Hannoversche Straße 6
On January 15, 1919, Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, co-founders of the socialist Spartacus League, were assassinated in Berlin. Käthe Kollwitz was asked by Liebknecht’s family to draw him in the morgue at Hannoversche Straße 6.
On Saturday, January 25, 1919, Kollwitz went there early in the morning, presumably on foot from home, Karl Liebknecht was to be buried that same evening. Individual views of Liebknecht on his deathbed drawn in pencil became charcoal and ink drawings with many figures in the studio. In the end, there was the woodcut “Gedenkblatt für Karl Liebknecht,” one of Käthe Kollwitz’s central works.
His murder had outraged Kollwitz. She was also deeply moved by the farewell of the workers – hundreds of thousands gave Liebknecht and other murdered people their last escort to the grave at Friedrichsfelde Cemetery in a funeral procession. Decades later, Käthe Kollwitz was also buried there.
The police morgue in Hanover Street was built in 1884/85, after the population of the city had grown considerably. It had become necessary for the judicial examination of the deceased from accidents, suicides and crimes, but during the November Revolution of 1918 hundreds of victims of street fights, executed and murdered people were brought in for examination. Käthe Kollwitz returned to the morgue to draw for months after January 25, 1919.
