Schwerinsdorf

coat of arms	Germany map
	Coordinates: 53 ° 19 ′  N , 7 ° 40 ′  E
Basic data
State :	Lower Saxony
County :	Empty
Joint municipality :	Hesel
Height :	9 m above sea level NHN
Area :	5.59 km 2
Residents:	686 (Dec. 31, 2019)
Population density :	123 inhabitants per km 2
Postal code :	26835
Area code :	04956
License plate :	LER
Community key :	03 4 57 019
Mayor :	Andreas Rademacher ( CDU )
Location of the municipality of Schwerinsdorf in the district of Leer

Schwerinsdorf ( East Frisian Low German Steern ) is a municipality in the integrated municipality of Hesel in the East Frisian district of Leer , Lower Saxony . The community has 686 inhabitants and covers an area of ​​5.57 square kilometers.

Geographical location

The community is located between Hesel and Remels on the former federal road 75 (today state road 24). Administratively, Schwerinsdorf belongs to the joint municipality of Hesel in the north of the district of Leer. Neighboring communities are Firrel in the north and Hesel in the west (both also belong to the joint community of Hesel) and Uplengen in the east.

history

From its foundation in 1802 to the end of the German Empire in 1918

The starting point of today's municipality of Schwerinsdorf was the request made on June 15, 1799 by a tenant of the Dominialgutshof Kloster Barthe at the Prussian War and Domain Chamber Aurich to lease a piece of moor for his son in today's municipal area, where he could settle. However, the first settlers did not build their modest houses in the moor until 1802, as the boundary with the neighboring towns of Selverde , Hasselt and Kleinoldendorf as well as with the Dominialgut had to be clarified beforehand . The new colony was named after Friedrich Carl Heinrich von Schwerin (1768–1805), President of the War and Domain Chamber in Aurich from 1798–1803 and 1804/05. He committed suicide in Aurich in 1805. Under him, the temporarily suspended bog colonization in East Frisia was resumed. Until then, the colony was called "bey dem Kloster Barthe".

After 1815 the Kingdom of Prussia East Frisia ceded to the Kingdom of Hanover . Within Hanover, Schwerinsdorf belonged to the Stickhausen office, to the Remels District District and to the Hesel District District District . In 1848 Hesel formed an independent bailiwick within the Stickhausen district.

Food source of the first bog settlers: buckwheat ( Fagopyrum esculentum )

"In 1803 everything here was uncultivated, in an unpredictable wilderness, consisting of arid sandy soil or marshes", it later said in a review of the responsible office in Stickhausen , to which the Schwerinsdorf area belonged from the beginning. As early as 1816 the further settlement of colonists by the officials of the Kingdom of Hanover was forced again. In the early decades, the colonists often applied for permission to enlarge their colonies so that the agricultural base would suffice. The basis of the bog colonies was the bog fire culture. Small trenches were dug in the summer to drain a piece of bog. In autumn, the Moor was chopped into flakes, which by freezing in winter and the following spring harrowed were. In late spring, the colonists set fire to the cultivated bog areas and placed seeds, mostly buckwheat, in the ashes, which grow very quickly and could be harvested after a few weeks. The buckwheat, a knotweed plant , was then processed. Potatoes, rye and oats were also grown. However, the bog soil was depleted after a few years due to this form of cultivation, so that the yields fell. The requests to enlarge the colony were often granted after corresponding inspections and reports from the Stickhauser officials to the Landdrostei Aurich - just as the long-term rent to be paid was often deferred or occasionally reduced. Nevertheless, colonists often had to give up their plan to establish an existence in the bog. It is reported about the colonist Jannes Hinrich Bartels that he had to sell his property in 1810 - just a few years after the colony was founded - because the debt burden had become too great. It was particularly problematic for the settlers when the weather spoiled the harvest, which was often the case with hailstorms or late frosts.

When common divisions in the first half of the 19th century, the Schwerinsdorf district was expanded to include areas of the municipality of Selverde. This ceded 140 Diemat Land to the place. Not infrequently, however, the colonists also enlarged their areas on their own initiative, and new settlers also moved to Schwerinsdorf without permission in order to cultivate a piece of land on their own and without official approval. It was not uncommon for colonists who had already failed in other bog colonies in the region. It therefore seemed advisable to the Stickhausen Office to make inquiries about the applicants for new colonies in the future, but did not seem to have taken it too seriously, as emerged from complaints by long-time residents about newcomers.

