7 Odyssey to Find a Chapel

There was no branch of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Schwerin, Mecklenburg, before 1945. Toward the end of 1945 or early in 1946, a branch was founded consisting of members who had arrived there as refugees. Sister Elli Polzin (seventy-three years old in 1989) remembers the early years:

I arrived in Schwerin with our children and my mother from Stettin in February 1946. We stayed first near Ludwigslust, about twenty-three kilometers from Schwerin. My husband was in a POW camp. Along with another member family, we turned for advice to the mission headquarters in Berlin. As a result of that, one day two missionaries arrived to help us get in contact with the Church again. One of them was Brother Walter Böhme from Groitzsch. They encouraged us to move to Schwerin, where there was a branch of the Church. I found work there as a secretary in the city hall, and after much difficulty, I was able to move my family to Schwerin. For years we lived there in a single room until we received an apartment. My husband returned from prison in December 1949, one day before Christmas Eve.

We were happy to find a branch of the Church there. Our first meeting place was a rented room on the square called Pig Market [Schweinemarkt]. The first members were old Brother and Sister Meyer from Königsberg and Sister Christel Kowitz and her husband. Brother Walter Schmeichel, a refugee from Schneidemühl in Pommern, was our branch president until 1952. By that time, we had exchanged our meeting place for one on Schloss Street. My husband was now the branch president, and the branch had to move again, this time to a place on Bornhöwitz Street. But we weren’t able to keep this for long, and the branch leaders had to start looking for something else. We rented rooms in a restaurant on Goethe Street. At the Church’s expense, we had to remodel them to fit our needs. After two years, this restaurant was taken over by the government, and we were obliged to give up our rooms once again. This time we were without any meeting place for more than a year and had to hold our meetings at the home of Brother and Sister Schüller, who made their living room available to us.

Following the advice of the district president, Brother Walter Krause, we tried to buy a piece of property for the Church. After many attempts, we succeeded in 1956 in buying a piece of property from a private owner on the Schlossgarten Allee, number 18a. Since the Church was not allowed to own property, it was bought in the name of the branch president, my husband, Brother Hans Polzin. Naturally, this caused a multitude of problems. On the property was an old business establishment which had one apartment and an old horse barn. When we bought the property, we intended to tear down the old building. But the application to tear down the building was denied because it contained an apartment with a family living in it. Our plan was to build a chapel on the property.

Hans Polzin, branch president. Courtesy Manfred Schütze.

An account from the branch history of the time gives some details about this project:

Toward the end of 1956, the branch acquired an old workers’ barracks, 12 meters x 20 meters, which we could tear down for material to build a new chapel so that we could finally have our own place to meet. On June 11, 1957, the work of tearing down the old barracks began. In a pouring rain, all the brethren set out on their bicycles for the barracks, which was about eight kilometers out of Schwerin. The work was under the direction of our district president, Brother Krause, and of Brother Wiese from Wolgast, whom he had brought along to assist us. The brethren all assembled for prayer to ask the Lord for protection and help.

With the help of all the members of the Schwerin Branch, we put in an average of twelve to fifteen hours a day. Brother Krause and Brother Wiese stayed at the site at night in a tent. The sisters were also active. A meal for the working brethren was prepared in Schwerin and was taken out to the work site on a bicycle by Sister Edith Schade. All together we hauled twenty-three truckloads of material to our building site in Schwerin. On Saturday, June 15, 1957, this difficult and dangerous work was completed without accident through the help of the Lord. Now all the members assembled at the building site in Schwerin to clean up and stack the building material.

On June 25, 1957, the branch presidency submitted their request for permission to build the branch house, indicating that they already owned the property and already had the necessary building material. In order to solve the problem of the apartment on the property, Brother Polzin offered the following proposal. Behind the branch house, they would erect a small building about thirty-five to forty square meters (one and one-half rooms with kitchen). This building would eventually become a little garden house, and Brother Polzin would live in the house himself, temporarily, until a new apartment could be constructed. In the meantime, while tearing down the old building, he would give the renter his own apartment on Geschwister-Scholl Street; that is, there would be an exchange of apartments.

