Billmuthausen

Billmuthausen (also Billmuthhausen ) is a deserted village in the Heldburger country in Thuringia. It is located in the extreme south of Thuringia in the district of Hildburghausen between the small towns of Bad Colberg- hero castle in Thuringia and bathroom Unterrodach in Bavaria on the River Unterrodach. The place is now a memorial to the former inner- German border.

History

1340 Billmuthausen was first mentioned as Billmuthehusen. The village was a manor in the core. 1840 were in Billmuthausen 14 houses, a mill and a church, in 1850 the village had 68 inhabitants. The mill had a meal and a grinding plant, its own water and electricity supply and a bakery. The manor was comprised of about 226 hectares of arable land and forests Agricultural. Billmuthausen belonged until 1918 to the Official Hero castle in the duchy of Saxe-Meiningen, then to the state of Thuringia. On 1 October 1936, the community was incorporated in Bad Colberg.

The fate of the village after the Second World War was determined by its immediate location on the inner German border. First Billmuthausen was occupied by the Americans, then moved in July 1945, the Red Army with zone protocol of the Allies in the village one. The manor was confiscated, arrested the landowner murdered in Buchenwald concentration camp and deported his family to Rügen. The land was distributed during the land reform. 1948 on the orders of the Russian occupying power ( SMAD Order 209 of 9 September 1947) was demolished Built in 1836, the manor house.

In 1952 the village was in the created by the GDR authorities restricted zone. In the same year fled seven families with 34 people and all movable property across the border to Bavaria. In the military expansion of the border has destroyed the dam for a mill race and thus the mill cut the ground. In 1961, two families forcibly evicted (Action Cornflower, see also Action vermin ). In 1965 the authorities ordered the demolition of the village church. The border fortifications were built by the village in the middle. After the inner border fence had been built, the mill and the Bergkeller were separated from the village.

1977, the authorities demolish the mill and announced the complete evacuation of the village. Under pressure from the politbureaucracy house was cleared for the house and then dismantled immediately. 1978 has deported the last one family and the village completely razed. The evacuation of the cemetery was planned, but was not completed because of the resistance of the former residents. Thus, a political deserted from the Thuringian village Billmuthausen.

In phone books, atlases and directories of the GDR the place Billmuthausen was continued even after the Wüstlegung. The entry in the last GDR postal code directory was DDR -6111 Billmuthausen Post Bad Colberg; he was taken over unchanged into the first all-German postcodes of June 1990. Even when in 1993 Germany for new five-digit postal codes were introduced, Billmuthausen was assigned the new ZIP code 98663.

Billmuthausen today

What remains are the graveyard and transformer tower. Also preserved the church bells are (today in the Otto -Ludwig- Museum in ice rink ) and sacred objects of the Church ( in church custody). A memorial was established in 1994 patrons Billmuthausen maintains the remains of the village complex. He has placed in the cemetery in 1992 a memorial stone ( Design: Martin Hänisch, Steinmetz: Kurt spear ), built a memorial chapel built in 2004 and a Mahnkreuz. The old transformer tower was reconstructed and the village fountain rebuilt.

A nearby receive on the Finkenberg retarded watchtower has been left to the Association for the Environment and Nature Conservation Germany ( BUND), who established it as a bat roost under the name of conservation, research and bat center Billmuthausen. In memory of the mill Billmuthäuser the Friends of the Memorial had erected a three -ton millstone in September 2005. In addition, the memorial has been extended by three new information boards.

The inscription on the memorial stone reads:

" Here stood from 1340 to 1978 the village Billmuthhausen. 1978 destroyed, the inhabitants driven out. "

The Foundation Billmuthausen (Chairman: Rüdiger stem, Coburg ) can repair the bells at the time. They should ring again in Billmuthausen on certain occasions. The bells consecration is scheduled on 31 May 2014. In 2013 there has been vandalism attacks on the memorial.