Sunday, June 16, 2013

Sunday in the Cemetery with Paul



A warm Sunday afternoon in Berlin. A little late Indian lunch – tasty linsen curry – at my local, a couple of streets away ..And then a small stroll… through the pretty little walled cemetery opposite. The Friedhof der Sophiengemeinde …
I really didn’t expect to find anyone I knew in my ‘local’ graveyard. But, suddenly, there I was standing opposite a large memorial to Walter Kollo. A stone bearing his name and his wife’s … and his musical and theatrical credits!


 Then, looking up, I saw an elegant, white gravestone, to the memory of … Albert Lortzing!  What was this?  Musical-theatre corner?


Not exactly. A nearby cross commemorated the last survivng grandson of Johann Sebastian Bach…



A mausoleum was the last resting place of Mr and Mrs Bechstein, of keyboard celebrity ….

But it wasn’t all music. A dramatic looking stele, with a brass relief, commemorates one Johanna Stegen. ‘The heroine of Lüneberg’. Born 1793. Which war was that? Who was she…
Well, turns out to be the Napoleonic wars, and Johanna was a sort of Grace Darling girl who brought the troops bullets in her apron.



What a trove of folk one finds on a Sunday in the cemetery with Paul.

1 comment:

  1. Gosh that's quite an amzing resting place! The headstones look well maintained Quite comforting that they are all resting close together ~ It's a bit like the cemetery in St Petersburg wherea famous musical or dramatic person lies at every other grave stone. How amazing that you've only just discovered this place!

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