What is/was a "Festungslazarett"?

[JWK]

What is/was a “Festungslazarett”?

I’ve googled the Google out of Google, but all I can find are a list of Festungslazarette, old Festungslazarette that have now been converted into libraries, many pictures of wounded soldiers in a Festungslazarett, and even more postmarks of Festungslazarette, but not a description/definition.

They were all over, Antwerp, Cologne (there were 10 or so there), Coblenz, Kiel etc etc

Is it just another name for a Lazarett, like Vereinslazarett, but this time run by the civil authorities of a city?

JW

[Coldstreamer]

knowing how German words are added together is it Festungs lazaret ?

[Stoppage Drill]

Translates as Fortress Military Hospital.

[SiegeGunner]

Assuming a fortress, fortified barracks or the like having a medical facility bigger than a 'sick bay', I'd use the word 'infirmary'.

[JWK]

For example :

Festungslazarett 3 (Kolpinghaus), Franzstrasse 8, Cologne-Lindenthal

http://www.bilderbuch-koeln.de/Fotos/lindenthal_kolpinghaus_denkmal_denkmalpflege_konservator_stadt_historisch_163822

Max Rehwagen died there 15.2.1915 http://des.genealogy.net/search/show/1505083

Does not look like a "fortress"

Neither does Festungslazarett Coblenz:

Wilhelm Horstmann died there 28.12.1915 http://des.genealogy.net/search/show/3550575

And in Wesel apparently a school (or at least the Gymnasium) was turned into a Festungslazarett

http://www.kdg-wesel.de/index.php?id=1292

Which does not bring us any closer to the meaning of "Festungslazarett", other than that you can't apparently translate it literally.

JW

[seaJane]

Military hospital? Festung being a fort.

[Ron Clifton]

I would say that it is named in contrast to a Feldlazarett, which is a field hospital. In other words, a static hospital in a fortress or garrison town.

Ron

[The Prussian]

Hello!
The german encyclopedia "Brockhaus" (edition 1894) says (in my bad english translation...)

"In case of a mobilization or an equipment of a forteress, all in the forts existing or new set-up hospitals of the military-administration, will be named "Forteress-Hospitals". Leader of those is the garrison-doctor, he has to care for the equipment and for well-educated staff. That staff will be taken from the "Forteress-Hospital-Depot", which has the requirements for 200 patients for three months. The Forteress-Hospital works solely for sick-nursing of wounded and ill men from the forteress, only exceptionally for those from the battlefield"

I hope, my english is understandable...

[trajan]

Garrison infirmary / hospital seems ok to me.... If you take 'Festung' in its alternative sense as a 'stronghold', then that's a place fortified and/or provided with a permanent garrison, and so 'Garrison infirmary / hospital' to distinguish it, as others have noted, from a 'Field infirmary / hospital'.

Trajan

[AOK4]

Hello,

Although Festungslazarette were originally created as hospitals for the fortress garrison, during WWI they refer to normal stationary military hospitals in fortified cities.

Jan

[bill24chev]

The picture of Coblenz "Festungslazarett" is, as any one who served in Germany will know, a typical layout for a German Barracks.

Maybe the "Festungslazarett" is one of the individual buildinds, probably the Block facing the camera position.

In my time in the Army, most large garrisons had a "Medical Receptio Station" (MRS), usualy with a small number of beds for short term patients who were either discharged back to unit or transferred to a British Military Hospital after observations.

A "Festungslazarett" would appear to me, to be a similer to an MRS but probably on a bigger scale bearing in mind there were more medical conditions that were more serious in the pre Antibiotic age.

bill

[bierast]

In Saxony each peacetime Garnisonslazarett (garrison hospital) became a Reservelazarett in wartime - presumably because most of the 'active' medical personnel went into the field with the Feldlazarette and were largely replaced by reservists.

