Kopli cemetery

Kopli cemetery ( _de. Friedhof von Ziegelskoppel or _de. Kirchhof von Ziegelskoppel), ( _et. Kopli kalmistu) was Estonia's largest Lutheran Baltic German cemetery, located in the suburb of Kopli in Tallinn. It contained thousands of graves of prominent citizens of Tallinn and stood for over 170 years from 1774 to shortly after World War II when it was completely flattened and destroyed by the Soviet occupation authorities governing the country at the time.Rein Taagepera, "Estonia: Return to Independence", Westview Press 1993, ISBN 0813317037, page 189] The former cemetery is now a public park.

Origins 1771-1774 and use

Between 1771 and 1772, Catherine the Great, empress of the Russian empire, issued an edict which decreed that from that point on no-one who died (regardless of their social standing or class origins) was to be buried in a church crypt or churchyard; all burials were to take place in the new cemeteries to be built throughout the entire Russian empire, which were to be located outside town boundaries.

These measures were intended to overcome the congestion of urban church crypts and graveyards, and were prompted by a number of outbreaks of highly contagious diseases linked to inadequate burial practices in urban areas, especially the black plague which had led to the Plague Riot in Moscow in 1771.

Against this background the cemetery at Kopli was founded in 1774 on the outskirts of Tallinn. Divided into a 2 sections, the western part was used for the deceased belonging to the Niguliste (Nikolai) church parish, while the eastern part was reserved for those of the Oleviste (St Olai, Olaf) church parish.

The cemetery served as a burial ground for over 170 years for almost all Baltic Germans who died in the city between 1774 and 1944. In 1939 it contained thousands of well kept graves of many prominent citizens of Tallinn.

Final burials 1939-1944

Burials at the cemetery were drastically reduced after Hitler's forced transfer, under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, of tens of thousands of Baltic Germans from Estonia and Latvia in late 1939 over to areas in western Poland.

Burials at the cemetery continued on a much smaller scale until 1944, principally among those Baltic Germans who had refused Hitler's call to leave the region.

Destruction by Soviet authorities after 1945

Shortly after World War II and during the second occupation of Baltic states, the suburb of Kopli, because of its strategic position as a base for the Red Army on the Gulf of Finland, was turned into a restricted zone for the Soviet military and closed to the public.

Around 1950-1951 the cemetery was entirely flattened by Russian Soviet authorities.Rein Taagepera, "Estonia: Return to Independence", Westview Press 1993, ISBN 0813317037, page 189] Gravestones were used to build walls along the ports and sidewalks in other parts of the city and no trace of the cemetery was left standing.

Soviet forces, in a coordinated effort to remove all traces of the past, non ethnic Russian, inhabitants of Tallinn, also destroyed two further 17th and 18th century cemeteries in the city in the suburbs of Kalamaja and Moigu which belonged to the ethnic Estonian and Baltic German communities.

In contrast the Russian Orthodox Cemetery, also established in the 18th century, south of the old town of Tallinn, was left standing.

Current Status

Presently the former area of the cemetery is a public park, with no immediate visible indication of its previous status. The only surviving evidence of those who were interred there consists of the parish registers of burials and some old detailed maps of the area in the Tallinn city archives.

List of famous graves at the cemetery that stood until 1950

Among the thousands who were buried at Kopli, were also the following:

* Gertrud Elisabeth Mara
* Various members of the Burchart family who owned and managed the Raeapteek in Tallinn
* Eduard Bornhöhe
* Carl Ferdinand v Kügelgen
* Rudolf Carl Georg Lehbert
* Franz Kluge

References in literature

The cemetery features several times in the short story collection "Der Tod von Reval" ("The Death from Tallinn") by the Baltic German author Werner Bergengruen.

References

* Adolf Richters Baltische Verkehrs- und Adreßbücher, Band 3-Estland, Riga 1913
* Schmidt, Christoph. Bergengruens Tod von Reval aus historischer Sicht. "Journal of Baltic Studies", 29:4 (1998), 315-325
* Tallinna Kalmistud, Karl Laane, Tallinn, 2002. ISBN 9985-64-168-x

See also

* Mõigu cemetery
* Kalamaja cemetery
* Raadi cemetery
* Great Cemetery (Riga)
* Nazi-Soviet population transfers
* Baltic Germans
* List of cemeteries

External links

* [http://www.tarkvarastuudio.ee/tallinn_linnaarhiiv/149-4-7.htm Image of a very detailed historical map from the year 1904 showing only the western part of the cemetery with all numbered grave plots]
* [http://www.tarkvarastuudio.ee/tallinn_linnaarhiiv/149-5-9.htm Image of a historical map from the year 1881 showing the cemetery and the whole Kopli peninsula]
* [http://www.epl.ee/?artikkel=267323 News article on the history of the cemetery, in Estonian, from 2004]
* [http://arhiiv2.postimees.ee:8080/htbin/1art-a?/00/08/31/uudised.shtmXkymnes News article on the history of the cemetery, in Estonian from 2000]
* [http://www.kopli.ee/index.php?Itemid=27&id=14&lang=ee&option=com_content&task=view Notes on the cemetery as a park, in Estonian]