Sites in Hesse and the Saarland

Wiesbaden

 Adolf-Hitler-Platz then and now 

The former Hotel Rose, shown in the period postcard with the swastika flying above, is now the seat of the government of the State of Hesse.

Marburg

 Marburg's marktplatz has changed considerably since the war, not least its name during the Third Reich 

Hessian State Archives

The Eagle remains sans swastika, but the ceiling maintains them

Above the door the small bust replaces the one of Hitler's during the Third Reich whilst outside one can find another eagle defaced on the Hausecke der ehemaligen Jägerkaserne in Marburg

Frankfurt

Adolf-Hitler-Bridge in 1936 and a view of the bridges over the river Main, from the Main tower.
Tax office built in 1935 with main entrance still enclosed within Nazi iconography.

Part of an air raid shelter built during the Second World War.

Left: Commemorating the site of the May 10 book burning in Frankfurt
Right: The Opera House (Alte Oper) inaugurated in 1880 where many important works have premièred including Carl Orff's Carmina Burana in 1937.
The Römer

The swastika being hoisted in March 1933 from the rathaus

Hitler speaking from the balcony March 31, 1938 after the anschluss with Austria. Hitler at this time had declared

I am happy that today I am able to enter this city as the man who has realized a yearning which once found its most profound expression in this location. Above all, I am happy that—for the first time in my life—I am able to stand in this magnificent hall. The cause for which our ancestors struggled and shed their blood ninety years ago may now be regarded as accomplished. I am firmly convinced and confident that this cause—the new Greater German Reich—will remain in existence for all time to come, for it is supported by the German Volk itself and founded upon the eternal yearning of the German Volk to possess one Reich.

Hitler being driven down Braubachstrasse nearby; period photo from the Hitler Pages.

What was left after the war.

The Synagogue

The Boerneplatz synagogue in flames during Kristallnacht on November 10, 1938. The Westend synagogue on Freiherr-vom-Stein-Strasse shown right is the only synagogue in the city to have survived the Reichskristallnacht.
I.G.Farben Building

The I.G. Farben building (or the Poelzig Complex ) was built from 1928 to 1930 as the corporate headquarters of the conglomerate and upon its completion was Europe's largest office building until the 1950s.

I. G. Farben also manufactured nerve gas that was used in poison gas experiments on Auschwitz prisoners. These experiments, conducted in secret laboratories at I. G. Farben factories, were used to determine how fast nerve gas would kill Allied soldiers. The helpless victims of these experiments died instantly. According to British intelligence, Ambros and other I. G. Farben officials "justified the experiments not only on the grounds that the inmates of concentration camps would have been killed anyway by the Nazis, but also . . . that the experiments had a humanitarian aspect in that the lives of countless German workers were saved."

Linda Hunt (76) Secret Agenda

Kassel

Hitler speaking 4 June 1939 at Friedrichsplatz with the old Staatstheater in the background, and its current incarnation since 1959.

Hitler on Königstraße, three months before the invasion of Poland, and today.

The Adolf-Hitler-Haus at Wilhelmshöher Allee 7 now is the site of a music shop.

St. Martin's church after the war and today

The hauptbahnhof then and now

Bebra

1944 postcard on the left showing Adolf-Hitler-Platz, Hauptman-Göring-Straße and Horst-Wessel-Straße.

Darmstadt

Hochschulstraße during the Third Reich

The Technische Universität Darmstadt einst und jetzt

Eagle above the rear main entry to the Robert-Piloty building, department of Computer Science, Technical University of Darmstadt. On the night of September 11 September 12, 1944 eighty per cent of the city, including many of the university's buildings were destroyed during a bomb attack. So far to date Darmstadt is the only German city that has given a synagogue to its Jewish community as a gesture of reconciliation.

 Meeting on the 100-year anniversary of the TH Darmstadt in May 1936 in the Städtischen Festhalle

A reichsadler also remains on the façade of the Psychologiegebäude

This was the site of the headquarters of the Gestapo in Darmstadt at what is now Wilhelm-Glässingstraße 21-23.

Naumburg

The rathaus in 1935 and today

Hitlerjugend marching in front of the Reichskrone topped with the Nazi eagle in 1940 and what's left today

Hitlerjugend in front of the Schützenhaus, renamed the Haus der deutschen Jugend in 1937 and Generalleutnant Peter Weyer swearing in recruits the following year.

 St. Wenzel church after the 1945 bombing and today

Windecken

 View from the Marktplatz towards Kirchgassse  in 1938 on the town's 650th anniversary 

The Amtshaus: "Das Lämmchen

The Rathaus

The Burgtor

The church from Spitalgasse (left) and Gutegasse (right)

The Alte Fachwerkhäuser on Friedrich Ebert Straße.

 By the East Gate in Schloßgasse

View from Schloßberg towards the clock tower

Fliegerdenkmal, Wasserkuppe

1923 memorial to the fallen airmen of the First World War

The Saarland

Saarbrücken 

Bishops Franz Rudolf Bornewasser of Trier and Ludwig Sebastian of Speyer giving the Nazi salute along with Reichskommissar for the Reunification of the Saarland to the German Reich Josef Bürkel, Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick, and Joseph Goebbels inside the rathaus on March 1, 1935.

 Goebbels provided a weekly illustrated magazine, telling the catholic Saar electorate that the bolsheviks were the sworn enemy of God. In neutral Geneva his ministry’s anti-Comintern unit set up a religious front, Pro Deo, which formally received the anti-bolshevik exhibition that he had prepared in Berlin and sent it on to the Saar camouflaged with Swiss certificates of origin. In the Saar, the catholic clergy publicized the exhibition from their pulpits. ‘ The Saarbrücken clerics never guessed whose errands they were running,’ wrote Eberhard Taubert.

Irving (362-3) Goebbels: Mastermind of the Third Reich

 

Hitler arriving

The rathaus on that day and today.


Adolf-Hitler-Straße before and after the war, and today as bahnhofstrasse 

 The hauptbahnhof itself with Hitler during a march, after the war, and its current replacement.

Saarländisches Staatstheater

The Saarland national theatre was officially opened in 1938 by Adolf Hitler as the Gautheater Saarpfalz. The following year on May 16, Hitler attended a performance of Karl Millöcker’s operetta Gräfin Dubarry here. "Incidentally, the foundations of the theatre building formed part of the West Wall’s substructure along the Saar River (Doramus p.1610)."

Galgenbergturm

The Galgenbergturm (Gallows Hill Tower), the main symbol of the community Schiffweiler, was built between 1937 and 1939, inaugurated 8 July 1939 in the name and service of Adolf Hitler. After the war it was renamed Galgenberg tower.