Unfortunately, this application was denied by the authorities. Consequently, the members turned to the local government officials with the request that they be permitted to remodel the horse barn into a meeting place. The branch record from this time contains the following entry:

All of the members and the district presidency fasted and prayed that this request would be granted, and it was granted.

Since the horse barn was old and falling apart there were many difficulties to be overcome. We laid up blocks for new walls and a new chimney and built door and window frames. A new toilet including drain pipes and water connections had to be installed; we paneled walls and ceilings, brought in floor joists, and laid a new floor. Two new stoves for heating were installed. Most of the material came from what was salvaged from the barracks.

The property itself was terribly overgrown and in a wild state and had to be completely redone. We planted hedges and landscaped. With the exception of some specialty work, the brothers and sisters of the branch did everything themselves. The work on the branch house took up nearly all of their free time as well as all of the money they could possibly spare.

It was not so easy to get the necessary building supplies such as cement, drain pipe, window frames, etc., since all of these things were controlled by the state building authorities. But it was all done with the help of the Lord, and things that often seemed impossible were made possible, which greatly strengthened our testimonies. So our own branch house approached completion toward the end of 1957. The chapel was thirty-two square meters large, and there was an adjoining room for the MIA and Relief Society. It also had a tiled toilet and a room with a washbasin that also served temporarily as a coatroom. We planned to add an entry later which would contain a coatroom.

To tear down the old building and build a new branch house, the members of the Schwerin branch put in 3,800 hours of voluntary labor and contributed 2,800 German marks in cash, which was a considerable amount for approximately thirty active members.

Everyone pitching in. This scene is typical of the times the Saints, such as those in Schwerin, built or remodeled meetinghouses through their own labor and minimal equipment. Pictured are the members in Wolgast building a branch house after the uprising of June 17, 1953. Courtesy Edith Krause.

On January 5, the first Sunday of 1958, the branch house was dedicated under the direction of a counselor to the mission president, Brother Henry Burkhardt, and the district president, Brother Walter Krause. Brother Burkhardt gave the dedicatory prayer. In the fast and testimony meeting, all the members expressed their gratitude that they now, finally, had their own branch house. In the afternoon, they held an impressive service with many investigators present.

But their difficulties were not yet over. Because of some jealousy between the county and the city officials over the legality of the building permit, the branch house was closed for a period of time, new fees were assessed, and Brother Polzin was fined a penalty of 500 marks. When he appealed, the fine was reduced to 200 marks. Continuing from the branch record, we read:

Now, finally, the branch had their own home. The rooms were sufficient for about a year, but as the branch grew, the rooms were soon too small to carry out all of the Church programs. In 1963, Brother Pawlowski was called as branch president. Since he was a construction worker, he had, in the intervening years, been able to do a lot of work on the building. In 1973 the brethren received permission from the mission to add a room made of prefabricated material. These prefabricated sections were to be delivered from Dresden, but for various reasons, the delivery was delayed. In the meantime, Brother Pawlowski went to one of the building commissioners, Werner Herbert, who was also associated with the Evangelical Church, where Brother Pawlowski had been employed as a construction hand. Mr. Herbert advised him to give up the idea of the prefabricated plates, and since he liked Brother Pawlowski and the Church, he obtained for the Church in the name of the Evangelical Church a commission for 4,000 building stones from the city building authorities. Brother Pawlowski was able to get an additional 2,000 bricks privately from a citizen’s commission for people’s building needs; thus we could begin a massive building expansion for another room measuring fifty square meters. The members all volunteered gladly for organized work parties, so the work could begin right away.

By the summer of 1974, the new branch room could be handed over to the branch in a small dedicatory service presided over by district president, Brother Gerd Skibbe. There was great joy among the members. We soon acquired a new electric organ, and everyone was happy to donate their share.

Of course, the building had not all gone as smoothly as it sounds in these few words. There were a number of problems getting the building materials. Those who participated in this had many unusual experiences in which they felt the hand of the Lord to a special degree.

The city building commission had openly given permission to build because the branch would not have to request building materials. That would have been the case had they built with the prefabricated sections that were to have been provided by the mission. Now, however, they needed cement, lime, gravel, and lumber, all of which could be obtained only from the Commission for People’s Needs [Bevölkerungsbedarf]. That meant that the branch president, Brother Pawlowski, had to pick up everything in small quantities by standing in line and by carrying it off in a wheelbarrow. He could not do this himself since he was working. Because all the other brethren in the branch were also working, the branch president’s wife, Sister Elfriede Pawlowski, said she would take charge of getting the building materials. Always, everyday, the material was there when it was needed.

