The battle of Hanau took place 210 years ago, in what is now the Lambboy-Tümpelgarten district: on 30 and 31 October 1813, the French emperor Napoleon won his last victory on German soil. That's why the name "Hanau" also appears on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. Around 15,000 soldiers died on all fronts. The impact on the civilian population was immense, due to quartering, destruction (in the suburbs, for example) and epidemics.
Between Schwarzenbergstrasse and the Johann-Kaiser-Ring lie almost unnoticed "contemporary witnesses" to the senseless event of 1813: four gnarled oak trees that are registered as official natural monuments and therefore subject to special protection. Schwarzenbergstrasse is named after Carl Philipp zu Schwarzenberg, the Austrian field marshal and commander-in-chief of the allied forces against Napoleon at the Battle of Leipzig in 1813. Johann Kaiser was a worthy pioneer of aviation in Hanau, but that's another story.
Article and photo by Martin Hoppe
Visit the website: https://www.museen-hanau.de/digital/objekt-der-woche/187-zeitzeugen