Between 1839 and 1841 the route from Hesel to Oldenburg was expanded.

Weimar Republic and National Socialism

In the whole of East Frisia, in the first five years of the Weimar Republic, there was a turnaround in voters away from the initially strong liberal parties towards right-wing and right-wing extremist parties. In Schwerinsdorf this change in the favor of the voters was even more evident than in many other moor and Geest communities in the region. There the left-liberal German Democratic Party won 55.9 percent of the vote in the election for the German National Assembly , followed by the national liberal German People's Party with 27 percent. In third place was the SPD , for which almost 16 percent of the voters voted. These three constitutional parties together got almost 100 percent of the vote. The DDP and SPD alone, both parties in the Weimar coalition , together won around 72 percent of the vote. The DNVP ended up in fourth place with around one percent of the vote. Five years later this picture had turned into the opposite: in the Reichstag elections in May 1924 , right-wing parties won an absolute majority: the Völkisch Social Bloc won 53.7 percent of the vote, the DNVP another almost 38 percent. In the following years, too, the right-wing extremist parties retained the upper hand in Reichstag elections, while local groups of voters were mostly victorious at the municipal level. In the Reichstag election in 1930, the National Socialists became the strongest party for the first time with 37 percent; over the next three years, they continued to build their primacy. In July 1932, the Nazis in Schwerinsdorf got 96 percent of the vote, only six residents of the town did not vote for the NSDAP. In the last Reichstag election in March 1933, the NSDAP again won 95 percent. In a retrospective in 1947, the long-time member of the municipal council, Räter Post, himself an opponent of the Nazis, declared: "Blinded by propaganda, the farmer in particular believed at the time that he could expect a better future."

Mayor Hinrich Janssen, who had already been in office during the Weimar Republic (since 1924), remained in office. The municipal council, however, was transformed into a municipality at council in 1934 , which could only be heard on local matters, but had little more decision-making powers. The Reichserbhofgesetz , enacted as early as 1933, also had an impact in the municipality of Schwerinsdorf: Several farmers tried to defend themselves against the ban on sale contained therein, but in vain. A dispute against the background of the church struggle developed between the Firrel pastor Ludwig Heinemeyer and the Schwerinsdorf teacher Andreas van Dieken, who had joined the NSDAP . Van Dieken did not belong to the German Christians , but saw in Heinemeyer a representative or supporter of the Confessing Church and therefore tried at every opportunity to prevent speeches by the pastor in Schwerinsdorf. A church service on New Year's 1934 was disrupted by gunfire, and in 1939 van Dieken refused the pastor to use the school for church purposes. Van Dieken also took over the management of the newly created NSDAP base in Schwerinsdorf in 1942.

During the war, the women took over the work that the drafted soldiers had previously done. Forced laborers were also deported to Schwerinsdorf, evidence of the work of a Belgian, a Polish woman with her son and a young Russian. Towards the end of the war there was also a so-called “Dutch camp” in the Schwerinsdorf school, but nothing is known about the number of people interned there. As early as March 8, 1945, the first displaced persons from the eastern regions of the Reich arrived in the community . After the Allied troops had taken Leer at the end of April 1945, they advanced further in a north-easterly direction. A Volkssturm troop led by NSDAP local leader van Dieken was called up, but did not offer any resistance when the Canadian and Polish troops arrived. Wehrmacht soldiers on the retreat fought with the approaching allies, who in turn returned fire. The teacher's apartment and six other houses in the village were destroyed. On May 2, 1945, there was a truce in Schwerinsdorf.

