Along the Breite Straße

Historical photograph of the Garrison Church. © Alfred von Loebenstein, Potsdam Museum Collection

Garnisonkirche - Garrison Church
(archway on Breite Straße)

By the year 2017, the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, the Potsdam Court, and Garrison Church is to be re-constructed on this spot. It fell victim to bombs in 1945; the ruins were removed in 1968.

On January 1, 1722, the first Court and Garrison Church was consecrated in Potsdam. It was a half-timbered building and had only a small roof turret. Nonetheless Bellamintes composed: "Here waves to me the tower from this church building, / Where the inhabitants seat themselves at the feet of God, / And where even the King himself from the beloved meadow / And the pleasant power of words takes delight."

Built on marshy ground, the church began to sink in 1730 and was demolished. The architect Philipp Gerlach (1679-1748), who already had the predecessor building and the town church St. Nikolai constructed, received the order for a massive new structure. The construction began in 1731, one year later the church was ready, and by 1735, so was the tower. A 35-bell carillon from the Netherlands, which had already hung in the old church building, was re-hung - now with the addition of five more bells. Since 1797, every hour on the hour, "Praise the Lord" rang out, and at the bottom of the hour, the famous Mozart melody "Üb' immer Treu und Redlichkeit ...."

In 1740, Frederick William I was buried in the crypt of the church, and in 1786, Frederick II was buried there - against his own declared wish. Czar Alexander (1805) and Napoleon I (1806) both paid visits to the burial crypt.

On the March 21, 1933, the so-called "Potsdam Day," the alliance between German fascism and the Prussian military was celebrated in the church by Reich's Chancellor Adolf Hitler and Reich President von Hindenburg.

During the government of Frederick William I, three large, new churches were built in Potsdam: the town church St. Nikolai (1721-1724 and anew in the 19th century), the Church of the Holy Ghost (1726-1728, destroyed 1945), and the Garrison Church (1730-1735). All three churches once stood in an almost straight line from west to east, and with their practically 90 meters high steeples they towered over the not-quite-so-big town, forming a unique urban ensemble.