
    In 1932 he publicly warned that Hitler was coming to power, so that in 1935 he had to give up most of his offices for political reasons. Otto von Velsen moved his residence to Berlin-Zehlendorf, where he died. He was probably moved to Herne at the end of the 1950s.

More graves

  • Family grave Heinrich Lindner (born March 31, 1857 - † June 13, 1917)
    Bergrat Heinrich Lindner was a member of the board of directors of     Gelsenkirchener Bergwerk AG . In particular, the mines Minister Stein and Fürst Hardenberg , which were bundled under United Stein & Hardenberg, were subordinate to him. On October 17, 1906, he was elected to succeed Karl Behrens as general director of the mining company Hibernia AG in Herne and remained so until his death.
  • Family grave Alexander Beien (* July 19, 1859; † February 9, 1943)
    The engineer Alexander Beien was the founder of the Beien iron foundry and machine factory in 1885 . This mainly manufactured machines for coal extraction and extraction. Especially the Beien air motors , blow     molding machines / rotary displacement machines and conveying machines achieved world renown. In addition to his children, his son-in-law Ernst Oellrich is also buried here.

  • Sassenhoff family grave (documented 1927–1988)

  • Beien and Oellrich family grave (1908–1980)

  • Family grave Bergrat Lindner (1917–1967)

  • Schlenkhoff family grave (1917–2000)

  • Wittkamp family grave (1914–1973)

  • Weusthoff family grave (1906–1935)

Grabfeld Dandelion

Dandelion

In the southern part of the southern cemetery, protected by a weeping willow, the grave field Dandelion for miscarriages and premature babies A Breath of Life was set up at the suggestion of those affected .

literature

  • Herne. The cemetery signpost. Mammut, Leipzig 2012.
  • Herne. From Ackerstraße to Zur-Nieden-Straße. City history as reflected in the street names. Herne 1995.
  • Heinrich Knöll (Ed.): Herne i. W. (= Germany's urban development ) 2nd edition, DARI-Verlag, Berlin-Halensee 1928.
  • Herne 1933-1945. The time of National Socialism. Herne 1963.
  • Herne 1945–1950. Five years of reconstruction. Herne 1950.
  • City of Herne 1956–1960. An accountability report. Herne 1960.
  • Hermann Schaefer : The story of Herne. Herne 1912.

Web links

Commons : Südfriedhof  - Collection of images

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Honorary grave in the main cemetery in Herne. ruhr1920.de
  2. ↑ We mustn't forget their names. derwesten.de, November 9, 2008
  3. ↑ http://www.bochumer-bunker.de/bergeversatz_1935.html
  4. ↑ http://www.google.de/patents?id=5-1TAAAAEBAJ&dq=%22Alexander+Beien%22&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=dtRV0ZbkZ1&sig=rZ3t1YcOuQQ0aWyxcFRu5Iub9KA&hlXresult1&AAU = c

Coordinates: 51 ° 31 ′ 53 "  N , 7 ° 14 ′ 40"  E