We've not yet found such a thing as a Festungslazarett in Saxony - conceivably there may have been one at the Festung Königstein on the Elbe, although this fortress had been downgraded before the war due to its location (near the Austro-Saxon border, traditionally used to secure the Saxon treasury during Prussian invasions). So far as I can tell, a Festungslazarett was simply the equivalent of a Reservelazarett within an officially designated fortress city (such as Coblenz).

[JWK]

Thanks for all your replies.

Looks like it's not such a straight-forward question I asked.

If I understand it correctly then Festungslazarette were pre-existing military hospitals in a fortified city,

(Festungsstadt https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Festungen_in_Deutschland )

And Vereinslazarette, Lazarette, Reserve-Lazarette etc etc etc were all war-time creations, or renamed pre-existing military hospitals in non-fortified cities?

Or am I now going down the wrong path?

JW

[bierast]

If I understand it correctly then Festungslazarette were pre-existing military hospitals in a fortified city,

(Festungsstadt https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Festungen_in_Deutschland )

And Vereinslazarette, Lazarette, Reserve-Lazarette etc etc etc were all war-time creations, or renamed pre-existing military hospitals in non-fortified cities?

As I understand it (mainly by a process of deduction from examples known to me):

Garnisonslazarett = peacetime military hospital.

Festungslazarett = wartime (probably pre-existing) military hospital in a fortified city within Germany. This designation was also used for establishments within fortified cities in conquered territory under military governments (i.e. the areas behind both the combat zone and the Etappe) - e.g. I have several photos from Festungslazarett Warschau in ex-Russian Poland.

Reservelazarett = wartime military hospital in a non-fortified city within Germany, typically the wartime designation of an existing (and probably expanded) Garnisonslazarett. This designation was quite probably used in the territories of the military governments as well. It seems that entirely new war-raised military hospitals within Germany also got this designation, since we know that there were ultimately at least four Reservelazarette in Dresden.

Vereinslazarett = this seemingly designated a peacetime private hospital in Germany 'conscripted' by the military authorities, going by the Saxon examples of which I am aware.

[JWK]

I wonder if there is a list somewhere of all the different Lazarett-types/names, and what the “order of battle” was for them.

For Cologne e.g. I now have 5 different Lazarett-types (Thanks to the Verlustliste):

-Festungslazarett 3, Kölpinghaus

-Kriegslazarett 4, Aug. Hospital

-Lazarett Köln-Ehrenfeld

-Reserve Lazarett Städtl. Krankenhaus

-Vereinslazarett Cöln

One gets confused….

[Garrie215]

An old thread but I am looking for German records from Metz military hospitals- Festungslazarett II Metz in particular.  Metz was part of Germany 1870-1918 so the records will be German ones.  My Great Uncle 2/Lt ACG Fowler RAF was killed 20 September, 1918 piloting HP O/400 night bomber to Frescaty Airfield, Metz and his body was taken to this hospital.  I would like to know if the original German records still exist somewhere to confirm his burial place

Thanx

[charlie2]

4 hours ago, Garrie215 said:

 I would like to know if the original German records still exist somewhere to confirm his burial place

There is the death certificate sent to the Red Cross.

https://grandeguerre.icrc.org/en/File/Details/503159/3/2/

https://grandeguerre.icrc.org/en/File/Details/2554752/3/2/
 

Charlie

[GreyC]

On 08/09/2015 at 15:45, bierast said:

Festungslazarett = wartime (probably pre-existing) military hospital in a fortified city within Germany.

Hi,

according to the Brockhaus-Encyclopedia of 1894 cited above, EVERY hospital in a city declared as a fortress was, from the moment mobilisation was initiated, called a Festungslazarett.

On 08/09/2015 at 20:57, JWK said:

For Cologne e.g. I now have 5 different Lazarett-types

Why the Lazarette were not (re)named accordingly in Cologne (as they should have been according to the Brockaus of 1894) I don´t know.

Either the regulations changed sometime between 1894 and 1914 or they were called what they were called because people did not care.

