two spa towns united

Lost cities 2:6

It was a bit of a shock to learn that the small but charismatic spa town of Bad Münster am Stein (the stone in the name refers to a massive red rock towering over the town, the Rheingrafenstein) lost its independence in 2014. It was merged into neighbouring Bad Kreuznach, which is ten times bigger and less picturesque, although it has an iconic bridge with historic houses perching on top - one of them has a Swedish cannon ball of the Thirty Years War stuck in its wall. On separate occasions and for unrelated reasons, both towns have been home to some of my ancestors, but as the stay at Bad Kreuznach was brief and uneventful I'll combine them into one entry.

Bad Münster am Stein is an icon of the romance of the Nahe valley with its salt extractors squeezed between vineyards and steep cliffs. The village Münster goes back to 1200 and has had spa visitors since the 15th century. It became a more widely known spa destination when the railway line along the river Nahe was completed in 1859. It gained the official name Bad Münster in 1905. It merged with Ebernburg in 1969 - until 1945 both communities had separate histories as Bad Münster was under Prussian rule and Ebernburg part of the Palatinate, thus ruled by faraway Bavaria.

Bad Kreuznach is the district capital of a fairly large region and thus a bit more of a city, but still very modest in size. It has a very turbulent history, being conquered back and forth by various armies in the Thirty Years War (1618-1648) and also in the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714), so it is quite amazing that those 15th century houses perching on top of the bridge are still there. It also has an impressive Roman mosaic floor.

Honestly, how these houses survived five centuries is a bit of a mystery to me.
Source.

I hear Bad Münster am Stein has the highest concentration of salt extractors (Salinen) anywhere.
Source.

What happened:

Until June 1919, Margaretha Imig, the widow of our station master at Adamsweiler (Alsace), had been living with her daughter Auguste Kauer at Saargemünd, Lorraine (today Sarreguemine, dept. Moselle). After the Versailles treaty, they found themselves on the French side of the new border and were evicted. They moved to Bad Münster am Stein, where Auguste's husband continued working for the Post Office. Auguste's sister Johanna also moved with them and stayed until 1929, when she took early retirement to build herself a house in the countryside.

Thus, Bad Münster am Stein became a focal point for the Kauer Clan. On big occasions such as Margarete's 80th birthday, everybody gathered there. Auguste's family lived in a flat within the main post office in the centre of town, the church towering in the background when they took family photos on their balcony.

I think it must have been this building Pfarrer-Dr.-Nagel-Weg 1 = Berliner Straße 23 - the balcony with the view of the church tower would have been at the back:

Von Karsten Ratzke - Eigenes Werk, CC0, Link

Confusingly, Margaretha's first identity document issued by French authorities upon arrival at Bad Münster gives her address as "Villa Günther" - as I've just discovered while looking for the address. As I've never heard of that place, I am inclined to think it must have served a kind of refugee accommodation for new arrivals. Her arrival date is given as 12.6.1919.

Margaretha died in September 1930 aged 83, and was buried in the local cemetery in what became a family burial site for the next 75 years. The presence of living ancestors ended at that point, but dead ancestors stayed a lot longer (and Auguste's family too). My great-grandmother Helene Kauer, Margarete's youngest daughter, had her husband Julius Düsselmann buried there when he died in 1950, with an additional inscription for their son who had died in the war. Auguste was buried there in 1952 and Johanna in 1953. (Auguste's husband, Wilhelm Fuchs, died 1963 and must have joined them as well, but I don't know that for certain.) Helene, the last survivor, joined her sisters in 1972. In 1973, her youngest daughter Esther had the tombstone of the old station master transferred from Adamsweiler to Bad Münster, and Esther's ashes were also buried there in 1983. The site was dissolved in 2005. It's a slightly weird thought in this day and age, to have such a huge family gathering underground. My grandparents opted out, however, otherwise the site could still be there.

Anyhow, that's the last the family saw of Bad Münster, so the dates (for living blood relatives) would be 1919 - 1930/1952

Next door in Bad Kreuznach, young Richard got his first teaching job after the war at the end of 1945, and the family moved to Philipstr. 12 at the beginning of 1946, and then to Carmerstr. 14 in July that year. They stayed there until the summer of 1951, when they moved to Idar-Oberstein, so let's call it 1945 - 1951

Locations

• Hauptpost Bad Münster, Pfarrer-Dr.-Nagel-Weg 1 = Berliner Straße 23
• Philipstr. 12, Bad Kreuznach
• Carmerstr. 14, Bad Kreuznach

As a child I must have visited Bad Münster am Stein a few times with my grandparents. Memories were kept alive by multiple times passing through on the train, marvelling at those rocks again. In 2015 I spent an hour there, just stepping off a train, having a walk around and taking the next train. No childhood memories of Bad Kreuznach, but I visited in 2018 to see the houses on the bridge and the Roman mosaic.

Previously in the #lostcities series:

1. Elberfeld / Wuppertal 1919 - 1961
2. Strasbourg 1901 - 1908
3. Minden 1903 - 1952/ca.1970
4. Tangermünde 1888 - 1916
5. Rheydt 1923 - 1935
6. Königsberg 1935 - 1945
7. Aachen 1936 - 1940
8. Idar-Oberstein 1940 - 1962
9. Bad Nauheim 1945 - 1972/1983
10. Würzburg 1961 - 1968
11. Hamborn inlaws: 1922 - 1979/2015
12. Bonn 1929 - 1934
13. Lorsch 1890 - 1938/1973
14. Krefeld 1764 - 1924/current
15. Gütersloh 1825 - 1928/1950s
16. Breslau 1830 - 1877

NB I'm adding a second end date to the cities where other family members stayed on after the direct ancestors died. So far, that is the case for Minden, Bad Nauheim, Hamborn, Krefeld and Gütersloh.

The Mastodon thread for season 2 starts here.