Chapel of Reconciliation

About

The Chapel of Reconciliation (German: Kapelle der Versöhnung) is a place of worship in Berlin, Germany. It stands on the site of the old Church of Reconciliation (de) (German: Versöhnungskirche), on Bernauer Strasse in the Mitte district.

Church of Reconciliation: The church was completed in 1894 as an imposing brick-built building by the architect Gotthilf Ludwig Möckel, in the Gothic revival style. It sustained some damage in the Second World War, and still had a deactivated American bomb in the basement discovered during its reconstruction in 1999, but the church survived the war. With the Division of Berlin in 1945, the church building found itself within the Soviet sector, with most of the parishioners in the neighbouring French sector. This meant that when the Berlin Wall was constructed in 1961, it ran directly in front of the church on its western side and behind it on the eastern side, preventing access to everyone except the border guards, who used its tower as an observation post. Snipers often shot at escapees from the church’s tower. The church building was demolished in 1985 in order ‘to increase the security, order and cleanliness on the state border with West Berlin...