You´ll probably find more in the Kriegs-Sanitätsordnung of 1907 with amendments up to 1914 p.88.

GreyC

Edited yesterday at 08:04 by GreyC

[Garrie215]

Thank you for your prompt reply - and research. I am trying to discover the original German document where the ICRC obtained this information - hopefully the one signed by Chefarzt Olbrin. I do not know if those military hospital records survived long after the end of the war and wonder how I can discover this. I have visited Garnisonfriedhof Metz - now known as Chambière French National Cemetery, Metz but was not able to locate any cemetery records from 1918 and was hoping there might be more details on the original German form. There are no Commonwealth War Grave records either relating to my great uncle's burial in this cemetery.

[charlie2]

Have you contacted the Volksbund, there is a remote possibility that they have the cemetery burial plans. Be aware that the majority of the Prussian Army and Volksbund records were lost in air raids in ww2. The Volksbund records have been reconstructed to a certain degree so its worth a try.

https://www.volksbund.de

Charlie

 

[AOK4]

11 hours ago, charlie2 said:

Have you contacted the Volksbund, there is a remote possibility that they have the cemetery burial plans. Be aware that the majority of the Prussian Army and Volksbund records were lost in air raids in ww2. The Volksbund records have been reconstructed to a certain degree so its worth a try.

https://www.volksbund.de

Charlie

 

Charlie (and others),

Since under the Versailles Treaty, France was taking care of the German burials on its territory, France had been given copies of all cemetery registers and plans. These copies from 1919/1920 were then handed over to the Volksbund when the Volksbund took over full responsibility over the German war graves in France (1966). So, the Volksbund should have a copy of the original register. Whether they want to take a copy of the relevant page is a totally different matter (they keep refusing to make these lists public because of privacy).

There may be some trace as well in the French archives in Pierrefitte-sur-Seine.

It might be interesting to find out whether there were other British burials in Metz and where they were taken to. You may find unknown British remains that were transferred at the same time. I very much doubt that the original diaries of the Festungslazarett have survived. Anyway, they wouldn't have mentioned the grave number.

Like I said, the Volksbund should have a copy of the original German register in which Fowler should be mentioned.

I'll bring this topic to the attention of @LDT006 since he has some experience with identifying airmen's graves that were originally buried by the Germans.

Jan

 

[LDT006]

On 21/09/2024 at 18:07, Garrie215 said:

I have visited Garnisonfriedhof Metz - now known as Chambière French National Cemetery, Metz but was not able to locate any cemetery records from 1918

There are some records for the British WWI plot on the CWGC website: https://www.cwgc.org/visit-us/find-cemeteries-memorials/cemetery-details/2031731/chambieres-french-national-cemetery-metz/
I looked at all of these and there is no trace of the occupants from C9732: 2Lt ACG Fowler, 2Lt CG Eaves and 2Lt JS Ferguson. There is only one unknown buried there: a Canadian soldier.

All 3 have similar dead certificates at ICRC statig that they were buried at the Garnisonfriedhof at Metz but unfortunatly without grave numbers:
https://media.grandeguerre.icrc.org/full-resolution/C/G1/E/01/03/C_G1_E_01_03_0024/C_G1_E_01_03_0024_0141.JPG
https://media.grandeguerre.icrc.org/full-resolution/C/G1/E/01/03/C_G1_E_01_03_0024/C_G1_E_01_03_0024_0139.JPG
https://media.grandeguerre.icrc.org/full-resolution/C/G1/E/01/03/C_G1_E_01_03_0024/C_G1_E_01_03_0024_0140.JPG

I would follow the advice from others, contact VDK and ask if they have more details, include the ICRC documents in your request as evidence that they where buried there.

These ICRC documents were used by the army and/or IWGC to find the graves of missing soldiers, something must have gone wrong because they should have a special memorial headstone stating: "Buried in this cemetery, actual grave unknown".

CWGC might change their commemoration based on the above documents and more evidence from VDK.

Hope this helps,
Luc.