Church buildings are part of almost every place in Central Germany. In everyday life they are known as landmarks, town centers or landmarks, they have a variety of architectural, art historical and regional historical significance. But the future of many churches is threatened: dozens of them have lost their function, some have already disappeared from the townscape without a trace. Time to remember disappeared churches – and what has been irrevocably lost with them.
The American Church of St. John in Dresden, also called American Church for short, was an American church.
This “American Saint John’s Church”, to give it the literal translation, was completed in 1884 as a church in the neo-Gothic style at Reichsstrasse 5 (today Fritz-Löffler-Strasse) in the southern suburbs.
How did the US church in Saxony’s state capital come about in the first place? In the last third of the 19th century, Dresden’s Seevorstadt district between Bürgerwiese and Wiener Strasse was the city’s most exclusive residential area.
Many wealthy people from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the USA and Russia built, bought or rented there at the time – people who, together with their talents, ideas and assets, helped to advance science, business and culture in Dresden and in the Kingdom of Saxony. Their houses were stately and worth seeing – guidebooks of the time recommended walks there.
These Dresdeners by choice from the USA naturally organized their social life in their chosen home country – of course their religious life as well. She founded Dresden’s parish of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America. At first she celebrated her services in rented rooms, for example in the old orphanage church on Georgplatz.
After the Anglican congregation had built their church in Dresden, this acted as an incentive for the Americans: John Henry Anketell in particular was committed to building his own church. The wealthy and benevolent American Mrs. Thompson made the construction possible with the foundation “American Church of St. John in the City of Dresden” founded on Easter Sunday 1869.
The church was built in 1883-1884 according to plans by the architect Otto Dögel (1855-1891) from Dresden behind the main train station, and was consecrated with the service on December 25, 1884.
The hall church with a three-aisled nave, a smaller transept and an adjoining chancel had a church tower in front of it, built on the Bergstrasse side – thanks to its shape and location, the church became a symbol of the community.
The sacred building had an artistically designed altar and a crypt; the pulpit and the baptismal font were of French limestone. The history painter Anton Dietrich (1833–1904) designed the stained glass for the three double windows in the chancel, executed by the Dresden workshop of Bruno Urban (1851–1910). In 1900 the parish had around 200 members.
There was a profound turning point in 1914. At the beginning of the First World War, US citizens living and working in Dresden were considered to be relatives of the war enemy: partly of their own accord, partly because of the now cold social environment, they left their adopted home of Dresden, Saxony and Germany permanently . The church has only been used irregularly since then.
The church burned down in the hail of air raids on Dresden on February 13 and 14, 1945 – it fell victim to what the English-speaking military jargon so innocently called “friendly fire”.
The enclosing walls and the church tower with the spire remained largely intact. But who in Dresden wanted to save a US church building after the Anglo-American bombing raids?
There were people like that. In the post-war period, starting in 1953, professors from the building faculty at the Technical University of Dresden and representatives of the State Monuments Office tried to convey the building, which experts believed to be entirely refurbished, to the Evangelical-Reformed community – but without success.
After this parish had found new premises in the former court gardens on the Brühlsche Terrasse, in 1957 an expansion of the “American Church” for the student parish was considered.
However, Dresden’s city planning office said negatively that “with a rebuilt American Church, the Zion Church and the Church of St. Luke, three churches are very close to each other … in the immediate vicinity [sei] the auditorium maximum is planned as the future landmark of the technical university, [wo]with … the preservation of the American Church could not be reconciled.”
In 1959 the church was blown up. The announced new buildings of the Technical University of Dresden were – if at all – erected elsewhere; the property remained green and open space.
Coordinates: 51° 1′ 56″ N, 13° 43′ 49.5″ O
Sources and links:
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Church_of_St_John
https://www.dresden.de/media/pdf/denkmal/verlorene-kirchen-2018_web.pdf
http://www.dresdner-stadtteile.de/Zentrum/Sudvorstadt/Strassen_Sudvorstadt/Bergstrasse/Amerikanische_Kirche/amerikanische_kirche.html
https://kirchensprengung.de/kirchensprengung-dresden
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