post war period

In the first general election , the CDU prevailed with confidence: it won 76.2 percent of the vote, ahead of the SPD (8.8 percent), FDP (5.2 percent) and the right-wing extremist DRP (4.2 percent). The dominance of the Christian Democrats did not change in the following decades, which means that Schwerinsdorf, like the neighboring towns of the municipality of Uplengen and the joint municipality of Jümme, as well as parts of the joint municipality of Hesel, are among those regions of East Frisia in which the Christian Democrats for a long time far above-average results in the otherwise social democratic East Frisia achieved. Up to and including the 1969 Bundestag election, the Social Democrats only made up the lower double-digit percentage range of the votes cast, while the Christian Democrats achieved results of up to 87.6 percent ( 1965 Bundestag election ). In the “Willy Brandt election” in 1972 , the Social Democrats achieved their best result to date of 27 percent (CDU: 68 percent). Since then, the SPD has caught up with the electorate, and in the 2002 federal election it was even ahead of the CDU (43.8 percent) with 46.7 percent. The next federal election saw the CDU again with 48.2 percent in front (SPD: 37.8 percent). The smaller parties only played a subordinate role in federal elections (2005: FDP with 6.3%, the Greens with 3.4% and Die Linke with 2%). With a brief interruption in 1947, Hinrich Janssen, who already held this office during the Weimar Republic, directed the fate of the community. He remained mayor until 1968 and was then declared an honorary citizen of Schwerinsdorf. At the municipal level, the local voter group “Steerner Voting Community” has secured a leading role over the years : it currently has seven out of eleven seats in the local council, the SPD and CDU each have two seats.

Formerly a village school, today there is a meeting room for the volunteer fire brigade on the ground floor and the Steerner Kring premises on the top floor

The destruction of the teacher's apartment in the last days of the war in 1945 was an obstacle to resuming school operations in the community for a long time. At the end of the 1940s there were 140 students in Schwerinsdorf, but only two teachers. These were housed in emergency shelters; there was no room at all for a third teacher who was required. A corresponding application was not approved until 1948. Since the 1960s, increasing centralization tendencies became noticeable. First of all, the school association “Kloster Barthe” was founded with the new central school in Hesel for classes from level five. The Schwerinsdorfers also followed suit, although the orientation also went in the direction of Remels . Finally, in 1974, the primary school in Schwerinsdorf was closed and from then on the students were schooled in Hesel. With that, around a century and a half of school history came to an end for the place. The former school was converted into a village community center in 2000.

Effective January 1, 1973, the Schwerinsdorf community joined the Hesel community . The community only received a coat of arms in 1987 at the suggestion of the local fire brigade, which had not been able to wear an emblem on their uniforms to date. It shows (heraldically) on the right the red diamond, which is taken from the coat of arms of the Count family von Schwerin, and on the left a star as a reference to the inn, to which the Schwerinsdorfers owe their Low German name "Steerner". In the coat of arms developed by the Leer-based graphic artist Panenborg, a clover leaf was also included as a symbol for the agricultural character of the municipality.

politics

Municipal council

The council of the municipality of Schwerinsdorf consists of 9 council women and councilors. This is the specified number for the member municipality of an integrated municipality with a population between 501 and 1,000 inhabitants. The 9 council members are elected by local elections for five years each. The current term of office began on November 1, 2016 and ends on October 31, 2021.

The last local election on September 11, 2016 resulted in the following:

Political party	Proportional votes	Number of seats	Change voices	Change seats
CDU	37.9%	3	+ 19.7%	+1
AWG Steern	33.7%	3	+ 33.7%	+3
SPD	22.1%	2	+ 2.9%	0
StWG	6.4%	1	−56.2%	−4

The turnout in the 2016 local elections was 61.7%, well above the Lower Saxony average of 55.5%. For comparison - in the previous municipal election on September 11, 2011, the turnout was 61.2%.

coat of arms

Blazon : “Split; in front a red diamond in gold, behind in red under a gold five-pointed star a gold four-leaf clover. "

At the beginning of the 19th century, Count Schwerin was the district president in Aurich . The village was named in his honor. His symbol, the red diamond on a gold background, is on the non-heraldic left side of the municipality's coat of arms. The other side shows a golden five-pointed star in the upper square, which was adopted as a symbol of the inn in Schwerinsdorf. This inn was a hostel and rest stop for the mail wagons between the towns of Leer and Westerstede . In the lower square of the page is a golden four-leaf clover on a red background as a symbol of the agrarian landscape.

societies

Club life developed in Schwerinsdorf - apart from the Kyffhäuserkameradschaft founded in 1911 - relatively late. In 1968 the SV Stern Schwerinsdorf was founded, which essentially has soccer teams. The “Steerner Kring” was added in 1983 as a home and citizens' association.

