From April 5 to April 15, 1945, Bambauer Germany was a command post for the 75th Infantry Division. The troops got some much needed rest and relaxation. After the 75th Infantry Division crossed the Dortmund-Ems Canal they held a line from the Zweg Canal just south of Ickern to Brambauer Germany.
In Brambauer, I decided to sketch the Martin Luther Church. I was seated right next to a World War II memorial that was a stone courtyard where the walls had plaques covered with the names of soldiers who had died in that war. Since it was World War 1 related, I decided to pass on sketching it. It was a bitter cold day and a tram car would pass the church every half hour or so.
Brambauer contributed to the German war effort thanks to its coal mines which provided fuel for factories and German tanks. Brambauer’s location near the industrial heartland meant it experienced the war’s impact through industrial demands, bombings, coal extraction, and the final battles of the war as Allied forces advanced.
The original Martin Luther Church was was a neo-Renaissance style church built between 1904 and 1906. It was largely destroyed during World War II. Only the tower stood at the end of the war. During the Nazi period, the broader German Protestant church was divided between the “German Christians” movement, which aligned with Nazi ideology and antisemitism, and the “Confessing Church”, which resisted state control. Pastor Karl Friedrich Stellbrink, a member of the Confessing Church preached in Lübeck until his arrest and murder by the Nazi regime.
At first Karl Friedrich embraced the Nazi ideals, but he soon felt that the Nazi’s had a hatred for Christ. On a Palm Sunday sermon in 1942, after the devastating bombing of Lübeck, Karl Frederick exclamation: “God has spoken in mighty language – the people of Lübeck will learn to pray again.” This sermon led to his arrest by the SS Police, followed by the arrest of the three Catholic chaplains. Along with them, 17 members of the Catholic community and one Protestant Christian in Lübeck were charged. Karl Frederick was murdered for his anti – Nazi sermon.
The present-day Martin Luther Church in Brambauer was erected as a simple brick building between 1962 and 1964. The original, surviving tower still bears the scars of the war.
After the war the town was used as a site for German war graves, including fallen soldiers and Soviet prisoners.