Schwerin Branch meetinghouse. Using a wheelbarrow as a delivery truck and the hand labor of all the members, the Schwerin Branch converted an old barn into a meetinghouse. Courtesy Edith Krause.

During this time, Brother and Sister Pawlowski found little time to spend with one another or to do anything with the family, but since Sister Pawlowski worked with her husband everyday or brought his meals to the building site, this did not seem to be such a big problem. When he returned home from his normal work and had refreshed himself, there stood the wheelbarrow full of building material, and they set off together to go to work at the Schlossgarten Allee.

Sister Pawlowski’s family doctor, who also lived on the Schlossgarten Allee and who had seen her going by several times, stopped her one day and asked her how long she thought she could continue this manual labor, and he admonished her to ease off. But both Brother and Sister Pawlowski were well aware that their strength came from a higher doctor, and this doctor received their thanks many times daily.

After the addition to the branch house was completed, they wanted to remodel the old building still standing on the property and begin landscaping. But before that could be done, two large chestnut trees had to be taken down and cut up into wood.

In the old building, there lived a family who did not belong to the Church and who were, in fact, not particularly friendly to the Church. Brother and Sister Pawlowski made an agreement with this family to exchange apartments. This took place in April 1976. This exchange of apartments was an advantage to the branch and a great relief to Brother and Sister Pawlowski because it saved them the daily travel to the branch house. But the apartment was in terrible condition. The doors and windows had to be replaced. Brother and Sister Pawlowski spent eight days sleeping on a mattress in the branch house and living in one room so they could move in little by little. After the construction work on the apartment was finished, the young women in the branch went to work diligently cleaning the rooms, and in three weeks the move was completed.

Walter Krause, now the mission counselor who was responsible for buildings in the Church, came by a few times to see how things were going and to give advice. One time he commented on the solid work that was going on and said that Schwerin was the only branch that was doing things right without his personal intervention. He was overburdened with building matters in other branches.

A building project requires many crafts and skills. It was certainly a blessing from heaven that there was one man in the branch who had all of these skills. This was also well understood by Brother Pawlowski and prayer was his constant support. The joy at seeing the progress day by day gave him the strength, courage, and enthusiasm to continue.

It was truly a relief that Sister Pawlowski was now living in the branch house so that she could accomplish something every evening. Everyone was learning, and Sister Pawlowski often mentioned that in these years she had become a carpenter.

The work progressed, and there was always talk about which improvements were necessary. A larger room was erected on the grounds for housing overnight guests. Every summer brothers and sisters from other branches come to spend their vacations here. The beautiful location and the large plot of ground are very conducive to this purpose.

Since 1977 the building has been in the name of the Church. As mentioned earlier, Brother Hans Polzin, who was branch president when the property was first bought, was the legal owner. Although they had often tried to change this, again and again the government raised legal objections to naming the Church as the legal owner. It took about ten years to bring this change about.

Once in 1961, on a private trip to Hamburg, Brother Polzin was encouraged to remain in the West. He mentioned his responsibility for the property of the Church in East Germany, which property was worth about nine thousand marks. One of the brothers who was there replied, “The door alone to the Hamburg Stake House is worth that much.” Obviously, he could not understand that Brother Polzin’s responsibility went beyond the material value of the property. Brother Polzin still says today, “What terrible harm that would have been to the Church.” Not only would the property have been lost, but it would also have greatly harmed the Church’s reputation.

Brother Pawlowski had been branch president in Schwerin for sixteen years and was able to complete all the building before, in his seventy-first year in 1979, he was released. But his help and advice were needed still. Since he was living in the branch house, he took care to see that no damage occurred.

How thankful we are that there were such brothers and sisters as the Polzins and the Pawlowskis in those days. Looking back, Brother Polzin says, “We risked many things in order to help the Church make progress, but the Lord was with us. We had no serious difficulties. In all of our problems there was always a good spirit of cooperation and love.”