Kyffhäuserkameradschaft Schwerinsdorf and the surrounding area

The "Kyffhäuserkameradschaft Schwerinsdorf and surroundings" is the oldest association in the Schwerinsdorf community (founded in 1911) with around 100 members. The club is actively involved in shooting sports and has its own air rifle shooting range on the Schoolpad. He is a member of the Kyffhäuserbund and belongs to the Bremen / Weser-Ems regional association. The association has been organizing the “Steerner Warrior Festival” every year since 1928. Furthermore, the comradeship has been organizing an annual flea market on Oldendorfer Straße since 2002. Both events contribute to the awareness of the village in the East Frisian region.

Steerner Kring

The "Steerner Kring" ( Low German : "Steern" for Schwerinsdorf and "Kring" for "district"), founded on August 26, 1983 in the hotel "Goldener Stern" in Schwerinsdorf, has set itself the goal of bringing together the existing associations and groups in the village and to promote their cultural activities. In addition, the association promotes village life within the scope of its possibilities. The association organizes the “Hackselball” annually, which marks the start of the harvest festival week in the joint municipality of Hesel . At the "Hackselball", grain is traditionally chopped up with an old chopping machine operated by the guests present at the opening of the event and distributed on the dance floor.

Oldtimer Club Schwerinsdorf

The "Oldtimer Club" (OTC) was founded in 1996 in Schwerinsdorf. It includes lovers of old machines (especially tractors) and classic cars. Every year at Whitsun, the club organizes one of the largest classic car meetings in the whole of East Frisia.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ State Office for Statistics Lower Saxony, LSN-Online regional database, Table 12411: Update of the population, as of December 31, 2019  ( help ).
2. ↑ Joachim Tautz: Steerner Chronik - The history of the East Frisian community Schwerinsdorf (Ed .: Municipality Schwerinsdorf), Verlag Risius, Weener 2002, ISBN 3-88761-075-X , p. 11, in the following: Tautz: Chronik .
3. ^ Curt Heinrich Conrad Friedrich Jansen: Statistical Handbook of the Kingdom of Hanover, 1824, p. 7 .
4. ↑ quoted in Tautz: Chronik , p. 18.
5. ↑ Helmut Sanders: Wiesmoor - His cultivation and settlement from the peripheral communities . Verlag Mettcker & Söhne, Jever 1990, ISBN 3-87542-006-3 , p. 22 ff.
6. ^ Tautz: Chronicle , p. 18.
7. ^ Tautz: Chronicle , p. 24.
8. ↑ The figures on the election results of the Weimar Republic are taken from the article by Ortschronisten der Ostfriesische Landschaft, Schwerinsdorf , PDF file, p. 2, accessed on February 23, 2013, and Tautz: Chronik , p. 66 ff.
9. ↑ Tautz: Chronicle , p. 69.
10. ^ Tautz: Chronicle , p. 80.
11. ^ Tautz: Chronik , p. 80 ff.
12. ^ Tautz: Chronicle , p. 89.
13. ↑ The figures for the Bundestag elections are taken from the article by Ortschronisten der Ostfriesische Landschaft, Schwerinsdorf , PDF file, p. 2, accessed on February 23, 2013.
14. ↑ Klaus von Beyme : The political system of the Federal Republic of Germany: An introduction , VS Verlag, Wiesbaden 2004, ISBN 3-531-33426-3 , p. 100, limited preview in the Google book search, accessed on February 23, 2013.
15. ^ Tautz: Chronik , pp. 101 ff. And 119.
16. ^ Tautz: Chronicle , p. 118.
17. ^ Lower Saxony Municipal Constitutional Law (NKomVG) in the version of December 17, 2010; Section 46 - Number of MPs , accessed on December 28, 2016.
18. ↑ ^{a b} Schwerinsdorf municipality - Schwerinsdorf municipal council elections 2016 (PDF; 19 kB), accessed on December 28, 2016.
19. ↑ hna.de: Local elections: All information, all results , accessed on December 28, 2016.
20. ↑ Municipality of Schwerinsdorf - overall results of the 2011 municipal council election (PDF; 12 kB), accessed on December 28, 2016.

Web links

Commons : Schwerinsdorf  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Joint municipality of Hesel
• Kyffhäuserkameradschaft Schwerinsdorf
• Steerner Kring
• SV Stern Schwerinsdorf
• OTC Schwerinsdorf