Schönhausen

The Colony

A mining town

Life in a miners’ colony was closely tied to the coal mine. The small houses stood close together, often with a vegetable garden, a barn, and a laundry room. Many families had known each other for generations; they helped one another in daily life and celebrated together. Traditions played an important role—from Sunday Mass to garden parties. Pigeon-keeping was also widespread. The pigeon coops stood in the gardens, and breeding and training pigeons was considered a source of pride. Children played in the streets, while the adults were organized into clubs. The colony was more than just a place to live—it was a social space with a strong sense of community.

Schönhausen

Life Next to the Coal Mine

Daily Life in the Colony

The Schönhausen settlement was established in the early 20th century. It served as housing for the employees of the nearby Grimberg coal mine, later known as Haus Aden. The uniformly built row houses with small gardens defined the character of the settlement.

Schönhausen was not only a place to live, but also a social space. Many families lived in the settlement for several generations. The close bonds that formed were the result of working together in the mines and living in the immediate vicinity.

Daily life was strictly structured. The men worked underground on early, late, or night shifts. The women ran the household, cared for the children, and helped secure the family’s income through gardening or piecework. When a man was sick or had a shift canceled, the women took on the responsibility for the family’s day-to-day survival. Women were also important pillars of social life. They provided assistance to neighbors, cared for the elderly, and upheld the rituals of community life.

Children grew up within a stable social structure. Life was shaped by the rhythm of the shifts. While the father slept, the house had to be quiet. Outside, the children played with other kids from the neighborhood—usually right on the street. The housing estate was their playground; the neighborhood was their safe haven.

Celebrations, rituals, and shared activities strengthened the sense of community. Birthdays, weddings, and funerals were celebrated together. Pigeon breeding was also widespread and was often passed down from generation to generation. Group outings and religious festivals provided additional opportunities for interaction and solidarity.

In Schönhausen, work, family, and the neighborhood were closely intertwined. The neighborhood is a prime example of life in many coal-mining communities in the Ruhr region.

Schönhausen

From Life

Schönhausen

Nutrition

Cooking Recipes

In miners' households, meals were simple and frugal. Popular dishes such as Pfefferpotthast, potato pancakes, and kale with Mettwurst were staples in the diets of many families in Schönhausen.

Meals had to be filling and could often be prepared the day before so they would be on the table on time for the work shift. Potatoes played a central role. They came from their own garden or the field next door. Vegetables such as cabbage, beans, and carrots were also grown at home. Meat was usually served only on Sundays or holidays; during the week, meals were simpler. Stews were practical and could be kept warm for hours.

Traditional dishes such as "Blindhuhn," sour lentils, or "Himmel und Erde" combined regional ingredients with whatever was currently available. The meals had to be nutritious, hearty, and easy to prepare.

Schönhausen

The Concentration Camp

The Concentration Camp

The early Schönhausen concentration camp was located in a former welfare building in the Bergkamen-Schönhausen coal-mining settlement. It was established in the spring of 1933, shortly after the National Socialists came to power. In the months that followed, between 900 and 1,000 people were detained here—primarily political opponents such as communists, social democrats, and trade unionists, as well as some Jewish citizens. The prisoners came from the region and were taken into so-called “protective custody” by the police or the SA.

The camp served as a transit and assembly camp. Accommodations were makeshift. There was hardly any furniture—only chairs—and no beds or sanitary facilities. Meals consisted of dry bread, weak coffee, or broth. Conditions were marked by violence. Numerous witness statements report systematic abuse: beatings with rubber truncheons and iron bars, humiliations, and interrogations lasting for hours. At least one death, that of Ernst Bronheim, is linked to the camp.

The duration of detention ranged from a few days to several weeks. Many were later transferred to other camps, such as Brauweiler near Cologne or the Esterwegen concentration camp. After a few months, the Schönhausen camp was closed.

Today, a commemorative plaque marks the building on Lentstraße, which has been used as a community center since the 1980s. For a long time, little was known about the camp’s history. It is only in recent years that local initiatives and commemorative events have brought it more firmly into the public consciousness. A list of names published in 2023 documents approximately 1,000 detainees and, for the first time, provides systematic information about the scale of this early site of persecution.

Schönhausen

Victims of the Nazi regime

Biographies of Victims in Schönhausen

Among the prominent Social Democrats held at Schönhausen were Valentin Schürhoff, a member of the Monopol works council and chairman of the SPD city council faction in Kamen, and Walter Poller, editor-in-chief of the SPD newspaper Der Hammer. However, Hubert Biernat, a close colleague of Walter Poller on the editorial staff of “Der Hammer,” Hubert Biernat, was able to avoid arrest by fleeing from his parents’ apartment at Reinhardstraße 1 in Heeren-Werve, thanks to his father—a miner at the Königsborn 2 coal mine—who managed to deceive the SA men.

Biernat, who after the war would go on to become district administrator of the Unna district, district president in Arnsberg, a member of the North Rhine-Westphalia state parliament, and North Rhine-Westphalia’s Minister of the Interior, went underground and fled through the Rhineland to Belgium. In late fall 1933, he returned to the eastern Ruhr region and joined the resistance group led by Walter Poller.

On the night of November 1, 1934, the Gestapo arrested Walter Poller once again. Despite brutal torture at the notorious “Steinwache” in Dortmund, he did not betray any of his fellow activists. On June 29, 1935, Poller was sentenced to four years in prison for “preparation for high treason.” He served his sentence in prisons in Münster, Neusustrum, Börgermoor, Plötzensee, Oslebshausen, Celle, and the Lührsbockel moor camp in the Lüneburg Heath. He was subsequently arrested again and transported via Celle and Dortmund to the Buchenwald concentration camp. Walter Poller recounted his memories in the book Arztschreiber in Buchenwald.

He was released from the concentration camp in 1940. After the war, Poller became the first editor-in-chief of the Westfälische Rundschau. On October 20, 1933, the new district administrator of Unna, Dr. Heinrich Klosterkemper, informed the camp administration that, by order of the Prussian Minister of the Interior, the smaller camps—including the Schönhausen concentration camp—were to be dissolved. This order was carried out on October 24, 1933. The last prisoners were either released or transferred to the Emsland camps and the Oranienburg concentration camp.

Schönhausen

A Look Back at the Past